First full-length critical study of humour in medievalism.
The role of laughter and humour in the postmedieval citation,
interpretation or recreation of the middle ages has hitherto received
little attention, a gap in scholarship which this book aims to fill.
Examining a wide range of comic texts and practices across several
centuries, from Don Quixote and early Chaucerian modernisation through
to Victorian theatre, the Monty Python films, television and the
experience of visiting sites of "heritage tourism" such as the Jorvik
Viking Museum at York, it identifies what has been perceived as uniquely
funny about the Middle Ages in different times and places, and how this
has influenced ideas not just about the medieval but also
aboutmodernity. Tracing the development and permutations of its various
registers, including satire, parody, irony, camp, wit, jokes, and farce,
the author offers fresh and amusing insight into comic medievalism as a
vehicle for critical commentary on the present as well as the past, and
shows that for as long as there has been medievalism, people have
laughed at and with the middle ages.
Louise D'Arcens is Associate Professor in English Literaturesat the
University of Wollongong.