The current focus on the theme of authorship in Medieval and Early Modern studies reopens questions of poetic agency and intent. Bringing into conversation several kinds of scholarship on medieval authorship, the essays in Author, Reader, Book examine interrelated questions raised by the relationship between an author and a reader, the relationships between authors and their antecedents, and the ways in which authorship interacts with the physical presentation of texts in books.
The broad chronological range within this volume reveals the persistence of literary concerns that remain consistent through different periods, languages, and cultural contexts. Theoretical reflections, case studies from a wide variety of languages, examinations of devotional literature from figures such as Bishop Reginald Pecock, and analyses of works that are more secular in focus, including some by Chaucer and Christine de Pizan, come together in this volume to transcend linguistic and disciplinary boundaries.

Stephen Partridge is an assistant professor in the Department of English at the University of British Columbia.

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Erik Kwakkel is a lecturer in the Institute for Cultural Disciplines at Leiden University.

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‘This is an excellent volume… A very useful contribution to the growing (and much needed) debate on medieval authorship.’

Mediavistik vol 25:2012

‘A rich and stimulating collection of essays whose workshop roots are evident in helpful cross-references as well as subtler forms of response and exchange among the individual contributors.’

Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada; vol 51:1:2013

‘The wide-ranging scope of this collection is one of the greatest attributes… A valuable interdisciplinary contribution to the study of authorship and the book during the Middle Ages that would be of interest to both literary scholars and book historians.’

Review of English Studies, vol 64:266:2013