Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Aucassin and Nicolette: A Facing-Page Edition and Translation

Aucassin and Nicolette: A Facing-Page Edition and Translation

Sturges, Robert S.

Paperback

FrenchFiction AnthologiesGeneral Poetry

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 1611861578
ISBN13: 9781611861570
Publisher: Michigan St Univ Pr
Published: Mar 1 2015
Pages: 134
Weight: 0.47
Height: 0.35 Width: 6.51 Depth: 8.80
Language: English
A comic masterpiece of medieval French literature, Aucassin and Nicolette is categorized by its anonymous author as a chantefable, or song-story, and is the only known work of this kind. This edition includes the thirteenth-century French text and a modern English translation on facing pages. An introduction outlines the text's background, genre, literary relations, historical contexts, major themes, and relevance to a contemporary audience. Its alternating sections of verse and prose recount a story of love between the aristocratic but distinctly unheroic young lord Aucassin and his beloved Nicolette. Despite familial disapproval, class and ethnic differences, imprisonment, and geographical separation, Nicolette's single-minded pursuit of Aucassin raises interesting questions about gender roles and their depiction in the Middle Ages. The issue of identity is also addressed, as the identity of Nicolette shifts in terms of class, religion, and ethnicity: born a Muslim princess, she becomes both a slave and a Christian convert, and is eventually recaptured by her Saracen family, much to her displeasure. With its daring escapes, its descriptions of travel to exotic lands, its separations, and its happy reunions, Aucassin and Nicolette is both a classic romantic comedy and an entertaining parody of the romance genre.

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