Early Fiction in England: From Geoffrey of Monmouth to Chaucer

by Laura Ashe (Introduction)

A brilliant new anthology that shows how fiction was reinvented in the twelfth century after an absence of hundreds of years.
     Before the twelfth century, fiction had completely disappeared in Europe. In this important and provocative book, Laura Ashe shows how English writers brought it back, composing new tales about King Arthur, his knights, and other heroes and heroines in Latin, French, and English. Why did fiction disappear, and why did it come to life again, to establish itself as our dominant form of literature ever since? And what do we even mean by the term “fiction”? Gathering extracts from the most important texts of the period, by Wace, Marie de France, Chaucer, and others, this volume offers an absorbing and surprising introduction to the earliest English fiction.

Genres: Classics, History, Medieval, Poetry, Short Stories, Anthologies, British Literature

464 pages, Paperback

First published September 24, 2015

About the author

Laura Ashe is Professor of English Literature and David Woods Kemper Family Fellow in English, at Worcester College, University of Oxford.

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This excellent anthology of thirteen works of medieval English fiction is as entertaining as it is enlightening. The texts themselves, which are presented either in substantial extracts or in full, and either translated into modern English when their original language was Latin or French, or in glossed Middle English, show a considerable variation in content, tone, and quality, ranging from the grotesque (Walter Map's Courtier's Trifles) to the charming (Sir Orfeo), and at least two (Thomas of Britain's version of the romance of Tristan and Yseut, and Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde) will have readers not already familiar with these narratives eager to seek out the full versions.

This book is not just a vehicle for the texts themselves, though. It represents a deft arrangement of sources for a convincing argument (perhaps reiterated just a little too often at the beginning, and not quite laid out explicitly enough towards the end) in which the emergence of fiction in English literature is the development of narratives of personal fulfilment and romantic love that both take inspiration from, and face conflict with, other perspectives on human relationships: the demands of chronicling a people, and of the Christian's relationship with God.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book I've been searching for: Ashe describes how fiction came into being in what is now England and France (for the first time after the Classical Era). She starts with an historian -- Geoffrey of Monmouth -- and illustrates how epic, lyric poetry, and the recording of history were pushed aside in favor of narratives whose purpose was to depict individuals and their interior feelings.

Ashe includes excerpts and entire narratives to prove each step of her theory. The translations are very good, and she presents the Middle English examples in their original with generous glosses.

Terrific book.

[Eyan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Super helpful for the research essay I am writing right now talking about genre in the ARthuriad. This is not specifically Arthurian, but so much of early fiction was Arthur centric so this book helps immensely for anyone working qwith genre studies and middle english or middle ages lit

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great anthology of many short stories, myths, and poems. A great one for the collection.