An Open Access Review Journal Encouraging Critical Engagement with the Continuing Process of Inventing the Middle Ages

August 15, 2016

Leveen: Juliet's Nurse


Lois Leveen, Juliet’s Nurse. New York. Atria/Emily Bestler Books, 2015.                              
Reviewed by Mikee Delony (mxd06b@acu.edu)

The most common complaint of readers approaching an adaptation of a well-known and beloved story, such as that of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet, is a lament or an explosion of frustration because “it’s not like the real story.” Certainly this is the case with some readers of Lois Leveen’s novel, Juliet’s Nurse.  However, disgruntled readers should remember that (a) Shakespeare made quite a few changes to his source material, so his version is not the real story either, and (b) Leveen’s novel is not about Juliet, but as the title clearly states, about Angelica, Juliet’s Nurse. 

Lois Leveen’s novel, Juliet’s Nurse, creates a compelling prequel to Shakespeare’s story of star-crossed lovers.  Noting that Juliet’s nurse is an important character in the play, speaking “the next largest number of lines, following those of Romeo and Juliet” (Author’s Note, 366), Leveen sets out to tell this woman’s story and creates a different kind of love story centered on an ordinary, lower-class woman, manipulated by her priest, beloved by her husband, and at the mercy of the Capelletto family, a woman who loved deeply and suffered greatly, and first person narrative makes the story Angelica’s, from the first word to the last. 

Surprisingly, all I knew when I picked up the novel was that the setting was fourteenth-century Italy. I was immediately captivated by Angelica’s narrative from the beginning, her 30-year love affair with her husband, Pedro, and the arrival of a surprise daughter some years after the tragic deaths of all of her children – six sons – of the plague in one horrific week. I mourned along with Angelica at the loss of her unexpected newborn daughter, and smiled when I read of her opportunity to nurse another newborn, this one named Juliet and born to Lord and Lady Capelletti on the same day as her dead daughter.  Still clueless, even when I learned of Juliet’s cousin, Tybalt, I did not recognize the connection to Shakespeare’s tale until Mercutio entered the narrative.  

Aware that adaptations are just that, adaptations, I did not expect this novel to follow the course of Shakespeare’s play.  Instead I walked beside Angelica as she loved Juliet as fiercely as she mourned her lost children, for what mother ever forgets those she had borne and raised and lost? Likewise, I admired her passion for her husband and the fervor with which she both missed and desired him, and I celebrated and felt her joy mixed with fear during their stolen moments together in Juliet’s nursery when he snuck in to see her after caring for the property’s bees. 

Love, death, mourning, bees, and families, both rich and poor, dominate Angelica’s story.  As we read of life in the Capelletto household, and particularly see the lived grief, misery, and early aging that marked the very young Lady Capelletto’s life, as well as the striving, scheming, and social climbing practiced by the heirless, aging Lord Capelletto, we learn that wealth and luxury are really meaningless when compared to the rich life of love, laughter, grief, and hard work that Angelica recalls when she thinks of her small, noisy, home in Verona’s poor neighborhood.  Perhaps the novel speaks to readers who have also lived long, watched children grow, and experienced loss.  The nurse’s narrative makes the reader privy to her thoughts, which often center on her sons, their active and noisy lives and their untimely deaths, and always she treasures her second chance with Juliet, whom she nurtures, cossets, and spoils, as she does Juliet’s motherless cousin, Tybalt.  This novel truly explores, as Leveen writes, “the relationship between loss and endurance” (369).

As a metaphor for life, bees and beekeeping provide a constant thread through Leveen’s novel, with their honey, their constant need for care, and their stings. Pedro supports his poor family by situating hives throughout Verona; he cares daily for the bees, harvests the combs to sell for beeswax candles, and makes a variety of mouth-watering treats with the honey.  Likewise, in a vain attempt to counter the social-climbing, the hate, and the self-centered revenge spewed by his uncle, Lord Capaletto, Pedro treats Tybalt as his own son, teaching him both the hard work and joy that comes from doing his job well. 

In this novel the expected “good guys” are not always so good, Juliet’s choices and sometimes those of her doting nurse are foolish and ultimately, tragic, and the Friar is self-serving and often dishonest, so readers expecting to find an expanded version of Shakespeare’s story will be disappointed.  However, those who enjoy a rich, thoughtful, beautifully written narrative in which the narrator and those she loves are fully developed, interesting characters, this book is a delight. 


Mikee Delony
Abilene Christian University

August 10, 2016

Walters Art Museum: Waste Not: The Art of Medieval Recycling


A Review of “Waste Not: The Art of Medieval Recycling,” at the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, MD

Reviewed by: Karl Fugelso (kfugelso@towson.edu)

Had it addressed ecotheory more completely and directly, this exhibition might have accomplished much more in its discussion of medieval recycling, but while it may fall short in that regard, it raises important questions about the definition of the Middle Ages and medievalism.

Though the curators did not produce a catalog for the twenty-three artifacts in this one-room show, their numerous, well-written placards construct an extensive definition of recycling.  The longest and most explicit of these statements, which appears just inside the entrance to the show, classifies recycling with upcycling and adaptive reuse as common medieval practices that were not only “acceptable” but “at times even desirable,” especially given the skill with which medieval craftsmen could “artfully repurpos[e] earlier medieval culture.”  And many of the labels explain how a particular example of recycling might have been motivated by convenience, economics, aesthetics, and/or historical appreciation.  But especially after the curators claim that modern recycling, upcycling, and adaptive reuse are “necessary responses to the growing awareness of our planet’s limited resources and to the environmental damage caused by our everyday activities,” the show could use an explanation of the differences among these categories and a detailed discussion of the ways in which their medieval incarnations may reflect and/or have influenced contemporaneous perceptions of surrounding ecosystems.  For example, beyond noting that recycled parchment indicates a scarcity of sheepskin, the curators might have examined how a particular reuse relates to the local availability of sheep, how that availability might have related to broader shifts in agribusiness, how those shifts might have related to ecological changes, and how, if at all, the recyclers and/or their contemporaries recorded their perceptions of those changes, other than through the reuse of parchment.

Yet, though the curators may not have fully explored the implications of medieval recycling, they foreground important issues through their definition of the Middle Ages.  While the placards adhere to tradition in dating the start of that period to the fourth century, the exhibits include a copy of Aesop’s Fables printed in 1495 and subsequently covered in a twelfth-century folio, a thirteenth-century Bible wrapped in a fifteenth-century folio sometime during the sixteenth century, and the insertion of mid-fifteenth-century miniatures in the Lace Book of Marie de’ Medici after the first quarter of the seventeenth century.  These and similar examples are a far cry from standard definitions of the Middle Ages, such as the one implicit in the mission statement for Studies in Medievalism as “an interdisciplinary medium of exchange for scholars in all fields […] concerned with any aspect of the post-medieval idea and study of the Middle Ages and the influence […] of this study on Western society after 1500.”  And a traditionalist may indeed doubt that anything made for Marie de’ Medici, who was a long-term guest of, and occasional subject for, Peter Paul Rubens, could be medieval.  But in ascribing these recyclings to the Middle Ages, the curators underscore the subjective nature of determining precisely when and where the period ends.  Even as late as the seventeenth century, a fondness for mid-fifteenth-century miniatures may mark more a sense of continuity with the past than nostalgia for it; in many parts of Europe, the sixteenth century was not much different from the fifteenth, fourteenth, or even earlier centuries; and, though printing is often seen as signaling the end of the Middle Ages, that perception is far from universal, particularly for books as old as the aforementioned copy of Aesop’s Fables.  Unless someone referring to the Middle Ages explicitly treats that period as prior to and distinct from his or her milieu—and perhaps not even then, given postmodernity’s doubts as to the reliability of such evidence—that reference may not qualify as post-medieval.

That ambiguity has obvious implications for medievalism, but our field may be even more challenged by some of the show’s earlier works.  While the fourth-century belt with medallions of Constantius II and Faustina merely echoes the most recent exhibits in questioning the chronological parameters of the Middle Ages, the ninth- or tenth-century Byzantine ring built around a Greco-Roman cameo, the twelfth-century German altar incorporating eleventh-century plaques, and several of the other exhibits that fit well within traditional definitions of the Middle Ages embody the many problems inherent in the possibility of medieval medievalism.

Relative to traditional perceptions of the Middle Ages as a monolithic period stretching from Antiquity to the Renaissance, the ring cannot represent medievalism, for the cameo would not qualify as medieval.  Nor, in such circumstances, can the altar embody medievalism, as it would not be post-medieval.  But if the Middle Ages were seen as a collection of middle ages, the altar and all other works that date from these periods and incorporate material from an earlier, post-Ancient period could qualify as medievalism.  And if the term “middle ages” were extended to any milieu that departs from the recycler’s and has a distinct predecessor, the ring and almost all other references to the past, including the aforementioned belt, could represent medievalism.
The difficulty with those approaches, particularly the latter, lies with deciding who would make such determinations and what we would accept as support for them.  If the choice were to rest solely with scholars of medievalism, then virtually any material from the past would indeed be fair game, our field would risk collapsing with all other studies of the past, and the term “medievalism” would lose much of its purpose.  If, however, we insist that the medievalist recognize the middle age(s) as such, then even if we brush aside postmodern doubts about knowing someone else’s thoughts, we might run into a paucity of evidence, especially for responses from the traditional Middle Ages.  Though the Walters show suggests that at least some medieval artists perceived their recycled material as originating from a milieu other than their own, as when a Talmud folio was treated with so little respect as to be used for covering the aforementioned copy of Aesop’s Fables, there is no proof in this exhibition—or, to my knowledge, anywhere else—that medieval artists saw their recycled material as coming from a chronologically bracketed period.  In fact, even when the recyclers imply they are aware of contextual differences, as with the Talmud folio, they do not necessarily treat these departures as diachronic.  And some artists demonstrate complete ignorance of their material’s original meaning and/or purpose, as when the twelfth-century German altar (mis)pairs a panel of John the Baptist with one portraying the Holy Women at the Tomb.  Thus, even if we expand our definition of the Middle Ages well beyond its traditional parameters, we do not seem to have a convincing case for medieval medievalism.

However, in merely raising that possibility, this small but stimulating show performs a great service, for it reminds us to ground our work in a clear definition of the middle ages and to explain as fully as possible how our material relates to yet departs from them.  Moreover, as this show highlights the difficulties in doing so, as it calls into question the boundaries and beliefs of our field, it paradoxically advances what we do, for only by constantly asking what medievalism comprises can we answer how and why it matters.

“Waste Not:  The Art of Medieval Recycling,” June 25—September 18, 2016, at the Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St., Baltimore, MD 21201, free museum and exhibition admission, open 10-5 Wed., Fri.-Sun., 10-9 Thu., handicapped accessible with some free parking on nearby streets, <http://thewalters.org>.

Karl Fugelso
Towson University

August 6, 2016

Morrison: Grendel's Mother


Susan Signe Morrison, Grendel’s Mother: The Saga of the Wyrd-Wife. Winchester, UK; Washington, USA [sic]: Top Hat Books, 2015. Pp. 226.

Reviewed by: Jana K. Schulman (jana.schulman@wmich.edu)

Susan Morrison’s familiarity with and love of Germanic literature can be found on every page of her novel about Grendel’s mother, the unnamed aglæcwif and ides introduced in the poem Beowulf.  In the Anglo-Saxon poem, Grendel’s mother enters Hrothgar’s hall to avenge her son and take back his arm. This is not to imply that the poem says nothing else about her: we know that she is in idese onlicnæs, in the shape of a woman, and we learn that she is a far superior fighter than her son when she poses a significant threat to Beowulf. In their fight, though Beowulf has a difficult time, he is able to decapitate her. That, short of Beowulf’s recapitulation of the events that took place in Denmark to Hygelac and his court is all that the Beowulf-poet relates of her. Like John Gardner’s novel, Grendel, that gave Grendel a voice and a story, Susan Signe Morrison gives a voice—as well as a name and history—to Grendel’s mother in this novel that tells the story, from beginning to end, of a female foundling from across the sea.

Called Brimhild by the couple that adopts her, Brimhild’s story unfolds against the backdrop of the Scylding court.  Juxtaposed with the court is the sea, with all that it promises, in terms of fish, travel, exploration, and raids.  These are a seafaring people. Brimhild herself goes to Hrothgar’s court when she is old enough; there she comes into contact with a new religion, though not for the first time, politics, class consciousness, and violence. Morrison’s novel shines in its depiction of Brimhild as idealistic, hopeful that violence—in the form of raiding specifically and cycles of violence generally—is not requisite for her society. In Beowulf, we see the women of the poem in the context of the masculine economy, trying to work within masculine expectations of feminine behavior.  The poem is nostalgic for a time when heroism was appreciated.  In Grendel’s Mother, we have a story where a woman is confronted with the truth of the hall: that without cycles of violence warriors become slothful, that a great hall like Heorot cannot even be built without gold and treasures obtained in battle or from a conquered people. The novel makes a reader think about the costs of heroism for everyone in a so-called heroic society.

Unfortunately, Morrison is too self-conscious, too aware of what she wants to accomplish; this historical novel, so-called adult fiction, is chock full with references to other Germanic literature: Norse poems such as “Þrymskviða,” (“The Lay of Thor”) “Völundarkviða” (“The Lay of Volund”), “Hávamál” (“Sayings of the High One”), Norse prose such as the Saga of the Volsungs and Þidrek’s saga; and Old English poetry such as “Widsið,” “The Wanderer,” “The Wife’s Lament” as well as others. One can commend Morrison for her desire to bring these other stories to her readers, but there are references without context with the result that the story is overwrought. Chapter 22, titled the Angel of Death, which itself is a reference to Ibn Fadlan’s report of a Viking funeral and a woman so called, opens with Brimhild, Grendel’s mother, and Freawaru, Grendel’s half-sister and lover, mourning Grendel. The narrator tells us “they suffered more than Gjaflaug, Herborg, and Gullrond, those widowed ladies each claiming she was most unhappy” (155). If the reader does not know who these women are, which the reader will not know unless she has read the poem “Gudrunarkviða in fyrsta” (The First Poem of Gudrun”], then the comparison of the level of grief, of the depth of sorrow, does not register.  It is only in the list of Proper Names, found at the end of the novel, that Morrison explains the reference and the significance of the comparison. 

Furthermore, Morrison has chosen to incorporate alliteration, a requirement for Germanic poetry, into her prose. While it is possible that a little alliteration might have worked—after all, Ælfric has rhythmic prose sentences that have occasional alliteration—Morrison’s alliteration has no discernable pattern and is all too frequently over done.  Consider the following 17 word sentence: “Hale heath heroes will harass halls, gone will be golden gables, bone-rings will burst in the blaze.” Five words alliterate with h, 3 on g, and 3 on b, with 11 words out of 17 bearing alliteration; there are just too many words in this sentence that alliterate, forcing the reader to focus less on the story than on a stylistic choice. Alliteration has, moreover, made for some infelicitious word choices, resulting in incongrous or offputting imagery: “foe’s female” (74, ‘female’ used because it alliterates, but one would have expected a word such as ‘wife,’ or ‘mate,’ or ‘bride’, given the context); the phrase “embraced by Hrothgar’s fleshly fetters” (78, a reference to Hrothgar’s arms—‘fetters’ works here as he has embraced Brimhild to hold her still, but ‘fleshly’ resonates weirdly); and “a fighter lowed a lacivious laugh” (93, according to the dictionary only cattle low, raising the question of how the reader is to think of the fighter). 

In addition to the problems with the alliteration, there are some odd turns of phrase: “had it off” (44); “wielding his metal friend” (141-2, a reference to a sword, but off-putting, off sounding to those who know Anglo-Saxon or Old Norse); “dragon fell” (155, a reference to dragon skin, but not explained) just to name a few. Morrison also incorporates basic kennings into her novel:  “gannet’s bath” (111), “whale’s back” (115), “victory-twig  (152, not explained in the glossary, but a reference to a sword), just to name a few.

A Note to the Reader, found at the end of the novel, explains Morrison’s reasons for writing the novel and provides some background about Beowulf. There are also Sources for Quotes, a Bibliography (for both the book and further reading), a Glossary, and a list of Proper Names. Unfortunately, there’s no table of contents that lets a reader know that these aids are there. I found all of these useful resources only when I had finished the book. I was also struck by the references to older translations for the eddas.  Morrison refers readers to Jean Young’s translation of Snorri’s Edda, i.e., the Prose Edda, when Anthony Faulkes’ translation is newer, complete, and much better than Young’s; she cites Lee Hollander’s 1964 translation of the Poetic Edda, when Carolyne Larrington’s more recent translation is more readable and, in my mind, far better.

I tried to read this novel simply as a novel, but I had real difficulties moving past what I have noted above.  In addition, I found archaic word choices and the occasionally didactic tone problematic, even out of place. Certain things were predictable (such as who Brimhild’s father was) and others unexpected (but possibily uncalled for—such as the doubled incest story).  What I found most insightful and thought provoking about this novel, Grendel’s Mother: The Saga of the Wyrd Wife, was that it asked me to rethink Anglo-Saxon culture as a whole, particularly in terms of violence and its repercussions.

Jana Schulman

Western Michigan University