The fourteenth-century Siege of Jerusalem has been called by Ralph
Hanna "the chocolate-covered tarantula of the alliterative
movement" for its apparent anti-Semitism and is, as Livingston
notes in his introduction, "simply difficult for
twenty-first-century readers to like." The poem, which describes
the destruction of the Second Temple by Roman forces in AD 70, is
graphic in detail and unpleasant in its relish of the suffering of
the Jews. But as Livingston points out, "Like the gritty violence
of Alliterative Morte Arthure, the gore in Siege is perhaps best
read as a grim awareness of the terrible realities of war, not as a
bloodthirsty and berserk cry for further bloodshed. The poem
chronicles a historical war, and it is this historical quality that
must stand out: the poem not only has resonances of the bloodshed
that battle inevitably brings, but it also is, in a very literal
sense, history. This is to say, the war is over. The vengeance of
Jesus has been accomplished. The Siege-poet's answer to the
social-political-religious question of whether there is such a
thing as a just war is that there was one: Titus and Vespasian's
vengeance for the death of Christ. . . . Further efforts to avenge
Christ were unnecessary. . . . That the poem is a call to action
and to crusade, then, seems to be a claim that is far less
sustainable than its opposite: a call to peace and to remembrance."
General
Imprint: |
Medieval Institute Publications
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
TEAMS Middle English Texts Series |
Release date: |
March 2005 |
First published: |
2005 |
Editors: |
Michael Livingston
|
Dimensions: |
254 x 178 x 10mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Paperback
|
Pages: |
154 |
Edition: |
New edition |
ISBN-13: |
978-1-58044-090-5 |
Categories: |
Books
|
LSN: |
1-58044-090-8 |
Barcode: |
9781580440905 |
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