Passionate about trying to create social justice in a time of
crisis after the Black Plague, William Langland spent his entire
life working on Piers Plowman, an epic study of the human quest for
truth, justice, and community. The "A Version," the first and
shortest of the three versions he crafted, is wonderfully relatable
and completely teachable to a modern student audience. Piers
Plowman is becoming ever more relevant to students and scholars in
English studies. Perhaps because the poem involves culture,
religion, community, and work and engages explicitly with the
histories of government and popular revolt, this allegorical tale
of a wandering Christian named "Will," searching for truth with the
aid of a humble plowman named Piers, has found new critical and
pedagogic life in the last 20 years. Currently there are no
translations of the A-version of Piers Plowman in print, so
readers, scholars and teachers have been longing for an affordable,
student-centered translation. The apparatus includes a 30-page
historical and critical introduction, footnotes, a bibliography, a
note on translation theory and practice, and samplings of the
original text in Middle English, with a guide to pronunciation of
that language. Piers Plowman is an extraordinary important document
about the issues dramatically relevant to this day. It confronts
poverty and inequity in 14th-century England and explores the need
for virtue and social justice, encouraging its readers to create
equality with open access for people of all classes and abilities.
Though a Christian poem, Piers addresses issues of inclusivity,
social responsibility and communal duty, as the poem's protagonist
wanders about the world, facing injustice and persecution as he
looks for truth and salvation. Michael Calabrese, author of An
Introduction to Piers Plowman and director of the Chaucer Studio's
Middle English recording of the poem, brings Piers Plowman to life
for 21st-century students and for all readers interested in the
history of society, virtue, faith and salvation.
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