New essays by outstanding European and American medievalists on major aspects of the most enduring medieval epic. The legend of Tristan and Isolde -- the archetypal narrative about the turbulent effects of all-consuming, passionate love -- achieved its most complete and profound rendering in the German poet Gottfried von Strassburg's verse romance Tristan (ca. 1200-1210). Along with his great literary rival Wolfram von Eschenbach and his versatile predecessor Hartmann von Aue, Gottfried is considered one of three greatest poets produced by medieval Germany, andover the centuries his Tristan has lost none of its ability to attract with the beauty of its poetry and to challenge -- if not provoke -- with its sympathetic depiction of adulterous love. The essays, written by a dozen leading Gottfried specialists in Europe and North America, provide definitive treatments of significant aspects of this most important and challenging high medieval version of the Tristan legend. They examine aspects of Gottfried'sunparalleled narrative artistry; the important connections between Gottfried's Tristan and the socio-cultural situation in which it was composed; and the reception of Gottfried's challenging romance both by later poets inthe Middle Ages and by nineteenth- and twentieth-century authors, composers, and artists -- particularly Richard Wagner. The volume also contains new interpretations of significant figures, episodes, and elements (Riwalin and Blanscheflur, Isolde of the White Hands, the Love Potion, the performance of love, the female figures) in Gottfried's revolutionary romance, which provocatively elevates a sexual, human love to a summum bonum. Will Hasty is Professor of German at the University of Florida. He is the editor of Companion to Wolfram's "Parzival," (Camden House, 1999). Click here to view the introduction (PDF file 83KB)

This work records the development of the teaching of Germanic languages, primarily German, at Canadian universities over a period of 150 years. The study focusses first on the undergraduate and graduate programmes of study, i.e., what has been and is taught, and on the numbers, sources, and kinds of students enrolled in comes at every level. A detailed analysis is made in particular of the subjects of dissertations for the MA and PhD degrees. A separate chapter is devoted to the programmes of study in Germanic languages and literatures other than German (Danish, Dutch, Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish, Yiddish). A similar survey is then made of the teaching staff, where they come from, where and what they studied, and what contribution they have made to research. The third issue is that of the infrastructure of the discipline, what professional organizations there are to represent germanists and to what extent those engaged in research are supported by public funding agencies. The final chapter records the changes in all areas of the discipline over the five-year period from 1990 to 1995.