Bestsellers and Masterpieces

Heather Blurton is Professor of English at the University of California, Santa BarbaraDwight F. Reynolds is Distinguished Professor of Arabic Language and Literature in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara

• Introduction - Heather Blurton and Dwight F. ReynoldsPart I: Hanging by a thread: unique manuscripts and their place in the ‘modern’ medieval canon1. Contemplating books with Usama ibn Munqidh’s Book of Contemplation – Paul M. Cobb2. Dons and dragons: Beowulf and ‘popular reading’ – Daniel C. Remein and Erica Weaver3. Ibn ?azm’s ?awq al-?amama (The Neck-Ring of the Dove) – Boris Liebrenz4. 'Thirty pieces of silver': interpreting anti-Jewish imagery in the Poema de mio Cid manuscript – Ryan D. Giles5. ‘Let no bad song be sung of us’: fame, memory and transmission in/and the Chanson de Roland – Sharon KinoshitaPart II: Medieval bestsellers: reading the ‘medieval canon’?6. World literature and its discontents: reading the life of A?iqar – Daniel L. Selden7. The Alexander Romance in the age of scribal reproduction: the aesthetics and precariousness of a popular text – Shamma Boyarin8. Wisdom literature and the medieval bestsellers – Karla Mallette9. Lost worlds: encyclopedism and riddles in the tale of Tawaddud/Theodor – Christine ChismIndex

'The essays [...] invite the reader to consider the pre-modern and modern cultural milieu that led to specific works’ genesis and, centuries later, privileged position in the canon and to consider a place for once widely-transmitted works that have since been marginalized—two intellectual ventures that will undoubtedly enhance scholarship and undergraduate curricula.' Arthuriana