Fantasy, Identity and Misrecognition in Medieval French Narrative

Oxford, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Frankfurt/M., New York, Wien. This book offers detailed and provocative readings of a range of medieval French texts (chansons de geste from the cycle du roi, the verse Ovide moralise and the trickster narrative, Trubert), aiming to illustrate how the ideas of Jacques Lacan and Slavoj Zizek can be applied to works from this period. By means of this approach, it aims to throw new light on the manner in which different works define, elaborate and undermine their respective visions of literary, communal and historical identity. Contents: ‘According to the Flesh’: Organic Community and its Discontents in Gaydon and the Paris Roland - ‘Father, Don’t You See…?’: Anseis de Carthage and the Joy(s) of Kingship - ‘Speak of This if You Can’: Voice, Pleasure and Prophylaxis in the Ovide Moralise - ‘Cankerous Imaginings’: Trubert and the Metastases of (Perverse) Enjoyment.