News

My new translation of Guillaume de Lorris: 'Le Roman de la Rose' is now online. Written c1230, in 4000 or so lines of Middle French, the Romance of the Rose is an allegorical work on the subject of love, and a fascinating development of the courtly tradition. I have translated the text in octosyllabic verse couplets reflecting the form of Guillaume's original text. I am now translating Jean de Meung's 17000 line Continuation of Guillaume's work, in which he ranges over the Medieval world, in a somewhat different style. Again the translation is in octosyllabic couplets. I am then hoping to write an original chapter by chapter commentary on the whole thing, which achieved great popularity in its own time, influenced later writers (Chaucer, Dante, perhaps, in my view, Shakespeare) and contains a wealth of information for those seeking an entry into the ideas and social structure of the period.