Medieval love letters ignite war of words in France

Stuff (New Zealand) ^ | 05 March 2005

[Borges]

Abelard was well ahead of his time on how Christianity is related to Judaism and is one of the great spirits of his time.

[CzarNicky]

Abelard was castrated on the orders of Heloise's uncle after she became pregnant with his child.

Kind of like closing the barn door after the horse got out.

[Graymatter]

113 letters? Any of them signed?

[razorback-bert]

Sounds like a job for Dan Blather.

[Focault's Pendulum]

I Am Abelard!!!

Mebbe I can get a movie deal.

[starfish923]

Sounds like the stuff our boob tube is made of...scandal.
The world loves to read about it.

I think it's boring unless the scandal is about someone at work I don't like. :o) Otherwise, who cares?

[monkey]

It's always sounded to me a lot like the letter-format fiction (e.g., Samuel Richardson's unbearable Clarissa) that was popular in later times. Maybe they'll discover a medieval Henry Fielding someday.

I have no idea, but I'm glad people are working on it, rather than talking about politics.

[niteowl77]

"She lived with her uncle Fulbert, a canon of the cathedral of Paris. I do not know what a canon of a cathedral is, but that is what he was. He was nothing more than a sort of a mountain howitzer, likely, becaise they had no heavy artillery in those days."

-- Mark Twain

[Borges]

It's always sounded to me a lot like the letter-format fiction (e.g., Samuel Richardson's unbearable Clarissa) that was popular in later times. Maybe they'll discover a medieval Henry Fielding someday.

Epistolary novels! Fielding parodied Richardson with 'Shamela' and went on to basically invent the English novel with 'Joseph Andrews'.

[Kirkwood]

"She called her son Pierre Astrolabe, after the astronomer's instrument, to give them bearings for their love."

Today his name would be Peter Radio Telescope. One of the oddest names I heard recently was a girl named Crayfish Shell. No kidding.

[jocon307]

Interesting! It's nice to know some people still want their relationships to last and produce children, that I will say!

[Publius]

Ah, "Joseph Andrews".

I remember reading that book and cracking up at the scene of two vicars, talking shop over sherry, quietly preening and bragging over the quality of their sermons about -- vanity.

[hinckley buzzard]

"Feelings ran high at a seminar in Paris where believers tried to convince skeptics the attribution is right."

Like other children, Frenchy-frenchmen are easily excited.

[GladesGuru]

Speaking of Sam Clements, does anyone remember The French and the Comanches, found in his Letters to the Earth?

Seems that Clements had the measure of the French waaay back then.

The book is worth the trouble to locate - I liked the letter from the recording angel about the prayers of one Mr. Scofield, coal dealer in New York state, regarding the diseases he prayed be visited upon the family of a competitor.

[NCjim]

113 letters?

Let me get this straight - they're fighting over French letters? Or over the missing 31? (The only thing I ever heard sold by the gross)