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Loading... Inventing the Middle Ages: The Lives, Works, and Ideas of the Great…by Norman F Cantor
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. Yes, this book is gossipy, and yes, Cantor's biases are quite evident, even to a reader who is not well versed in medieval studies, but I still found this book compelling. The book is highly readable and, as another reviewer indicated, includes a basic bibliography for those who want to learn more about the discipline. However, I am most interested in the direct and indirect criticism of the field that emerges from the text. Cantor acknowledges the fact that many of these great medievalists seemed to be driven--at least at some point in their lives--by melancholy and escapism. The reader is left to ask whether or not these qualities must necessarily define and color the great works in the field--and, if so, what does that mean for the possibilities and limitations of the field itself? (  ) Chartres | May 9, 2009 |  A rather gossipy examination of how it was historians of the Twentieth Century who established medieval studies as a set of historical and critical disciplines after centuries of neglect. Even though the work of these scholars is only just beginning to enter popular consciousness (which still holds the Nineteenth Century view of the period as a "dark age"), it was people like Southern, Bloc, Strayer and Haskins who laid the foundations for future study. How exactly J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis made Cantor's list is more of a mystery. As excellent as their work was, it wasn't in the same league as the others in the book in terms of influence. I suspect Cantor had his eye on non-academic book buyers (most of whom would never have heard of Haskins let alone read Maitland). Nonetheless, a great book and a brilliant history of a field of history. ( ) TimONeill | Oct 15, 2008 | Full of good information about major medieval historians and their contributions to the field, and how their personal lives affected their understanding of history. However, Norman Cantor has a tendency to get carried away and make really broad overgeneralizations or exaggerations, and I never quite trust him. This book is full of Cantor's assessments of historians' works and personalities, and his view isn't always the generally-accepted view. This book is a good starting point, but should be followed with some further reading to get a better-rounded view. (  ) Gwendydd | Jan 30, 2008 | Focuses on lives & works of 20 c. medievalists. Interesting and useful, but somewhat tendentious -- for instance, Cantor finds it suspicious and peculiar that Tolkien and Lewis wore tweed and never underwent psychotherapy. Who's the weird one? lisanicholas | Aug 17, 2007 | Very lively personal views, but not always fair (  ) antiquary | Jul 25, 2007 |  no reviews | add a review
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| Book description |
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INVENTING THE MIDDLE AGES
The Lives, Works, and Ideas of the Great Medievalists of the Twentieth Century
In this ground-breaking work, Norman Cantor explains how our current notion of the Middle Ages-with its vivid images of wars, tournaments, plagues, saints and kings, knights and ladies-was born in the twentieth century. The medieval world was not simply excavated through systematic research. It had to be conceptually created: It had to be invented, and this is the story of that invention.
Norman Cantor focuses on the lives and works of twenty of the great medievalists of this century, demonstrating how the events of their lives, and their spiritual and emotional outlooks, influenced their interpretations of the Middle Ages. Cantor makes their scholarship an intensely personal and passionate exercise, full of color and controversy, displaying the strong personalities and creative minds that brought new insights about the past.
A revolution in academic method, this book is a breakthrough to a new way of teaching the humanities and historiography, to be enjoyed by student and general public alike. It takes an immense body of learning and transmits it so that readers come away fully informed of the essentials of the subject, perceiving the interconnection of medieval civilization with the culture of the twentieth century and having had a good time while doing it! This is a riveting, entertaining, humorous, and learned read, compulsory for anyone concerned about the past and future of Western civilization.
(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:10 -0400)
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