New Book - Memory and Medievalism in George RR Martin and Game of Thrones

Memory and Medievalism in George RR Martin and Game of Thrones: The Keeper of All Our Memories

Carolyne Larrington (Anthology Editor), Anna Czarnowus (Anthology Editor)

Full details on ordering information can be found on the publisher's website at this link.

Product details

Published Sep 08 2022

Format Hardback

Edition 1st

Extent 240

ISBN 9781350269590

Imprint Bloomsbury Academic

Illustrations 12 bw illus

Dimensions 9 x 6 inches

Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

Description

This book explores the connections between history and fantasy in George RR Martin's immensely popular book series 'A Song of Ice and Fire' and the international TV sensation HBO TV's Game of Thrones. Acknowledging the final season's foregrounding of the cultural centrality of history, truth and memory in the confrontation between Bran and the Night King, the volume takes full account of the TV show's conclusion in its multiple readings across from medieval history, its institutions and practices, as depicted in the books to the show's own particular medievalism. The topics under discussion include the treatment of the historical phenomena of chivalry, tournaments, dreams, models of education, and the supernatural, and the different ways in which these are mediated in Martin's books and the TV show. The collection also includes a new study of one of Martin's key sources, Maurice Druon's Les Rois Maudits, in-depth explorations of major characters in their medieval contexts, and provocative reflections on the show's controversial handling of gender and power politics.

Written by an international team of medieval scholars, historians, literary and cultural experts, bringing their own unique perspectives to the multiple societies, belief-systems and customs of the 'Game of Thrones' universe, Memory and Medievalism in George RR Martin and Game of Thrones offers original and sparky insights into the world-building of books and show.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I – Memory

1. On Medieval Dream Tradition in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire 

Bartlomiej Blaszkiewicz (University of Warsaw, Poland)

2. The Medievalist Emotional Economy in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire 

Anna Czarnowus (University of Silesia, Poland)

Part II – Reimagining History

3. George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire and Maurice Druon's Les Rois Maudits (The Accursed Kings) 

Carolyne Larrington (University of Oxford, UK)

4. Broken Bodies, Broken Kingdoms, Broken Promises: The Revolutionary Failure of A Game of Thrones 

Robert Rouse (University of British Columbia, Canada) and Cory Rushton (St Francis Xavier University, Canada)

Part III – Faith and Salvation

5. The Dog, the Cynic, and the Saint: The Case of Sandor Clegane 

Thomas Honegger (Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Germany)

6. The Figure of George R.R. Martin's Septon Meribald and the Franciscan Legacy 

Maria Blaszkiewicz University of Warsaw, Poland)

Part IV – Key Institutions

7. The Citadel and the Ivory Tower: Academia and Education in Westeros 

Mikayla Hunter (University of Oxford, UK)

8. The Iron Bank Will Have Its Due: Trade and Economics in Game of Thrones 

Caroline Batten (University of Oxford, UK)

Part V – Chivalry: Theory and Practice

9. The Warrior(s) in Crisis: The Knights of Westeros and the Process of Civilization 

Anja Müller (Siegen University, Germany)

10. Tournaments and Judicial Duels in George R.R. Martin's The World of Ice & Fire and A Song of Ice and Fire 

Przemyslaw Grabowski-Górniak (Independent Scholar, Poland)

Part VI - The HBO Effect: Violence and Misogyny

11. From Romance to Rape: The Portrayal of Masculine Sexuality in Game of Thrones 

Kristina Hildebrand (Halmstad University, Sweden)

12. The Case of Cersei Lannister: Neomedievalist Misogyny in George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire 

Sylwia Borowska-Szerszun (University of Bialystok, Poland)

Index

Check It Out: Neomedievalism, Popular Culture, and the Academy

Finally had a chance to review this. Looks like a great resource. 

Neomedievalism, Popular Culture, and the Academy: From Tolkien to Game of Thrones

by KellyAnn Fitzpatrick

Full details and ordering information from the publisher is available at this link.

TITLE DETAILS

244 Pages

21.6 x 13.8 cm

Series: Medievalism
Series Vol. Number: 16

Imprint: D.S.Brewer


Hardcover
9781843845416
October 2019
$95.00 / £65.00

Ebook (EPDF)
9781787447028
October 2019
$29.95 / £24.99

Ebook (EPUB)
9781800109308
October 2019
$29.95 / £24.99

Description

The medieval in the modern world is here explored in a variety of media, from film and book to gaming.

Medievalism - the ways in which post-medieval societies perceive, interpret, reimagine, or appropriate the Middle Ages - permeates popular culture. From Disney princesses to Game of Thrones, medieval fairs to World of Warcraft, contemporary culture keeps finding new ways to reinvent and repackage the period. Medievalism itself, then, continues to evolve while it is also subject to technological advances, prominent invocations in political discourse, and the changing priorities of the academy. This has led some scholars to adopt the term "neomedievalism", a concept originating in part from the work of the late Umberto Eco, which calls for new avenues of inquiry into the way we think about the medieval.
This book examines recent evolutions of (neo)medievalism across multiple media, from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings to the film Beowulf and medieval gaming. These evolutions can take the form of what one might consider to be pop culture objects of critique (art, commodity, amusement park, video game) or academic tools of critique (monographs, articles, lectures, university seminars). It is by reconciling these seemingly disparate forms that we can better understand the continual, interconnected, and often politicized reinvention of the Middle Ages in both popular and academic culture.

Contents

Introduction
1. The Academy and the Making of Neomedievalism
2. Tolkien: From Medieval Studies to Medievalist Fantasy
3. Hollywood Genders the Neomedieval: Sleeping Beauty/Beowulf/Maleficent
4. Game of Thrones: Neomedievalism and the Myths of Inheritance
5. Magic: The Gathering and the Markets of Neomedievalism
6. Digital Gaming: Coding a Connective Neomedievalism
Bibliography

Author

KELLYANN FITZPATRICK is an affiliated researcher at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Out Now from McFarland: Power and Subversion in Game of Thrones: Critical Essays on the HBO Series

Further information and ordering information is available at McFarland's website from this link.

Power and Subversion in Game of Thrones: Critical Essays on the HBO Series

Bibliographic Details

Edited by A. Keith Kelly

Format: softcover (6 x 9)

Pages: 198

Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliographies, index

Copyright Date: 2022

pISBN: 978-1-4766-8264-8;$39.95

eISBN: 978-1-4766-4466-0

Imprint: McFarland

About the Book

This collection of essays examines the structures of power and the ways in which power is exercised and felt in the fantasy world of Game of Thrones. It considers how the expectations of viewers, particularly within the genre of epic fantasy, are subverted across the full 8 seasons of the series. The assembled team of international scholars, representing a variety of disciplines, addresses such topics as the power of speech and magic; the role of nationality and politics; disability, race and gender; and the ways in which each reinforces or subverts power in Westeros and Essos.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments v


Introduction
A. Keith Kelly 1


List of Seasons and Episodes: HBO’s Game of Thrones 7


Breaking the Wheel: Game of Thrones and the American Zeitgeist
Daniel Vollaro 13


Dangerous Nostalgia: Fantasies of Medievalism, Race, and Identity
Robert Allen Rouse 30


Game of Victims and Monsters: Representation of Sexual and Female Violence
Sylwia Borowska-Szerszun 48


Subversion or Reinforcement? Patriarchy and Masculinity
Andrew Howe 68


“I’ll go with anger”: Female Rage in and at Game of Thrones
Lindsey Mantoan 87


The Developing Verbal Power of Daenerys: A Pragmatics Analysis
Graham P. Johnson 108


“Who has a better story than Bran the Broken?”: The Power of Disability Narratives
Jan Doolittle Wilson 131


Magic’s Failure to Reanimate Fantasy
Jason M. Embry 161


A Brief Conclusion on the Conclusion
A. Keith Kelly 181


About the Contributors 185


Index 187




About the Author(s)


A. Keith Kelly is a professor of English at Georgia Gwinnett College, outside of Atlanta, where he teaches medieval literature, linguistics and writing. In addition to being a poet and author of short fiction, he has published work on literary pragmatics, Old Norse saga, the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and the representation of the Middle Ages in film and television.

New from Oxford UP - The Oxford Handbook of Music and Medievalism

Worth a look for medievalism on screen:

 

The Oxford Handbook of Music and Medievalism

Edited by Stephen C. Meyer and Kirsten Yri 

 

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-music-and-medievalism-9780190658441

 

Oxford Handbooks

 

Presents a cross-section of a diverse and growing area of study
Draws connections between musical styles and eras
Approaches topics from multiple disciplinary and thematic perspective



$175.00 (Hardcover)

 

Also Available As: Ebook

Published: 02 March 2020

848 Pages | 86 musical examples; 34 illustrations

6-3/4 x 9-3/4 inches

ISBN: 9780190658441




Description

The Oxford Handbook of Music and Medievalism provides a snapshot of the diverse ways in which medievalism--the retrospective immersion in the images, sounds, narratives, and ideologies of the European Middle Ages--powerfully transforms many of the varied musical traditions of the last two centuries. Thirty-three chapters from an international group of scholars explore topics ranging from the representation of the Middle Ages in nineteenth-century opera to medievalism in contemporary video game music, thereby connecting disparate musical forms across typical musicological boundaries of chronology and geography. While some chapters focus on key medievalist works such as Orff's Carmina Burana or Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings films, others explore medievalism in the oeuvre of a single composer (e.g. Richard Wagner or Arvo Pärt) or musical group (e.g. Led Zeppelin). The topics of the individual chapters include both well-known works such as John Boorman's film Excalibur and also less familiar examples such as Eduard Lalo's Le Roi d'Ys. The authors of the chapters approach their material from a wide array of disciplinary perspectives, including historical musicology, popular music studies, music theory, and film studies, examining the intersections of medievalism with nationalism, romanticism, ideology, nature, feminism, or spiritualism. Taken together, the contents of the Handbook develop new critical insights that venture outside traditional methodological constraints and provide a capstone and point of departure for future scholarship on music and medievalism.



Table of Contents


Introduction [Stephen Meyer and Kirsten Yri] 

Section 1: Romanticizing the Medieval: The Longing for the Middle Ages in the Nineteenth Century
1. Medievalisms in Early Nineteenth-Century German Thought [Laura K. T. Stokes]
2. From Knight Errant to Family Man: Romantic Medievalism and Domesticity in Brahms's Romanzen aus L. Tieck's Schöne Magelone, op. 33 (1865, 1869) [Marie Sumner Lott]
3. Liszt's Medievalist Modernism [Balázs Mikusi]
4. Soldiers and Censors: Verdi's Medieval Imagination [Liana Püschel]
5. The Distant Past as Mirror and Metaphor:ÂPortraying Medievalism in Historical French Grand Operas [Diana Hallman]
6. Medievalism and Regionalist Identity in Lalo's Le Roi d'Ys [Elinor Olin]
7. Romantic Medievalist Nationalism in Schumann's Genoveva, Then and Now [Michael S. Richardson]
8. The Middle Ages in Richard Wagner's Music Dramas [Barbara Eichner] 

Section 2: Performing the Middle Ages
9. Medievalism at the University: Collegia and Choral Societies [Jacob Sagrans]
10. Medieval Folk in the Revivals of David Munrow [Edward Breen]
11. Re-sounding Carl Dreyer's La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc [Donald Greig] 

Section 3: Medievalism and Compositional Practice in the Twentieth Century
12. Medievalism and Anti-Romanticism in Carl Orff's Carmina Burana [Kirsten Yri]
13. Past Tense: Creative Medievalism in the Music of Margaret Lucy Wilkins [Lisa Colton]
14. Hucbald's Fifths and Vaughan Williams's Mass: The New Medieval in Britain Between the Wars [Deborah Heckert]
15. The Return of Ars subtilior?: Rhythmic Complexity and Appeal of Codex Chantilly Six Hundred Years Hence [Aleksandra Vojcic]
16. Miserere: Arvo Pärt and the Medieval Present[Laura Dolp]
17. The Postmodern Troubadour [Anne Stone] 

Section 4: Reimagining the Medieval Woman
18. Tolling Bells and Otherworldly Voices: Joan of Arc's Sonic World in the Early Twentieth Century [Elizabeth Dister]
19. Medievalism and Rued Langgaard's Romantic Image of Queen Dagmar [Nils Holger-Petersen]
20. Nature, Vision, and Light in Vision-Aus dem Leben der Hildegard von Bingen [Jennifer Bain]
21. Disciplining Guinevere: Courtly Love and the Arthurian Tradition from Henry Purcell to Donovan Leitch [Gillian L. Gower] 

Section 5: Echoes of the Middle Ages in Folk, Rock, and Metal
22. Early Music and Popular Music: Medievalism, Nostalgia, and the Beatles [Elizabeth Upton]
23. "Ramble On": Medievalism as Nostalgic Practice in Led Zeppelin's use of J. R. R. Tolkien [Caitlin Carlos]
24. A Gothic Romance: Neomedieval Echoes of Fin'amor in Gothic and Doom Metal [Ross Hagen]
25. Viking Metal [Simon Trafford]
26. Medievalism and Identity Construction in Pagan Folk Music [Scott R. Troyer] 

Section 6: Medievalism of the Screen
27. From the Music of the Ainur to the Music of the Voiceover: Sounding Medievalism in The Lord of the Rings [Stephen C. Meyer]
28. Faith, Fear, Silence and Music in Ingmar Bergman's Medieval Vision of The Virgin Spring and The Seventh Seal [Alexis Luko]
29. Hope Against Fate or Fata Morgana? Music and Mythopoiesis in Boorman's Excalibur [David Clem]
30. The Many Musical Medievalisms of Disney [John Haines]
31. Evil Medieval: Chant and the New Dark Spirituality of Vietnam-Era Film in America [James Deaville]
32. Fantasy Medievalism and Screen Media[James Cook]
33. Gaming the Medievalist World in Harry Potter [Karen M. Cook]


Author Information


Stephen C. Meyer is Professor of Musicology at the University of Cincinnati's College-Conservatory of Music. He is the author of Carl Maria von Weber and the Search for a German Opera (2003) and Epic Sound: Music in Postwar Hollywood Biblical Films (2015) as well as numerous articles on topics ranging from nineteenth-century German opera to film music to the history of recorded sound. He is editor of Music in Epic Film: Listening to Spectacle (2016), and from 2014 to 2018 he served as the Editor-in-Chief for the Journal of Music History Pedagogy.

Kirsten Yri is Associate Professor of Musicology at the Faculty of Music at Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada. She has published widely on the role of the early music revival and the intersections between music and medievalism in American Music, Intersections, Early Music, and Women and Music. Her work on medievalism and rock music (Dead Can Dance, Black Sabbath, and Corvus Corax) has been published in Current Musicology, Popular Music, and Postmedieval. Her recent research examines parody, gender, and social programs in Carl Orff's Trionfi against a context of German contemporary literary and philosophical debates.
Contributors:


Jennifer Bain, Professor of Music, Dalhousie University

Edward Breen, Coordinator of the Music Department, The City Literary Institute, London

Caitlin Vaughn Carlos, Adjunct Faculty, Chapman University

David Clem, Instructor of Music History, Greatbatch School of Music, Houghton College

Lisa Colton, Reader in Musicology, University of Huddersfield

James Cook, Lecturer in Early Music, University of Edinburgh

Karen M. Cook, Assistant Professor of Music History, The Hartt School of the University of Hartford

James Deaville, Professor, School for Studies in Art & Culture: Music at Carleton University

Elizabeth Dister, Webster University Faculty Development Center

Laura Dolp, Associate Professor, Montclair State University

Barbara Eichner, Senior Lecturer in Music, Oxford Brookes University

Gillian L. Gower, Visiting Assistant Professor of Musicology, Southern Methodist University

Donald Greig, Founding Member, The Orlando Consort

Ross Hagen, Assistant Professor of Music Studies, Utah Valley University

John Haines, Professor of Music and Medieval Studies, University of Toronto

Diana R. Hallman, Associate Professor, University of Kentucky

Deborah Heckert, Department of Music, Stony Brook University

Alexis Luko, Associate Professor of Music, School for Studies in Art & Culture and the College of the Humanities at Carleton University

Stephen Meyer, Professor of Musicology, College-Conservatory of Music of the University of Cincinnati

Balázs Mikusi, Head of Music, National Széchényi Library in Budapest since 2009

Elinor Olin, Music History Faculty, Northern Illinois University

Nils Holger Petersen, Associate Professor emeritus of Church History, University of Copenhagen

Liana Püschel, Teaching Assistant of Musicology, Università degli studi di Torino, Humanities Faculty

Michael S. Richardson, Assistant Professor of Musicology, University of St. Thomas

Jacob Sagrans, Independent Scholar, Editor, Administrator, and Choral Performer

Laura K. T. Stokes, Performing Arts Librarian and Visiting Lecturer in Music, Brown University

Anne Stone, Associate Professor of Musicology, Graduate Center of the City University of New York

Marie Sumner Lott, Associate Professor of Music History, Georgia State University in Atlanta

Simon Trafford, Lecturer in Medieval History, Institute of Historical Research, University of London

Scott R. Troyer, Ph.D. candidate, University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music

Elizabeth Randell Upton, Associate Professor of Musicology, UCLA

Aleksandra Vojcic, Associate Professor of Music Theory, The University of Michigan

Kirsten Yri, Associate Professor of Musicology, Wilfrid Laurier University 

Now in paperback: From Medievalism to Early-Modernism

Out now in paperback. Definitely worth a look.

From Medievalism to Early-Modernism: Adapting the English Past 

Edited by Marina Gerzic and Aidan Norrie

Copyright Year 2019

Paperback ISBN 9780367664725

Published September 30, 2020 by Routledge
284 Pages 

Available at https://www.routledge.com/From-Medievalism-to-Early-Modernism-Adapting-the-English-Past/Gerzic-Norrie/p/book/9780367664725.



Book Description

From Medievalism to Early-Modernism: Adapting the English Past is a collection of essays that both analyses the historical and cultural medieval and early modern past, and engages with the medievalism and early-modernism—a new term introduced in this collection—present in contemporary popular culture. By focusing on often overlooked uses of the past in contemporary culture—such as the allusions to John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi (1623) in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, and the impact of intertextual references and internet fandom on the BBC’s The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses—the contributors illustrate how cinematic, televisual, artistic, and literary depictions of the historical and cultural past not only re-purpose the past in varying ways, but also build on a history of adaptations that audiences have come to know and expect. From Medievalism to Early-Modernism: Adapting the English Past analyses the way that the medieval and early modern periods are used in modern adaptations, and how these adaptations both reflect contemporary concerns, and engage with a history of intertextuality and intervisuality.

Table of Contents



Acknowledgements

List of Figures

Notes on Contributors



1. Introduction: Medievalism and Early-Modernism in Adaptations of the English Past

Marina Gerzic and Aidan Norrie



Section I: Cultural Medievalism and Early-Modernism

2. Wonder Woman and the Nine Ladies Worthy: The Male Gaze and what it takes to be a ‘Worthy Woman’

Simone Celine Marshall



3. The King, the Sword, and the Stone: The Recent Afterlives of King Arthur

Sarah Gordon



4. Brand Chaucer: The Poet and the Nation

Martin Laidlaw



5. Moving between Life and Death: Horror films and the Medieval Walking Corpse

Polina Ignatova



6. From Cabaret to Gladiator: Refiguring Masculinity in Julie Taymor’s Titus

Marina Gerzic



7. "There’s My Exchange": The Hogarth Shakespeare

Sheila T. Cavanagh



8. Bloody Brothers and Suffering Sisters: The Duchess of Malfi and Harry Potter

Lisa Hopkins





Section II: Historical Medievalism and Early-Modernism

9. Playing in a Virtual Medieval World: Video Game Adaptations of England through Role-play

Ben Redder



10. "I can piss on Calais from Dover": Adaptation and Medievalism in Graphic Novel Depictions of the Hundred Years’ War (1337–1453)

Iain A. MacInnes



11. Beyond "tits and dragons": Medievalism, Medieval History, and Perceptions in Game of Thrones

Hilary Jane Locke



12. Re-fashioning Richard III: Intertextuality, Fandom, and the (Mobile) Body in The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses

Marina Gerzic



13. The Many Afterlives of Elizabeth Barton

Annie Blachly



14. The Queen, the Bishop, the Virgin, and the Cross: Catholicism versus Protestantism in Elizabeth

Aidan Norrie



15. "Unseen but very evident": Ghosts, Hauntings, and the Civil War Past

Michael Durrant



Index




Editor(s) Biography


Marina Gerzic works for the Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies at The University of Western Australia, in both research and administrative roles. She also works as the Executive Administrator for the Australian and New Zealand Association for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, and as the editorial assistant for the academic journal Parergon. She has published articles on film and adaptation theory, Shakespeare, pedagogy, cinematic music, cultural studies, science fiction, comics and graphic novels, and children’s literature.



Aidan Norrie is a historian of monarchy, and is currently a Chancellor’s International Scholar in the Centre for the Study of the Renaissance at The University of Warwick. He is the editor, with Lisa Hopkins, of Women on the Edge in Early Modern Europe (Amsterdam University Press); and, with Mark Houlahan, of On the Edge of Early Modern English Drama (MIP University Press).

Coming Soon: Vying for the Iron Throne

McFarland continues its line of Game of Thrones books this fall. Contents list to be provided once it becomes available.

Vying for the Iron Throne: Essays on Power, Gender, Death and Performance in HBO’s Game of Thrones 
https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/vying-for-the-iron-throne/
Edited by Lindsey Mantoan and Sara Brady

Not Yet Published: FALL 2018

$35.00
Format:
Pages:
Bibliographic Info: appendix, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2018
pISBN: 978-1-4766-7426-1
eISBN: 978-1-4766-3473-9
Imprint: McFarland

Game of Thrones has changed the landscape of television during an era hailed as the Golden Age of TV. An adaptation of George R.R. Martin’s epic fantasy A Song of Fire and Ice, the HBO series has taken on a life of its own with original plotlines that advance past those of Martin’s books.
The death of protagonist Ned Stark at the end of Season One launched a killing spree in television—major characters now die on popular shows weekly. While many shows kill off characters for pure shock value, death on Game of Thrones produces seismic shifts in power dynamics—and resurrected bodies that continue to fight. This collection of new essays explores how power, death, gender, and performance intertwine in the series.


About the Author(s)

Lindsey Mantoan is assistant professor of theatre at Linfield College in McMinnville, Oregon.

Sara Brady is associate professor at Bronx Community College of the City University of New York. She is also managing editor of TDR: The Drama Review.

The Ballad of the Lone Medievalist

A massive collaboration effort has been officially released in The Ballad of the Lone Medievalist (2018). In it, you will find 33 essays on experiences, experiments, and ideas how on how medieval academics can creatively survive, relate, and thrive in worlds where the Middle Ages remain seemingly obscure and derided by peers and students.

Apropos to cinematic medievalism is the joint-essay “A Trip to England: Discovering the Ties Between Medievalism and Pop Culture” by Danielle Girard, Sarah Huff, Justine Marsella, Alicia Protze, Abbie Rosen, and Jacki Teague. During an undergrad trip to England, medievalists emphasize how during the trip “it became clear that there was an indisputable link between the medieval sites we visited and the fan culture that we so thoroughly immersed ourselves in daily.” And “while the world of academia may marginalize medieval scholars in favor of contemporary scholars, the world of popular culture embraces and profits from the fascinating and diverse stories of medieval culture.” The examples include but are by no means limited to the works of Tolkien, George R.R. Martin, and even Stan Lee. The medieval links include King Arthur and Robin Hood with visits to Tolkien’s grave and the Warwick Castle. The essay concludes, “A class discussing the origins of the most popular fan cultures would essentially be a class on medieval literature.”

In another essay, Lee Templeton found success by deciding to teach their colleagues with the goal of presenting “the Middle Ages not as a long-past, ‘dead’ time period, but rather one that laid the foundations for many of the ideas that we consider to be ‘modern,’ one that is still very much alive in its influence on the world in which we live.” One of the exercises includes requiring “the students to organize a ‘medieval’ film festival open to faculty, staff, and students.”

John P. Sexton presents a set of 12 suggestions to “help medievalists—whether newly-minted or mid-career—make themselves at home in their jobs.” In one suggestion on utilizing current events and pop culture, Sexton tells us “popular entertainment’s perpetual fascination with medieval themes provides us ‘teaching moment’ points of entry for any medievalist.” Among the opportunities are Game of Thrones, History Channel’s Vikings series, and Robin Hood. They rightfully point out, “Every time we enter into a conversation about the links (or lack thereof) between our subject and the world around us, we increase the visibility of our discipline while making a case to our students and colleagues for the necessity and relevance of our courses.” Above all, medievalists should “Get creative. Get active. Get noticed.”

The Ballad of the LoneMedievalist is therapeutic and immensely useful.

-Scott Manning (@warpath, Historian on the Warpath)

Askey on Game of Thrones

The Journal of Popular Culture is currently allowing open access to articles in its February 2018 number, which includes the following essay on Game of Thrones:

Askey, Brooke. “I'd Rather Have No Brains and Two Balls”: Eunuchs, Masculinity, and Power in Game of Thrones.” The Journal of Popular Culture Volume51, Issue1, Feb. 2018, pp. 50-67, available at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jpcu.12647.

Update: Medievalism in A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones

One final book notice for the night. Here is the updated information on Shiloh Carroll's Medievalism in A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones:


Medievalism in A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones
https://boydellandbrewer.com/medievalism-in-i-a-song-of-ice-and-fire-i-and-i-game-of-thrones-i-hb.html
Shiloh Carroll

March 2018
214 pages
21.6x13.8 cm
Medievalism
ISBN: 9781843844846
Format: Hardback
D.S.Brewer


Game of Thrones is famously inspired by the Middle Ages - but how "authentic" is the world it presents? This volume offers different angles to the question.

One of the biggest attractions of George R.R. Martin's high fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire, and by extension its HBO television adaptation, Game of Thrones, is its claim to historical realism. The author, the directors and producers of the adaptation, and indeed the fans of the books and show, all lay claim to Westeros, its setting, as representative of an authentic medieval world. But how true are these claims? Is it possible to faithfully represent a time so far removed from our own in time and culture? And what does an authentic medieval fantasy world look like?

This book explores Martin's and HBO's approaches to and beliefs about the Middle Ages and how those beliefs fall into traditional medievalist and fantastic literary patterns. Examining both books and programme from a range of critical approaches - medievalism theory, gender theory, queer theory, postcolonial theory, and race theory - Dr Carroll analyzes how the drive for historical realism affects the books' and show's treatment of men, women, people of colour, sexuality, and imperialism, as well as how the author and showrunners discuss these effects outside the texts themselves.


An e-book version of this title is available (9781787441941), to libraries through a number of trusted suppliers. See here for a full list of our partners.



Table of Contents:

Introduction: Martin and Medievalist Fantasy
Chivalric Romance and Anti-Romance
Masculinity, Femininity, and Gender Relations
Sex and Sexuality
Postcolonialism, Slavery, and the Great White Hope
Adaptation and Reception
Afterword
Bibliography



About the Author:

Shiloh Carroll teaches in the writing center at Tennessee State University.

Now Available: Chivalry in Westeros: The Knightly Code of A Song of Ice and Fire

Out now from McFarland is another new book on the Game of Thrones phenomenon:

Chivalry in Westeros:The Knightly Code of A Song of Ice and Fire
https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/chivalry-in-westeros/
Carol Parrish Jamison

Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 217
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2018
pISBN: 978-1-4766-7005-8
eISBN: 978-1-4766-3316-9
Imprint: McFarland
$35.00


About the Book:

George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire has sparked a renewed interest in things medieval. The pseudo-historical world of Westeros delights casual fans while offering a rich new perspective for medievalists and scholars.

This study explores how Martin crafts a chivalric code that intersects with and illuminates well known medieval texts, including both romance and heroic epics. Through characters such as Brienne of Tarth, Sandor Clegane and Jaime Lannister, Martin variously challenges, upholds and deconstructs chivalry as depicted in the literature of the Middle Ages.



Table of Contents:

Preface 1
One • An Introduction to Westerosi Chivalry 7
Two • Chivalry in Oral Tradition 25
Three • Chivalry in Written Tradition 44
Four • Franchise 62
Five • Loyalty 89
Six • Prowess 114
Seven • Vengeance 141
Eight • Peace Weaving 160
Conclusions: Teaching Westeros 182
Chapter Notes 191
Bibliography 201
Index 207


About the Author:

Carol Parrish Jamison is a professor of English at Georgia Southern University, Armstrong Campus, in Savannah, Georgia. She specializes in medieval literature, linguistics, and medievalism.

New Book: The Middle Ages in Popular Imagination: Memory, Film and Medievalism

Start saving now for this new book from I. B. Tauris:

The Middle Ages in Popular Imagination: Memory, Film and Medievalism
http://www.ibtauris.com/Books/Humanities/History/History-earliest-times-to-present-day/Early-history-c-500-to-c-14501500/Medieval-history/The-Middle-Ages-in-Popular-Imagination-Memory-Film-and-Medievalism
Paul Sturtevant

Imprint: I.B.Tauris
Publisher: I.B.Tauris & Co. Ltd.
Series: Library of Medieval Studies

Hardback | In Stock | £75.00

Hardback | Not Yet Published | $110.00


Hardback
ISBN: 9781788311397
Publication Date: 28 Feb 2018
Number of Pages: 336
Height: 216
Width: 138
Illustrations: 20 black and white integrated illustrations


Description:

It is often assumed that those outside of academia know very little about the Middle Ages. But the truth is not so simple. Non-specialists in fact learn a great deal from the myriad medievalisms - post-medieval imaginings of the medieval world - that pervade our everyday culture. These, like Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones, offer compelling, if not necessarily accurate, visions of the medieval world. And more, they have an impact on the popular imagination, particularly since there are new medievalisms constantly being developed, synthesised and remade.

But what does the public really know? How do the conflicting medievalisms they consume contribute to their knowledge? And why is this important?

In this book, the first evidence-based exploration of the wider public's understanding of the Middle Ages, Paul B. Sturtevant adapts sociological methods to answer these important questions. Based on extensive focus groups, the book details the ways - both formal and informal - that people learn about the medieval past and the many other ways that this informs, and even distorts, our present. In the process, Sturtevant also sheds light, in more general terms, onto the ways non-specialists learn about the past, and why understanding this is so important. The Middle Ages in Popular Imagination will be of interest to anyone working on medieval studies, medievalism, memory studies, medieval film studies, informal learning or public history.

Author Info:

Paul B. Sturtevant is an audience research specialist at the Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, DC. He completed his PhD at the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds. He is also the founder and Editor-in-Chief of the very popular collaborative history blog 'The Public Medievalist' (http://www.publicmedievalist.com/).

Carroll on Game of Thrones

Came across the following today:

Medievalism in A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones 
https://boydellandbrewer.com/medievalism-in-i-a-song-of-ice-and-fire-i-and-i-game-of-thrones-i-hb.html
Shiloh Carroll

Details

March 2018
192 pages
21.6x13.8 cm
Series: Medievalism
ISBN: 9781843844846
Format: Hardback, $39.95
D.S.Brewer


Overview:

Game of Thrones is famously inspired by the Middle Ages - but how "authentic" is the world it presents? This volume offers different angles to the question.

One of the biggest attractions of George R.R. Martin's high fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire, and by extension its HBO television adaptation, Game of Thrones, is its claim to historical realism. The author, the directors and producers of the adaptation, and indeed the fans of the books and show, all lay claim to Westeros, its setting, as representative of an authentic medieval world. But how true are these claims? Is it possible to faithfully represent a time so far removed from our own in time and culture? And what does an authentic medieval fantasy world look like?

This book explores Martin's and HBO's approaches to and beliefs about the Middle Ages and how those beliefs fall into traditional medievalist and fantastic literary patterns. Examining both books and programme from a range of critical approaches - medievalism theory, gender theory, queer theory, postcolonial theory, and race theory - Dr Carroll analyzes how the drive for historical realism affects the books' and show's treatment of men, women, people of coloir, sexuality, and imperialism, as well as how the author and showrunners discuss these effects outside the texts themselves.


Contents

Introduction: Martin and Medievalist Fantasy
Chivalric Romance and Anti-Romance
Masculinity, Femininity, and Gender Relations
Sex and Sexuality
Postcolonialism, Slavery, and the Great White Hope
Adaptation and Reception
Afterword
Bibliography


About the Author

Shiloh Carroll teaches in the writing center at Tennessee State University.

CFP You Win or You Die: Performances of Gender, Death, and Power in Game of Thrones (10/1/2017)

You Win or You Die: Performances of Gender, Death, and Power in Game of Thrones
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/08/03/you-win-or-you-die-performances-of-gender-death-and-power-in-game-of-thrones

deadline for submissions: October 1, 2017

full name / name of organization: Lindsey Mantoan, Linfield College

contact email: lmantoan@linfield.edu


CALL FOR PROPOSALS

for a new anthology

You Win or You Die: Performances of Gender, Death, and Power in Game of Thrones


Called “the world’s most popular show” by TIME magazine, Game of Thrones has changed the  landscape of serial narrative during an era hailed as the New Golden Age of TV. While an adaptation of George R. R. Martin’s epic fantasy A Song of Fire and Ice, the television show has taken on a life of its own, including creating original plotlines when the story advanced past the books that Martin has published.

With the death of protagonist Ned Stark at the end of Season One, Game of Thrones launched a killing spree in television: major characters die on popular shows every week now (for an excellent analysis of this trend and a demographic breakdown of who’s getting killed off, see https://www.vox.com/2016/6/1/11669730/tv-deaths-character-best). While many shows kill off major characters for pure shock value, death on Game of Thrones produces seismic shifts in power dynamics and resurrected bodies that continue to fight on in war.

War in early seasons is solidly the purview of men, but by Season Six, women are literally and figuratively changing the battlefield, overthrowing the men who have dominated and controlled them, and vying for thrones. For a show that’s been accused of mishandling rape, using it for titillation and voyeurism rather than condemning it, the writers seem to be playing a different game with female characters as the narrative rushes toward its conclusion.

The complex dynamics of how gender, death, and power are performed in Game of Thrones warrants rigorous analysis by scholars in performance and media studies and beyond. Our proposed anthology will be divided into overlapping sections on gender, death, power, and performance.

Possible topics include:

GENDER

- What kinds of performances of masculinity and femininity do we see in this show?

- Women as nurturers, women as vengeful assassins, women as queens

- Dany’s retinue includes two eunuchs and a dwarf, and by the time she arrives in Westeros, none of her closest advisors are alpha males. What does this say about gender and power?

- How does the show handle hypermasculinity?

- Jon Snow’s hair

- Sansa’s fantasies of marrying a prince, and her harsh realities

- The men who manipulate Cersei, and the way she takes her revenge

- The Sand Snakes and the trope of desert people being hypersexualized and violent

- Yara, Brienne, The Waif, and female masculinity

- Arya, marrying a nobleman, and “that’s not you”

- Gender, politics, and regionalism: how do politics and gender intersect differently north of the wall, in Dorne, in the rest of Westeros, and across the sea?

- What’s the significance of the men of the Night’s Watch swearing a vow of chastity, and why does Jon Snow get away with breaking it so easily? Why does Sam?

- Does the narrative critique the characters’ misogyny enough, or reify it?

- Motherhood (Cersei’s incestual children are all dead, Dany’s children are dragons)

- Sam’s gentle demeanor and academic nature


DEATH

- What does the show seem to say about death, given that for so many characters, death is not the end?

- What is the distinction between alive and not?

- What do the narrative’s rituals related to death say about its values?

- Wights as zombies

- The distinction between White Walkers and their army of wights

- The relation between those resurrected by Red Priests/Priestesses and those resurrected by ice

- How does death often lead to new life or new dynamics of power (dragons, killer zombies, a king)

- “In the light of the seven,” “the night is dark and full of terrors,” “what is dead may never die,” and religion’s disposition toward death and resurrection

- Religion used to fight zombies and create them

- Arya’s list

- Supernatural and Faceless men, Three-Eyed Raven


POWER

- What’s the show’s attitude toward war and violence?

- How does the show represent war?

- How does the show braid together issues of gender, violence, power, and war?

- Endless war

- Religion used as a weapon, a justification for violence, a political tool

- White trash (Freys, Greyjoys) and inbreeding

- The dynamics of color; ethnicity and race; rehearsal of Western hegemony under a slightly different name

- How does the show use accents to imply power and authority

- New languages--who speaks which language(s) and how does language interact with power?

- Low / no-tech world, pre-industrial society--does that give the show a pass on contemporary values?

- The above ideas relate to power within the narrative, but what about the power of this TV show? HBO’s budgets are some of the highest per episode of any television show in history, and GoT has influenced not only serial television but also films and novels. What kind of cultural and industry power does the show wield?


PERFORMANCE and REPRESENTATION

- Performances of gender, sexuality, and power

- What gets performed around the show—fandom, social media, criticism, ComiCon, cosplay, watching parties

- The performance of the actors

- How do characters perform nobility, authority, power, family?

- Theater has a powerful impact on Arya Stark--how and why?

- The show has been criticized for the way it represents: sex, love, romance, same-sex intimacy, race, and violence. How are these criticisms apt? What do these criticisms miss?

- What stereotypes does the show trade in, especially in conflating region, geography, accent, class, and race?



Please submit 300-word abstracts to Lindsey Mantoan (lmantoan@linfield.edu) and Sara Brady

(Sara.Brady@bcc.cuny.edu) by Oct 1, 2017.


Last updated August 4, 2017

Pavlac's Game of Thrones versus History

Game of Thrones versus History: Written in Blood
Brian A. Pavlac (Editor)
http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-1119249422.html

ISBN: 978-1-119-24942-9
312 pages
April 2017, Wiley-Blackwell

Paperback: $18.95
E-Book: $9.99


Description

Since it first aired in 2011, Game of Thrones galloped up the ratings to become the most watched show in HBO’s history. It is no secret that creator George R.R. Martin was inspired by late 15^th century Europe when writing A Song of Ice and Fire, the sprawling saga on which the show is based. Aside from the fantastical elements, Game of Thrones really does mirror historic events and bloody battles of medieval times—but how closely?

Game of Thrones versus History: Written in Blood is a collection of thought-provoking essays by medieval historians who explore how the enormously popular HBO series and fantasy literature of George R. R. Martin are both informed by and differ significantly from real historical figures, events, beliefs, and practices of the medieval world. From a variety of perspectives, the authors delve into Martin’s plots, characterizations, and settings, offering insights into whether his creations are historical possibilities or pure flights of fantasy.

Topics include the Wars of the Roses, barbarian colonizers, sieges and the nature of medieval warfare, women and agency, slavery, celibate societies in Westeros, myths and legends of medieval Europe, and many more. While life was certainly not a game during the Middle Ages, Game of Thrones versus History: Written in Blood reveals how a surprising number of otherworldly elements of George R. R. Martin’s fantasy are rooted deeply in the all-too-real world of medieval Europe.

Find suggested readings, recommended links, and more from editor Brian Pavlac at gameofthronesversushistory.com.


Table of Contents:

Notes on Contributors ix

Foreword by William Irwin xiii

Acknowledgments xv

Introduction: The Winter of Our Discontent 1
Brian A. Pavlac

Part I Kings, Queens, Knights, and Strategy 17

1 High and Mighty Queens of Westeros 19
Kavita Mudan Finn

2 A Machiavellian Discourse on Game of Thrones 33
Jacopo della Quercia

3 Chivalry in Westeros 47
Steven Muhlberger

4 Of Kings, Their Battles, and Castles 57
Brian A. Pavlac

Part II Slaves, Barbarians, and Other Others 71

5 Barbarian Colonizers and Postcolonialism in Westeros and Britain 73
Shiloh Carroll

6 A Defense against the “Other”: Constructing Sites on the Edge of Civilization and Savagery 85
Brian de Ruiter

7 The Eastern Question 97
Mat Hardy

8 Slaves with Swords: Slave‐Soldiers in Essos and in the Islamic World 111
Robert J. Haug

Part III Women and Children 123

9 Rocking Cradles and Hatching Dragons: Parents in Game of Thrones 125
Janice Liedl

10 “Oh, my sweet summer child”: Children and Childhood in Game of Thrones 137
Helle Strandgaard Jensen and Magnus Qvistgaard

11 Writing the Rules of Their Own Game: Medieval Female Agency and Game of Thrones 147
Nicole M. Mares

12 The Power of Sansa Stark: A Representation of Female Agency in Late Medieval England 161
Danielle Alesi

Part IV Religion 171

13 Continuity and Transformation in the Religions of Westeros and Western Europe 173
Don Riggs

14 Religious Violence in Game of Thrones: An Historical Background from Antiquity to the European Wars of Religion 185
Maureen Attali

15 Coexistence and Conflict in the Religions of Game of Thrones 195
Daniel J. Clasby

16 “I shall take no wife”: Celibate Societies in Westeros and in Western Civilization 209
Kris Swank

Part V The Background 225

17 By Whisper and Raven: Information and Communication in Game of Thrones 227
Giacomo Giudici

18 What’s in a Name? History and Fantasy in Game of Thrones 241
Sara L. Uckelman, Sonia Murphy, and Joseph Percer

19 Setting up Westeros: The Medievalesque World of Game of Thrones 251
Gillian Polack

Appendix: List of Books and Episodes 261

Index 000


About the Editor:

Brian A. Pavlac is Professor of History at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, USA. His books include A Concise Survey of Western Civilization: Supremacies and Diversities throughout History, 2nd Edition (2nd Edition, 2015), Witch Hunts in the Western World: Persecution and Punishment from the Inquisition to the Salem Trials (2010), and Warrior Bishop of the Twelfth Century (2008).
 

Coming Soon: Mondschein on Game of Thrones

Advance notice:

Game of Thrones and the Medieval Art of War
Ken Mondschein
http://www.mcfarlandbooks.com/book-2.php?id=978-0-7864-9970-0

Print ISBN: 978-0-7864-9970-0
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-4766-2926-1
27 photos, notes, bibliography, index
236pp. softcover (6 x 9) 2017
Price: $19.99

Not Yet Published, Available Fall 2017 (Amazon says 11/1/17)

About the Book
George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire novels and HBO’s Game of Thrones series depict a medieval world at war. But how accurate are they? The author, an historian and medieval martial arts expert, examines in detail how authentically Martin’s fictional world reflects the arms and armor, fighting techniques and siege warfare of the Middle Ages. Along the way, he explores the concept of “medievalism”—modern pop culture’s idea of the Middle Ages.


Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vi
Timeline ix
Introduction 1
1. No True Knights: Chivalry in Myth and the Middle Ages 11
2. A Good Way to Survive a Battle: Armor in Westeros 33
3. Dragonsteel and Wildfire: Weapons in Westeros 55
4. "Stick them with the pointy end": Fighting Arts in Westeros and the Middle Ages 75
5. The Wager of Battle: War, Duels and Tournaments 105
6. Down and Out in Westeros: The Economics of Feudal Warfare 133
7. Women Warriors of Westeros 148
8. Words and Swords: Conquest and Culture 174
9. A Medieval Atrocity Sourcebook 191
Chapter Notes 207
Further Reading 213
Index 219


About the Author
History professor, fencing master and jouster Ken Mondschein is the author of several books on medieval and Renaissance martial arts. He lives in Northampton, Massachusetts, and is a Visiting Fellow at the Massachusetts Center for Renaissance Studies.
 

Lushkov on Game of Thrones

Of potential interest:

You Win or You Die: The Ancient World of Game of Thrones
By Ayelet Haimson Lushkov
http://www.ibtauris.com/en/Books/Literature literary studies/Literature history criticism/Literary studies fiction novelists prose writers/You Win or You Die The Ancient World of Game of Thrones?menuitem={DFF51E2F-C0BA-4928-ACC4-415188DCDEE8}

Imprint: I.B.Tauris
Publisher: I.B.Tauris & Co Ltd.

Paperback
ISBN: 9781784536992
Publication Date: 29 Apr 2017
Height: 203; Width: 127
£12.99 / $15.95

Description:
If the Middle Ages form the present-day backdrop to the continents of Westeros and Essos, then antiquity is their resonant past. The Known World is haunted by the remnants of distant and powerful civilizations, without whose presence the novels of George R. R. Martin and the ever popular HBO show would lose much of their meaning and appeal. In this essential sequel to Carolyne Larrington's Winter is Coming: The Medieval World of Game of Thrones, Ayelet Haimson Lushkov explores the echoes, from the Summer Islands to Storm's End, of a rich antique history. She discusses, for example, the convergence of ancient Rome and the reach, scope, and might of the Valyrian Freehold. She shows how the wanderings of Tyrion Lannister replay the journeys of Odysseus and Aeneas. She suggests that the War of the Five Kings resembles the War of the Four Emperors (68-69 AD). She also demonstrates just how the Wall and the Wildlings advancing on it connect with Hadrian's bulwark against fierce tribes of Picts. This book reveals the remarkable extent to which the entire Game of Thrones universe is animated by its ancient past.

Author Info:
Ayelet Haimson Lushkov is an Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Texas at Austin. She has wide interests in Roman history, literature, and reception. Her previous books are Magistracy and the Historiography in the Roman Republic (2015) and Reception and the Classics: An Interdisciplinary Approach to the Classical Tradition (co-edited with W Brockliss, P Chaudhuri and K Wasdin, 2012). She has written on Game of Thrones for The Guardian.

Coming Soon: Fan Phenomena: Game of Thrones

Due out later this year. No contents available yet.

Fan Phenomena: Game of Thrones
Edited by Kavita Mudan Finn
http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/books/view-Book,id=5247/
http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/F/bo26237077.html

Price £28.50, $41
267 pages; 27 color plates; 7 x 9

Winter is coming. Every Sunday night, millions of fans gather around their televisions to take in the spectacle that is a new episode of Game of Thrones. Much is made of who will be gruesomely murdered each week on the hit show, though sometimes the question really is who won’t die a fiery death. The show, based on the Song of Ice and Fire series written by George R. R. Martin, is a truly global phenomenon.

With the seventh season of the HBO series in production, Game of Thrones has been nominated for multiple awards, its cast has been catapulted to celebrity, and references to it proliferate throughout popular culture. Often positioned as the grittier antithesis to J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, Martin’s narrative focuses on the darker side of chivalry and heroism, stripping away these higher ideals to reveal the greed, amorality, and lust for power underpinning them.

Fan Phenomena: Game of Thrones is an exciting new addition to the Intellect series, bringing together academics and fans of Martin’s universe to consider not just the content of the books and HBO series, but fan responses to both. From trivia nights dedicated to minutiae to forums speculating on plot twists to academics trying to make sense of the bizarre climate of Westeros, everyone is talking about Game of Thrones. Edited by Kavita Mudan Finn, the book focuses on the communities created by the books and television series and how these communities envision themselves as consumers, critics, and even creators of fanworks in a wide variety of media, including fiction, art, fancasting, and cosplay.

Game of Thrones Psychology

Game of Thrones Psychology is a new book from Sterling Publishing. The publisher's website is still under construction and there are no previews available online or contents list posted anywhere yet, so do see the scans below for details.

Carolyne Larrington on Game of Thrones

Now available: 

Winter is Coming: The Medieval World of Game of Thrones
Carolyne Larrington
Paperback | In Stock | £12.99

Imprint: I.B.Tauris
Publisher: I.B.Tauris & Co Ltd

Paperback
ISBN: 9781784532567
Publication Date: 30 Nov 2015
Number of Pages: 288
Height: 198
Width: 129
Illustrations: 40 bw integrated

Game of Thrones is a phenomenon. As Carolyne Larrington reveals in this essential companion to George R R Martin's fantasy novels and the HBO mega-hit series based on them the show is the epitome of water-cooler TV. It is the subject of intense debate in national newspapers; by PhD students asking why Westeros has yet to see an industrial revolution, or whether astronomy explains the continent's climatic problems and unpredictable solstices ('winter is coming'); and by bloggers and cultural commentators contesting the series' startling portrayals of power, sex and gender. Yet no book has divulged how George R R Martin constructed his remarkable universe out of the Middle Ages. Discussing novels and TV series alike, Larrington explores among other topics: sigils, giants, dragons and direwolves in medieval texts; ravens, old gods and the Weirwood in Norse myth; and a gothic, exotic orient in the eastern continent, Essos. From the White Walkers to the Red Woman, from Casterley Rock to the Shivering Sea, this is an indispensable guide to the twenty-first century's most important fantasy creation.

New/Recent: Medieval Motion Picture: The Politics of Adaptation

Here's another recent book of interest. This one looks to be from mostly European scholars.

The Medieval Motion Picture: The Politics of Adaptation
Edited by Andrew James Johnston, Margitta Rouse, Philipp Hinz
Publisher Palgrave Macmillan
Series The New Middle Ages

$95.00
ISBN 9780230112506
Publication Date April 2014
Hardcover (256 pages)
Formats Hardcover Ebook (EPUB) Ebook (PDF)

Details

Providing new and challenging ways of understanding the medieval in the modern and vice versa, The Medieval Motion Picture: The Politics of Adaptation highlights how medieval aesthetic experience breathes life into contemporary cinema. Engaging with the subject of time and temporality, the essays examine the politics of adaptation and our contemporary entanglement with the medieval: not only in overtly medieval-themed films but also in such diverse genres as thrillers, horror films, performance animation, and even science fiction. Among the films and TV shows discussed are productions such as HBO's award winning series Game of Thrones, Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, Akira Kurosawa's Ran, and M. Night Shyamalan's The Sixth Sense.


Contents

Introduction: Temporalities of Adaptation; Andrew James Johnston and Margitta Rouse (read online)

1. "Now is the time": Shakespeare's Medieval Temporalities in Akira Kurosawa's Ran; Jocelyn Keller and Wolfram R. Keller

2. Dracula's Times: Adapting the Middle Ages in Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula; Cordula Lemke

3. Rethinking Anachronism for Medieval Film in Richard Donner's Timeline; Margitta Rouse

4. Otherness Redoubled and Refracted: Intercultural Dialogues in The Thirteenth Warrior; Judith Klinger

5. Crisis Discourse and Art Theory: Richard Wagner's Legacy in Films; Veith von Fürstenberg and Kevin Reynolds Stefan Keppler-Tasaki

6. Adaptation as Hyperreality: The (A)historicism of Trauma in Robert Zemeckis's Beowulf; Philipp Hinz and Margitta Rouse

7. Perils of Generation: Incest, Romance and the Proliferation of Narrative in Game of Thrones; Martin Bleisteiner

8. Arthurian Myth and Cinematic Horror: M. Night Shyamalan's The Sixth Sense; Hans Jürgen Scheuer

9. Marian Re-writes the Legend: The Temporality of Archaeological Remains in Richard Lester's Robin and Marian; Andrew James Johnston

Bibliography


Editors

Andrew James Johnston is Chair of Medieval and Renaissance English Literature at the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, and author of Performing the Middle Ages from Beowulf to Othello.

Margitta Rouse is Assistant Professor at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Germany. She teaches medieval English literature as well as cinematic adaptation.

Philipp Hinz curates film festivals and publishes stage-to-screen adaptations on DVD.