Animal skins and the reading self in medieval Latin and French bestiaries / Sarah Kay.

• Introduction: skin, suture, and caesura -- Book, word, page -- Garments of skin -- Orifices and the library -- Cutting the skin: sacrifice, sovereignty, and the space of exception -- The riddle of recognition -- Skin, the inner senses, and the soul as "inner life" -- Conclusion: reading bestiaries.

• "Just like we do today, people in medieval times struggled with the concept of human exceptionalism and the significance of other creatures. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the medieval bestiary. Sarah Kay's exploration of French and Latin bestiaries offers fresh insight into how this prominent genre challenged the boundary between its human readers and other animals. Bestiaries present accounts of animals whose fantastic behaviors should be imitated or avoided, depending on the given trait. In a highly original argument, Kay suggests that the association of beasts with books is here both literal and material, as nearly all surviving bestiaries are copied on parchment made of animal skin, which also resembles human skin. Using a rich array of examples, she shows how the content and materiality of bestiaries are linked due to the continual references in the texts to the skins of other animals, as well as the ways in which the pages themselves repeatedly--and at times, it would seem, deliberately--intervene in the reading process. A vital contribution to animal studies and medieval manuscript studies, this book sheds new light on the European bestiary and its profound power to shape readers' own identities" -- From the publisher. 

Ämnesord

Medeltida handskrifter  (sao)

Bokmåleri  (sao)

Böcker och läsning  (sao)

Fabeldjur i litteraturen  (sao)

Manuscripts, Medieval.  (LCSH)

Parchment.  (LCSH)

Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval.  (LCSH)

Animals in literature.  (LCSH)

Animals, Mythical, in literature.  (LCSH)

Animals in art.  (LCSH)

Animals, Mythical, in art.  (LCSH)

Human-animal relationships.  (LCSH)

Bestiaries  -- History and criticism. (LCSH)

Books and reading  -- History -- To 1500. (LCSH)

Animals in art.  (fast)

Animals in literature.  (fast)

Animals, Mythical, in art.  (fast)

Animals, Mythical, in literature.  (fast)

Bestiarier  -- historia (sao)

Animals in art. 

Animals in literature. 

Animals, Mythical, in art. 

Animals, Mythical, in literature. 

Bestiaries. 

Books and reading. 

Human-animal relationships. 

Illumination of books and manuscripts, Medieval. 

Manuscripts, Medieval. 

Parchment. 

Illumination of books and manuscripts  (LCSH)

Books and reading  (LCSH)

Manuscripts, Medieval  (LCSH)

Animals, Mythical, in literature  (LCSH)

To 1500  (fast)

Genre

Analys och tolkning  (saogf)

Criticism, interpretation, etc.  (fast)

History.  (fast)

Klassifikation

PA8275.B4 (LCC)

809.93362 (DDC)