Orpheus in the Middle Ages

by John Block Friedman

This is a new edition of Friedman's classic examination of the myth of Orpheus in the late antique and medieval periods. Friedman discusses Christian, Jewish and romantic secular `portraits' of Orpheus, and considers artistic, literary and philosophical sources. In this edition the original text remains unchanged, but the bibliography has been updated.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Mythology, Medieval

267 pages, Paperback

First published April 22, 1971

Reviews

[Jem]

Super helpful. Scholarship as a sequence of citations and little linkages, trajectories, drawing out developments and unravelings and weirdnesses. But without any attention to the lyric...idea decoupled from the material of its expression, which is ultimately lacking, especially in a treatment of Orpheus The Poet?

[Thom Dunn · Rating 5 out of 5]

More accurately, A Complete History of Orpheus from his mythic origins to his appearance in Medieval Romances. Harvard U. Press, 1970.