The Jew in the Medieval Book: English Antisemitisms 1350-1500

by Anthony Bale

This interdisciplinary study explores images of Jews and Judaism in late medieval English literature and culture. Using four main categories - history, miracle, cult and Passion - Anthony Bale demonstrates how varied and changing ideas of Judaism coexisted within well-known anti-semitic literary and visual models, depending on context, authorship and audience. He examines the ways in which English writers, artists and readers used and abused the Jewish image in the period following the Jews' expulsion from England in 1290. The texts are analysed in their manuscript and print contexts in order to show local responses and changing meanings. This important work opens up fresh texts, sources and approaches for understanding medieval anti-semitism and shows how anti-semitic stereotypes came to be such potent images which would endure far beyond the Middle Ages.

Genres: Medieval, British Literature, History

284 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2007

About the author

Professor Anthony Bale, MA (Oxford), MA (York), DPhil (Oxford), is Professor of Medieval Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London, England.

Anthony Bale teaches on the BA English, MA Medieval Literature and Culture and supervises doctoral students working on medieval topics.

Bale has published widely on medieval literature, culture, and religion. In particular, his work has explored relations between Christians and Jews in medieval England. He has also edited and translated several medieval texts, and has recently published a new translation and edition of The Book of Margery Kempe with Oxford University Press. His current work explores travel and pilgrimage between England and the Holy Land in the later Middle Ages.

He has received fellowships from the Arts & Humanities Research Council, the Australian Research Councils, the British Academy, the Huntington Library, the Leverhulme Trust, the University of Michigan Frankel Institute, and the National Humanities Center.