tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post5300101673615130533..comments2024-03-10T20:46:19.274-04:00Comments on In the Middle: The Ethics of Inventing Modernity: Stephen Greenblatt’s The SwerveCord J. Whitakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06224143153295429986noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-33192852062840336092016-07-23T05:47:25.635-04:002016-07-23T05:47:25.635-04:00I love history, but I am interested in learning th...I love history, but I am interested in learning the truth as well as reading a good story. Do you have any recommendations? Gwendolyn Olsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08843064332471337473noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-85223995579983448042016-07-20T13:39:03.341-04:002016-07-20T13:39:03.341-04:00Does anyone have any good examples of books about ...Does anyone have any good examples of books about the Middle Ages that approach the period with accuracy AND are readable? I appreciate Greenblatt's style, but I would appreciate a book like The Swerve, but accurate. Thanks!Lem_Fliggityhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09535608734858978195noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-32080051662245199432016-05-31T17:34:54.055-04:002016-05-31T17:34:54.055-04:00ZH: Thanks for that recommendation of the Exemplar...ZH: Thanks for that recommendation of the Exemplaria reviews. Sorry to have missed it the first time around... so many reviews to track down!Laura Saetveit Mileshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06860013301088259248noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-49752337396766657382016-05-31T08:46:29.608-04:002016-05-31T08:46:29.608-04:00If you can face it, you might also read David Woot...If you can face it, you might also read David Wootton's The Invention of Science, which does much the same thing as Greenblatt's book and is probably a shameless attempt to obtain the same level of celebrity and financial reward.Historian on the Edgehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14069934072719158780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-90163371113133555242016-05-30T18:10:11.900-04:002016-05-30T18:10:11.900-04:00This is excellent. I'd just add that this sou...This is excellent. I'd just add that this sounds like much of Greenblatt's more recent work - elegantly and engagingly written, but usually with one idea that is carried much too far, so that it oversimplifies the problem/issue he is writing about. He is not a historian, and so the context is almost always oversimplified. His biography of Shakespeare is terrible. Susanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09716705206734059708noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-7012622163713379352016-05-30T18:06:49.277-04:002016-05-30T18:06:49.277-04:00I disagree with the comment above that "...no...I disagree with the comment above that "...not only do we need more voices like yours in the article, but also that we need medievalists to stand up and start fighting against the early modernist lack of knowledge." This is like telling climate change scientists that they have to work harder to get skeptics to believe that climate change is a fact. Once they've produced the work, and they've disseminated that work, they've done their job. We produce the scholarship that shows a universe far different from the one described in The Swerve and elsewhere, we have plenty of conversations across disciplines and the curriculum, there are heaps of medievalists who have used public platforms for discussing their nuanced work, and our scholarship is widely available. <br /><br />At some point we need to put the burden of understanding on those who willfully refuse to change their minds. This stubborn refusal is not innocent. Because those who choose to believe in the teleological version of history's onward march of progress, pushed forward by great geniuses are choosing to believe in what those Great Geniuses were so great at selling. S. Drimmernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-10425968993358044932016-05-30T15:28:19.923-04:002016-05-30T15:28:19.923-04:00The "Book Review Forum" in _Exemplaria_ ...The "Book Review Forum" in _Exemplaria_ 25.4 (2013) is also a useful resource for (some very good) reviews of _The Swerve_. ZHnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-44019103186737281812016-05-30T14:34:28.329-04:002016-05-30T14:34:28.329-04:00That's a great piece, thanks so much for shari...That's a great piece, thanks so much for sharing it! The problem, I think, is also much wider - I work on fourteenth- to seventeenth-century England, but am definitely a medievalist, and what strikes me is that the distortions of what the Middle Ages were you describe in the Swerve are actually commonplace among the majority of early modernists I know and read. Noble few actually go to the bother of reading something about the Middle Ages, let alone read any of the texts (apart from Canterbury Tales in high school, perhaps), but *all* have very clear ideas as to what the period was like (just like Greenblatt in the Swerve). So I'd say that not only do we need more voices like yours in the article, but also that we need medievalists to stand up and start fighting against the early modernist lack of knowledge that perpetuates eighteenth-century stereotypes about the 'dark ages'. I really think we should start taking a stance on that, because only through open action that leads to dialogue can we make sure there are less and less people who really think the Swerve is a great and accurate account of what the Middle Ages were like. Not to mention that early modernity as a discipline would also benefit from such a dialogue in general, as would no doubt medieval studies. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-39131887991745549812016-05-30T12:15:49.522-04:002016-05-30T12:15:49.522-04:00The problem is, of course, that most "general...The problem is, of course, that most "general readers" are quite ok with the truthinesss, even if it is pointed out to them. A student of mine-- a good student, with considerable interest in early literatures--told me he'd read The Swerve over the break. He clearly expected praise from me, and was quite taken aback when I said there were serious problems with the book. Nor had he seen any negative reviews or heard that there was any controversy; he just felt that it was a Worthy Tome, by a Harvard Professor no less, on something quite old and Latin, so surely it must be a Good Thing, in a general sort of way. And he was willing to defend it along those lines: yeah, ok, so maybe it isn't really true, BUT.... I don't think I managed to sway him; actually I let it go because I was running somewhere, and because I felt bad about bursting this nice young man's bubble. <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com