European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages

TLDR

The book traces the continuity of European literature from antiquity through the Latin Middle Ages to the early nineteenth century, highlighting medieval Latin as the bridge to vernacular traditions. Colin Burrow’s new introduction offers critical insights into Curtius’s life and ideas, underscoring the book’s significance. The work synthesizes European literature from Homer to Goethe, presenting a masterful, monumental scholarship.

Abstract

Published just after the Second World War, European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages is a sweeping exploration of the remarkable continuity of European literature across time and place, from the classical era up to the early nineteenth century, and from the Italian peninsula to the British Isles. In what T. S. Eliot called a magnificent book, Ernst Robert Curtius establishes medieval Latin literature as the vital transition between the literature of antiquity and the vernacular literatures of later centuries. The result is nothing less than a masterful synthesis of European literature from Homer to Goethe. European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages is a monumental work of literary scholarship. In a new introduction, Colin Burrow provides critical insights into Curtius's life and ideas and highlights the distinctive importance of this wonderful book.