Reading Through Prayer: Lectio Divina and "Liturgical Reading" in Some Medieval Texts

<p>Prayer texts found in a variety of medieval genres merit more careful scrutiny from literary critical perspectives. Such attention to the verbal artifacts, prayers, that memorialize an activity of central importance in medieval culture, praying, deepens our understanding not only of the prayers and the works in which they are found, but also of the milieu that produced them. This study seeks to model such a critical turn by reading three particular works "through" the prayers that constitute, punctuate and frame them -- privileging the prayers as the starting points for the investigation of their literary and devotional settings. This vantage yields fresh insights into an Anglo-Latin prayerbook -- <em>The Book of Nunnaminster</em>, Cynewulf's Old English poem<em> Elene</em>, and the Middle English prose <em>Seinte Margarete</em> of the Katherine Group. This approach reveals as well the high degree of association between prayer and reading in medieval culture where prayers are most often highly formal or formulaic texts intended to be read (rather than spontaneous speech) and praying is often figured as an interpretive activity akin to reading. Two medieval reading practices, lectio divina and "liturgical reading," have shaped both the discrete prayers and the whole works examined here. The full appreciation of these texts, and perhaps many others, requires close attention to the prayers within them and an understanding of these habits of prayerful reading.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

English

Grantor

The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York

Year dc:date.available

2012

Author dc:creator

• Grogan, Marie Schilling

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• E. Gordon Whatley

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Steven Kruger
• Michael Sargent

• English Language and Literature

Repository record dc:identifier

https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/4253

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:academicworks.cuny.edu:gc_etds-5330