SONIC INTERVENTIONS: SILENCE, SOUND, AND MELODY IN MEDIEVAL LITERATURE

Abstract

In “Sonic Interventions: Silence, Sound, and Melody in Medieval Literature,” I examine five early literary texts, spanning from the late-fifth to early-fifteenth-century: Geoffrey Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde, the anonymous Le Roman de Silence, the aptly named Book of Margery Kempe, John Gower’s “Apollonius of Tyre” and the anonymous, late fifth-century Historia Apollonii Regis Tyri. These five works may differ in author, time of composition, and genre, but I yoke these stories together because of each author's treatment of agency and the sonic. In response to the latter, many texts from past and present include representations of sound, but there is more regarding the sonic in these five works than the mere presence of such a literary feature. What joins these five works is how each author draws upon sound as an alternative way to animate their marginalized characters when their voices fail. Even when voice proves to be impossible for myriad reasons, these early literary works showcase marginalized characters that can temporarily rebel, refute, and resist through their author's orchestration of what I refer to as “sonic expressions” or the ability to express through sound. In this dissertation, I examine expressions of silence, laughter, weeping, and song. As a result, I argue that each author repositions minoritized character(s) from the margins of the text to its center because the agency sound affords these figures, however temporarily. When marginalized voices are silenced, oppressed, or ignored in the story, their sonic expressions still pulsate across the page.