Download or read book Fantasies of Troy written by Alan Shepard and published by Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies. This book was released on 2004 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For medieval and early modern Europeans, contemporary culture was often refracted through the legend of Troy, arguably the most important set of stories outside the Bible for centuries of western European history. These stories were transmitted in dozens of competing versions, and contemporary local events were habitually understood in the context of a pagan legend whose origins were remote and whose mandate was ambiguous. The fifteen essays in this volume offer compelling new treatments of these now-evaporated fantasies of Troy, which were central to the European social imaginary. The essays consider texts and performances of Troy across a wide generic range, from learned court poetry to burlesque, from treatises on linguistic history to public spectacles.