E-Book Overview
The most comprehensive compilation of the works of Abelard and Heloise ever presented in a single volume in English, The Letters and Other Writings features an accurate and stylistically faithful new translation of both The Calamities of Peter Abelard and the remarkable letters it sparked between the ill-fated twelfth-century philosopher and his brilliant former student and lover -- an exchange whose intellectual passion, formal virtuosity, and psychological drama distinguish it as one of the most extraordinary correspondences in European history. Thanks to this edition, Latin-less readers will be better placed than ever to see why this undisputed milestone in the intellectual life of medieval France is also a masterpiece of Western literature.
In addition to the The Calamities and the letters -- the first complete English translation of all seven in more than eighty years -- this volume includes an Introduction, a map, and a chronology, Abelard's Confession of Faith , letters between Heloise and Peter the Venerable, the Introduction to The Questions of Heloise , and selected songs and poems by Abelard, among them a previously untranslated "shaped" poem, "Open Wide Your Eyes." Extracts of "lost" letters sometimes ascribed to Abelard and Heloise are given in appendixes.
E-Book Content
abelard_final.qxd 3/16/07 9:20 AM Page 1 ABELARD THE LETTERS In addition to the The Calamities and the letters—the first complete English translation of all seven in more than eighty years—this volume includes an Introduction, a map, and a chronology, Abelard’s Confession of Faith, letters between Heloise and Peter the Venerable, the Introduction to The Questions of Heloise, and selected songs and poems by Abelard, among them a previously untranslated “shaped” poem, “Open Wide Your Eyes.” Extracts of “lost” letters sometimes ascribed to Abelard and Heloise are given in appendixes. ABELARD AND OTHER WRITINGS The most comprehensive compilation of the works of Abelard and Heloise ever presented in a single volume in English, The Letters and Other Writings features an accurate and stylistically faithful new translation of both The Calamities of Peter Abelard and the remarkable letters it sparked between the ill-fated twelfth-century philosopher and his brilliant former student and lover—an exchange whose intellectual passion, formal virtuosity, and psychological drama distinguish it as one of the most extraordinary correspondences in European history. Thanks to this edition, Latin-less readers will be better placed than ever to see why this undisputed milestone in the intellectual life of medieval France is also a masterpiece of Western literature. & To Abelard from Heloise. HELOISE To her lord, no, her father To her husband, no, her brother From his handmaid, no, his daughter His wife, no, his sister— THE LETTERS AND OTHER WRITINGS “A welcome bundle of texts, in an English that seeks to recreate in its style the artful elegance of the originals.” —Jan Ziolkowski, Department of Classics, Harvard University ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-875-9 90000 by Lucas Cranach the Elder, 1533. 0875 9 780872 208759 FnL1 00 0000 CCover art: detail from Adam and Eve HACKETT William Levitan is Associate Professor of Classics, Grand Valley State University and a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome. & HELOISE TRANSLATED, WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES, BY WILLIAM LEVITAN AbelardHeloiseLet-00Bk Page i Wednesday, January 10, 2007 9:40 PM i ABELARD AND HELOISE THE LETTERS AND OTHER WRITINGS AbelardHeloiseLet-00Bk Page iii Wednesday, January 10, 2007 9:40 PM iii ABELARD AND HELOISE THE LETTER