Death and Dying in the Middle Ages

The Editors: Edelgard E. DuBruck, who received her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan, is Professor Emerita of French and Humanities at Marygrove College in Detroit, Michigan. She was the recipient of the Michigan Academy Award and was invited to lecture in England, Germany, and at the Sorbonne. She founded and edited Fifteenth-Century Studies (volumes 1 through 23) and organized three international congresses in Europe. Among her publications are The Theme of Death in French Poetry of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, a critical edition of the Passion Isabeau (1983) (Peter Lang, 1990), and Aspects of Fifteenth-Century Society in the German Carnival Comedies, as well as many articles and book reviews. Barbara I. Gusick is Assistant Professor of English at Troy State University (Dothan). She received her Ph.D. from Loyola University Chicago and has published essays on medieval drama and presented papers on death and dying at international conferences, including the Fifteenth-Century Congress held in Salzburg, Austria, and the International Medieval congresses in Leeds, United Kingdom.

Contents: Edelgard E. DuBruck: Introduction - Yves Ferroul: The Doctor and Death in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance - Christine Guidera: The Role of the Beguines in Caring for the Ill, the Dying, and the Dead - Kornelia Imesch: The Altar of the Holy Cross and the Ideal of Adam's Progeny: «ut paradysiace loca possideat regionis» - Franco Mormando: What Happens to Us When We Die? Bernardino of Siena on 'The Four Last Things' - Patrick Quinn: Aquina's Dilemma about Knowledge After Death - Thomas Worcester: In the Face of Death: Jean Delumeau on Late-Medieval Fears and Hopes - Peter M. De Wilde: Between Life and Death: the Journey in the Otherworld - Anca Bratu-Minott: From the Bosom of Abraham to the Beatific Vision: On Some Medieval Images of the Soul's Journey to Heaven - Mathilde Van Dijk: Travelling-Companion in the Journey of Life: Saint Barbara of Nicomedia in a Devotio Moderna Context - Ilse E. Friesen: Saints as Helpers in Dying: the Hairy Holy Women Mary Magdalene, Mary of Egypt, and Wilgefortis in the Iconography of the Late Middle Ages - Franco Mormando: 'Virtual Death' in the Middle Ages: the Apotheosis of Mary Magdalene in Popular Preaching - Martha Rampton: Up from the Dead: Magic and Miracle - Edelgard E. DuBruck: Death: Poetic Perception and Imagination - Barbara I. Gusick: The Ultimate Nothing: Death and the End of Work in Late Medieval English Lyrics - Barbara I. Gusick: Death and Resurrection in the Towneley Lazarus - Edelgard E. DuBruck: The Death of Christ on the Late-Medieval Stage: A Theater of Salvation - Donald F. Duclow: Dying Well: the Ars moriendi and the Dormition of the Virgin - Roger S. Wieck: The Death Desired: Books of Hours and the Medieval Funeral.