{"product_id":"claims-of-poverty-kate-crassons-9780268023027","title":"Claims of Poverty: Literature, Culture, and Ideology in Late Medieval England","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eThe Claims of Poverty\u003c\/i\u003e, Kate Crassons explores a widespread ideological crisis concerning poverty that emerged in the aftermath of the plague in late medieval England. She identifies poverty as a central preoccupation in texts ranging from \u003ci\u003ePiers Plowman\u003c\/i\u003e and Wycliffite writings to \u003ci\u003eThe Book of Margery Kempe\u003c\/i\u003e and the York cycle plays. Crassons shows that these and other works form a complex body of writing in which poets, dramatists, and preachers anxiously wrestled with the status of poverty as a force that is at once a sacred imitation of Christ and a social stigma; a voluntary form of life and an unwelcome hardship; an economic reality and a spiritual disposition. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCrassons argues that literary texts significantly influenced the cultural conversation about poverty, deepening our understanding of its urgency as a social, economic, and religious issue. These texts not only record debates about the nature of poverty as a form of either vice or virtue, but explore epistemological and ethical aspects of the debates. When faced with a claim of poverty, people effectively become readers interpreting the signs of need in the body and speech of their fellow human beings. The literary and dramatic texts of late medieval England embodied the complexity of such interaction with particular acuteness, revealing the ethical stakes of interpretation as an act with direct material consequences. As \u003ci\u003eThe Claims of Poverty\u003c\/i\u003e demonstrates, medieval literature shaped perceptions about who is defined as \"poor,\" and in so doing it emerged as a powerful cultural force that promoted competing models of community, sanctity, and justice.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Kate Crassons\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0268023026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780268023027\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of Notre Dame Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 04\/30\/2010\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 402\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.45lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.90h x 5.90w x 1.00d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eReview Citation(s): \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eReference and Research Bk News\u003c\/i\u003e 11\/01\/2010 pg. 292","brand":"Kate Crassons","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":47424999915775,"sku":"9780268023027","price":40.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_6abce22c-8014-4646-b8f8-2189317fbc3b.jpg?v=1761536307","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/claims-of-poverty-kate-crassons-9780268023027","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}