Aspirations Unmet and Exceeded: Failure and Its Fruits in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Special Session
Organizer Name
Diane Shane Fruchtman
Organizer Affiliation
Indiana Univ.-Bloomington
Presider Name
Diane Shane Fruchtman
Paper Title 1
Epistolary Failure in Late Antiquity
Presenter 1 Name
Bradley K. Storin
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Indiana Univ.-Bloomington
Paper Title 2
The Failure Burns: Arson and Information in Late Antique Egypt
Presenter 2 Name
Martin Reznick
Presenter 2 Affiliation
Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, New York Univ.
Paper Title 3
The Apotheoses of a Defeated Warlord: Widukind as Christian Exemplar and Heathen Ideal
Presenter 3 Name
Mary Ellen Rowe
Presenter 3 Affiliation
Univ. of Central Missouri
Start Date
8-5-2014 10:00 AM
Session Location
Valley III Stinson 303
Description
What happens when an epistolary overture falls flat? When an aristocrat fails to take a hint and legal proceedings ensue? When a warlord is defeated but his followers and enemies alike cannot accept his failure or irredeemability?
Moments of failure--whether personal, social, military, political, or economic--produce re-evaluation and reconsideration, a scramble to recoup and an attempt to salvage the situation. Sometimes failure provokes significant change; at other times it is elided, explained away, or covered-up. Failure can be either destructive or productive, signaling the end of an endeavor or the start of its re-envisioned successor.
For historians, moments of failure captured in the historical record provide unique insight into the ordinary functioning of a society. Failures of etiquette, character, and all manner of military, political, or social aspirations drew comment from contemporaries and survive in the historical record precisely because they stood out so egregiously as violations of custom or as exemplars of how not to proceed.
We can, therefore, uncover and explore societal norms by examining those instances where those same norms have been breached, by studying the exceptions to the rule, and the monumental mistakes that drew comment from contemporary observers, as well as by assessing how failure was perceived, theorized, and processed by medieval commentators.
This session aims to explore the fruits of failure in the early medieval world.
--Diane Fruchtman
Aspirations Unmet and Exceeded: Failure and Its Fruits in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages
Valley III Stinson 303
What happens when an epistolary overture falls flat? When an aristocrat fails to take a hint and legal proceedings ensue? When a warlord is defeated but his followers and enemies alike cannot accept his failure or irredeemability?
Moments of failure--whether personal, social, military, political, or economic--produce re-evaluation and reconsideration, a scramble to recoup and an attempt to salvage the situation. Sometimes failure provokes significant change; at other times it is elided, explained away, or covered-up. Failure can be either destructive or productive, signaling the end of an endeavor or the start of its re-envisioned successor.
For historians, moments of failure captured in the historical record provide unique insight into the ordinary functioning of a society. Failures of etiquette, character, and all manner of military, political, or social aspirations drew comment from contemporaries and survive in the historical record precisely because they stood out so egregiously as violations of custom or as exemplars of how not to proceed.
We can, therefore, uncover and explore societal norms by examining those instances where those same norms have been breached, by studying the exceptions to the rule, and the monumental mistakes that drew comment from contemporary observers, as well as by assessing how failure was perceived, theorized, and processed by medieval commentators.
This session aims to explore the fruits of failure in the early medieval world.
--Diane Fruchtman