CONGRESS CANCELED Playing with Game Theory I: Reading Games in Medieval Culture

Medieval Institute, Western Michigan University

Description

It is well known that the glosses and marginalia found in medieval manuscripts were commonly left by scribes, readers, and illuminators as ways to respond to the texts they read. Oftentimes, these marginal additions—including images of people, animals, flora, and fauna –were created to react directly to a given text and purposefully designed to be understood as interactive games to be played with the text and the reader. This session proposes to explore the gaming relationships among image, text, and reader to comprehend better how the people of the Middle Ages understood the purpose and function of games in literary texts. Sarah Sprouse

 
May 8th, 10:00 AM

CONGRESS CANCELED Playing with Game Theory I: Reading Games in Medieval Culture

Schneider 1325

It is well known that the glosses and marginalia found in medieval manuscripts were commonly left by scribes, readers, and illuminators as ways to respond to the texts they read. Oftentimes, these marginal additions—including images of people, animals, flora, and fauna –were created to react directly to a given text and purposefully designed to be understood as interactive games to be played with the text and the reader. This session proposes to explore the gaming relationships among image, text, and reader to comprehend better how the people of the Middle Ages understood the purpose and function of games in literary texts. Sarah Sprouse