Professor Ad Putter

Professor of Medieval English Literature

Room: 2.10

Phone: 0117 928 9151

Fax: 0117 331 7933

Research supervision

I would be happy to supervise students on topics in Middle English language and literature, particularly in the areas listed under the heading ‘Research Interests’, below.

I have supervised or co-supervised research theses on a number of topics. Past students include:

Rhiannon Purdie, ‘Edition of Ipomadon A’ (PhD, 1997)
Paul Price, ‘Gender in Medieval Saints' Lives’ (PhD, 1999)
Ken Byrne, ‘The Tale of Constance’ (MLitt, 2002)
Marian Trudgill, ‘Chivalric Ideals in Twelfth-Century Champagne and Flanders’ (PhD, 2000)
Kate Rambridge, ‘Eighth-Century Northumbrian Historiography’ (PhD, 2003)
Robert A. Rouse, ‘Representations of Anglo-Saxon Past in Middle English Literature’ (PhD, 2003)
Demelza Curnow, ‘Textual Transmission of Middle English Romance’(PhD, 2002)
Roseanna Cross, ‘The Handling of Time in Medieval Romance’ (PhD, 2003)
Claire Jackson, ‘Space and Mobility in French and English Romances’ (PhD, 2005)
Cathy Hume, ‘Chaucer and Medieval Letter Collections’ (PhD 2006)
Gareth Griffith, 'Rhetorical Functions of Landscape in Early Middle English Literature' (PhD 2008)

I am currently supervising theses on realistic detail in alliterative literature; early Middle English literature; the language of Middle English literature; and the formation of the Chaucer canon.

Research interests

Areas of research expertise include metre and Middle English Language, medieval romance, the Gawain-poet, editing, Arthurian literature, the alliterative tradition, and comparative literature (English, Dutch, French and Latin).

Publications

Monographs and editions:

An Introduction to the Gawain-Poet (Harlow: Longmans, 1996)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and French Arthurian Romance (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995, reprinted 1999)
The Spirit of Medieval English Popular Romance, ed. with Jane Gilbert (London: Pearson, 2000)
Envisaging Heaven in the Middle Ages, ed. with Carolyn Muessig (London: Routledge, 2007)
Ad Putter, Judith Jefferson, and Myra Stokes, Studies in the Metre of Alliterative Verse, Medium Aevum Monographs (2007)
Approaches to the Metres of Alliterative Verse, ed. with Judith Jefferson (Leeds: Leeds Studies in English Texts and Monographs, 2009)
The Cambridge Companion to the Arthurian Legend, ed. with Elizabeth Archibald (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009)

Selected chapters and articles

"Finding Time for Romance: Medieval Arthurian Literary History", Medium Aevum 53 (1994), 1-16
"Knights and Clerics at the Court of Henry the Liberal: A Context for Chrétien de Troyes's Romances", in Medieval Knighthood 5, ed. Ruth Harvey (Boydell and Brewer, 1995), 219-35
"Descriptions of the Flood in Medieval and Renaissance Literature: Some Sources and Backgrounds", in Studies in Philology 94 (1997), 137-159.
"Transvestite Knights in Medieval Life and Literature", in Becoming Male in the Middle Ages, eds. B. Wheeler and J. Cohen, The New Middle Ages (NY: Garland, 1997, paperback edn. 1999), 279-303
"Walewein in the Otherworld and the Land of Prester John", Arthurian Literature XVII (1999), 79-99, reprinted in Digitaale Bibliotheek der Nedelandse Letteren (2004): www.dbnl.org/tekst
"A Historical Introduction to Medieval Popular Romance" and "The Narrative Logic of Emaré", in The Spirit of Medieval English Popular Romance, ed. Ad Putter and Jane Gilbert (London, Pearson, 2000), 1-15.
"Gifts and Commodities in Sir Amadace", Review of English Studies n.s. 51 (2000), 372-94.
(with Myra Stokes), "Spelling, Grammar and Metre in the Works of the Gawain-Poet', Medieval English Measures, ed. Ruth Kennedy, Parergon (2000),77-95.
‘Cleanness’, ‘Patience’, ‘Pearl’, ‘Sir Gawain and the Green Knight’, in the Literary Encyclopedia: www.LitEncyc.Com
‘In Search of Lost Time: Missing Days in Sir Cleges and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, in Time in the Medieval World, ed. C. Humphrey and W. M. Ormrod (York Medieval Press, 2001), 119-136.
‘The Text of Sir Perceval of Galles’, Medium Aevum 70 (2001), 191-203.
‘King Arthur at Oxbridge: Nicholas Cantelupe, Geoffrey of Monmouth and Cambridge’s Arthurian Foundation Myth’, Medium Aevum 72 (2003), 63-81.
‘Story Line and Story Shape in Sir Percyvell of Gales’, Pulp Fictions of medieval England, ed. Nicola McDonald (Manchester University Press, 2004), 171-196.
‘False Friends in the Works of the Gawain-poet’, in Arthurian Studies in Honour of P.J.C. Field, ed. Bonnie Wheeler (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 2004), 173-80.
‘Fier Margrietken: A Medieval Ballad and its History’, in The Singer and the Scribe: European Ballad Traditions and European Ballad Cultures, ed. Philip Bennett and Richard Firth Green (Amsterdam and NY: Rodopi, 2004), 69-88.
‘Nicholas of Cantalupe’, new entry for New Dictionary of National Biography (2004)
‘The Language and Metre of Three Dead Kings and Pater Noster, in Review of English Studies 55 (2004), 498-526
'The Cloud-Author and Walter Hilton', in A Companion to Middle English Prose, ed. A.S.G Edwards (Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2004), 33-52
‘Late Romance: Malory and the ‘Tale of Balin’, in Readings in Medieval Texts, ed. Andrew Johnson and Elaine Treharne (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004)
With Judith Jefferson, ‘Alliterative Patterning in the Morte Arthure’, in Studies in Philology 102 (2005), 415-33
'Weak e and the Metre of Richard Spalding's Alliterative Katherine Hymn', in Notes and Queries n.s. 52 (2005), 288-292
With Judith Jefferson, 'The Distribution of Infinitives in -e and -en in Some Middle English Alliterative Poems', in Medium Aevum 74 (2005), 221-247
'The Ways and Words of the Hunt: Notes on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, The Master of Game, Sir Tristrem, Pearl, and Saint Erkenwald', in Chaucer Review 40 (2006), 354-85
'The Influence of Visions of the Otherworld on Some Medieval Romances', in Envisaging Heaven in the Middle Ages, ed. Carolyn Muessig and Ad Putter (London: Routledge, 2006), 237-251
'Chaucer's Verse and Alliterative Poetry: Grammar, Metre, and Some Secrets of the Syllable Count', in Poetica 67 (2007), 19-35
With Myra Stokes, 'The Linguistic Atlas and the Dialect of the Gawain Poems', in Journal of English and Germanic Philology (October, 2007), 468-491
With Demelza Curnow, 'Textual and Familial Relationships: The Place of the Michigan Fragment in the Evolution of Sir Eglamour', in People and Texts: Relationships in Medieval Literature. Studies Presented to Erik Kooper, ed. Thea Summerfield and Keith Busby (Amsterdam/NY: Rodopi, 2007)
'Walewein ende Keye and the Strategies of Honour', in Arthuriana 17 (2007), 55-78
‘Moving Towards God: the Possibilities and Limitations of Metaphorical Journeying in Walter Hilton’s Scale of Perfection’, forthcoming in Harlaxton Proceedings.
'Multilingualism in England and Wales, c.1200: The Evidence of Gerald of Wales', forthcoming in Medieval Francophonia, ed. Keith Busby and Chris Kleinhenz.

Teaching

My teaching interests are in medieval literature, Arthurian literature, and modern philosophy. For the English Department I teach classes on literary theory ('Critical Issues'), Old English, Literature 1 (medieval) and options on Arthurian Literature (medieval to modern) and Medieval Popular Romance. For the MA in Medieval Studies I teach (amongst other things) codicology, textual criticism, and options on Arthurian Literature, and (jointly with Professor J. A. Burrow), Ricardian Literature.

Administrative responsibilities

My main administrative role is that of Graduate Officer in the School of Humanities. I have pastoral responsibility for MA students in the School of Humanities, and oversee the content of MAs in the School.

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