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  • Comic Medievalism: Laughing at the Middle Ages by Louise D’Arcens
  • Rosemary Greentree
D’Arcens, Louise, Comic Medievalism: Laughing at the Middle Ages (Medievalism), Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2014; hardback; pp. 219; R.R.P. £55.00; ISBN 9781843843801.

Writing about comedy is a serious undertaking, and Louise D’Arcens offers a studious account of the process, to show that ridicule can have a serious purpose. She sets out possibilities for laughing ‘at, with and in the Middle Ages’ (p. 3), when she announces her plan to probe aspects of medievalism from Don Quixote to educational television, concluding with the smells of theme parks. Both of the latter cover an ambit from gravity to grossness. The serious purpose is generally didactic, with varying targets and intentions.

Ridicule of the medieval romance happened even in the Middle Ages, as we see when the Host intervenes to stop the wearying absurdity of The Tale of Sir Thopas, with slight unkindness to the pilgrim Chaucer. Cervantes forces harsher revelations on Don Quixote. The laughter at ‘his delusional knight errantry’ (p. 36) is grim, but Don Quixote’s fantasies are his ‘ballast against the changing world’ (p. 38).

‘Chaucer in the Age of Wit’ presents that age’s attempt to refine and renovate a poet perceived as uncultivated and outmoded. D’Arcens points out that Chaucer was at least matched in vulgarity by Rochester and Swift, but Addison and Pope thought the coarseness of the fabliaux must be avoided and more elegant verse forms employed to allow readers of the time to appreciate the antique works.

Using his guise as ‘the people’s court jester’ (p. 73), Dario Fo, in Mistero Buffo and other plays, offered political satire, to expose ‘the pretensions and abuses of the powerful, both religious and secular’ (p. 74). Vladimir Mayakovsky and Mikhail Baktin wrote in similar vein, in Mystery-Bouffe and Rabelais and his World, and Pier Paolo Pasolini also used medieval materials. Umberto Eco showed the importance of medieval laughter in The Name of the Rose, and those who have employed it in all ages acknowledge the dangerous effectiveness of piercing satire. [End Page 285]

Nineteenth-century comic medievalism introduced the thread of camp that D’Arcens follows throughout, with the bewildering cross-dressing of pantomime and burlesque. All art forms introduced parody of other genres, and historical periods and genres mingled freely. The allusions to other performances included Shakespeare’s and contemporary plays, and there was comment on current events. The audience’s knowledge and wish to extend it were assumed. The audience was also expected to recognise and be entertained rather than offended by the anachronistic burlesque.

Medieval cinematic figures can speak freely in their disguised voices, and D’Arcens detects parodic references in many films of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The preposterous picaresque adventures of the knight-errant Brancaleone, in Mario Monicelli’s films, seem closest to those of Don Quixote. Camp references to sexual mores abound, and the chastity belt becomes a recurring motif. Time travel is sometimes a theme, and its reversal in Les Visiteurs offers sustained satire of modern life. As primus inter pares in the genre, Monty Python and the Holy Grail is selected, for its irreverent familiarity with Arthurian literature and meta-parody.

Laughter has always leavened education, which can be seen as the purpose of many works. D’Arcens considers this in some television programmes and in theme parks. There are frequent allusions to other performances. Medieval Lives, presented by Terry Jones, intersperses scholarly sections with Pythonesque sketches. Similarly, Tony Robinson, in The Worst Jobs in History, often recalls his role as Baldrick in Blackadder in his medieval menial tasks. Terry Deary’s Horrible Histories gain attention as they ridicule, horrify, and disgust, and D’Arcens notes his contradictory yearnings for both ‘a world without schools’ and ‘schools with good history lessons’ (p. 151). References to others’ works are plentiful, and all may be seen as a counter to more serious presentations, such as those of Simon Schama and David Starkey. The intimacy of television enhances the effects. In theme parks, intimacy is extended when the visitor enters the setting for earlier events. There may...

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