'The pure and perfect book': Marilynne Robinson, Maureen Duffy, and the Heirs of Piers Plowman

TY - JOUR

T1 - 'The pure and perfect book'

T2 - Marilynne Robinson, Maureen Duffy, and the Heirs of Piers Plowman

AU - Johnston, Michael

AU - Warner, Lawrence

PY - 2021/12/31

Y1 - 2021/12/31

N2 - This essay brings readers’ attention to the role of Piers Plowman in the writings of two major modern authors, Marilynne Robinson and Maureen Duffy. At first glance these authors differ dramatically—Robinson is an Iowa-based Christian passionate about Calvinistic theology who came to Langland only recently, while Duffy is a longtime Londoner, patron of HumanistsUK, for whom Piers Plowman has been a lodestar for over sixty years. Yet both place the poem in an ethical, utopian, and prophetic literary genealogy, one in which anti-racism is central, culminating in William Blake, which they see their own works as continuing.

AB - This essay brings readers’ attention to the role of Piers Plowman in the writings of two major modern authors, Marilynne Robinson and Maureen Duffy. At first glance these authors differ dramatically—Robinson is an Iowa-based Christian passionate about Calvinistic theology who came to Langland only recently, while Duffy is a longtime Londoner, patron of HumanistsUK, for whom Piers Plowman has been a lodestar for over sixty years. Yet both place the poem in an ethical, utopian, and prophetic literary genealogy, one in which anti-racism is central, culminating in William Blake, which they see their own works as continuing.

KW - anti-racism

KW - Marilynne Robinson

KW - Maureen Duffy

KW - medievalism

KW - Piers Plowman

KW - social activism

KW - Theology

KW - utopianism

KW - William Blake

KW - William Langland

M3 - Article

VL - 35

SP - 61

EP - 104

JO - The Yearbook of Langland Studies

JF - The Yearbook of Langland Studies

ER -