European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages

Ernst Robert Curtis's great study of the forms of mediaevel Latin literature shows how these forms took their origin in classical writings and how, after their mediaeval transformations, they were perpetuated in modern literature. One of his major efforts was to develop a set of principles of literary criticism. He also made a special analysis of the contribution of Latin, both as a living language and as the medium of transmission for antique form and content. Technical procedures such as metaphor and the neglected rhetorical category of topics, together with such conceptual pattern as 'the hero', 'the ideal landscape', and 'the Muses', are fully discussed and illuminated by analogies drawn from Renaissance and modern literatures.