Recasting the Past: The Middle Ages in Young Adult Literature

Writers of adolescent fiction have long mined the Middle Ages for settings and materials-without much regard for historical accuracy. Too often, they perpetuate anachronistic fallacies, allowing modern attitudes about such things as literacy and tolerance for diversity to enter their presentation. So how are you to know whether a book is accurate? Where else can you look? That's where Recasting the Past steps in: both as a crash course in the Middle Ages and as a guide to some of the adolescent fiction set in this period.

The purpose of this book is to provide teachers, librarians, and scholars of adolescent literature with a discussion of fiction set in the Middle Ages. By showing how novels incorporate ideas and misconceptions about the medieval period, Barnhouse demonstrates how to evaluate this fiction for historical accuracy and acquaints you with nineteen novels that can be paired with history lessons and canonical literary texts. The introductory chapter provides a brief overview of the Middle Ages and a timeline to help you conceptualize the novels; while the appendix offers suggestions for classroom use. Another chapter helps you differentiate between historical and fantasy fiction. Barnhouse provides a wealth of information about medieval people and practices-from pilgrims to crusaders, from Heloise and her lover Abelard to the saintly Joan of Arc, and from the Viking invasions of Ireland to the Norman Conquest of England. Along the way, you will learn more about medieval gender roles, literacy and the ways of learning, and attitudes toward religious diversity. You will also encounter familiar poems like The Canterbury Tales, Beowulf, and The Song of Roland as modern writers incorporate them within their novels.