Repeat the Sounding Joy: Hearing Communal Joy in Medieval German Literature

Abstract

Expressions of joy in Western European literature of the central Middle Ages often aid in community formation. The historical study of emotional communities inspired by Barbara Rosenwein has allowed emotions to be reexamined as expressions defined by socio-cultural, linguistic, and gendered norms, yet joy remains overlooked. This dissertation delves into joy’s literary depictions and perceived impacts—negative and positive—on religious and secular communities. Despite their potential incompatibility, these communities portray similar intersections between joy and sound. A medical manual by Hildegard von Bingen and a moral treatise by Bernard of Clairvaux encourage a vocal control of emotion to protect the spiritual health of both the individual and the monastic community. Secularizing these values, Thomasin von Zerclaere exhorts young nobles in the pursuit of quiet moderation. Conversely, noisy festivity marks key narrative turns in Arthurian romances and indicates whether the hero, the community, and its king are in right relationship, as seen in Erec by Hartmann von Aue and Erec et Enide by Chrétien de Troyes. The aural images of these diverse texts underscore joy’s bubbling, cackling, roaring ability to unite and divide. Old Occitan troubadours and Middle High German Minnesänger—such as Guillaume IX, Dietmar von Eist, Reinmar von Hagenau, and Walther von der Vogelweide—position themselves as gatekeepers of a joyful, elite community by enforcing good taste and cultivating collective memory, which Gottfried von Strassburg overtly claims in his romance Tristan. To analyze joy’s as a communal and artistic tool, I draw on literary criticisms proposed by Sara Ahmed and Will Hasty as well as medieval understandings of music. This dissertation restores these songs, stories, and treatises to their original vocality: these texts’ first audiences were largely illiterate, lending the aural imagery more emphasis. Most of the melodies for the troubadour and Minnesang corpora have been lost; nonetheless, troubadour scholars have applied techniques from musicology and sound studies to re-imbue their texts with sound. I propose similar methods for medieval German literature, rediscovering the aural and formative effects of joy on its audiences.