All the Frills: Abelard and Heloise

Continuing on from last week, where I profiled a few of my favourite books, this week I’m featuring an older edition of the Letters of Abelard and Heloise and a reproduction of the illuminated Master of Mary of Burgundy that I picked up many years ago while hunting for used book treasures in NYC. I can’t remember exactly where or when I came across the edition of the letters of Abelard and Heloise but it’s a favourite of mine. Most people know the twelfth century couple through re-tellings of their ill-fated love affair (which encompassed such engrossing episodes as Abelard’s castration) but I have always been more interested in the figure of Heloise and her fierce intellectualism. To me the part of the love story between Abelard and Heloise that fascinates is not the actual romantic events that the two shared but their long-enduring intellectual exchange. As for the reproduction of the Book of Hours of Mary of Burgundy, the original of which was made in about 1477 and is held at the Getty, what can I say other than that I’m a sucker for a good reproduction of an illuminated manuscript?

And here’s a little link love:

• Okay, so there are few strange ones on the list and some notable people missing but some of my favourite ladies are here – hello Flannery O’Connor
  
• Another awesome list full of awesome ladies I freaking love this! A little literary mystery...
  
• Like the gals at Go Fug Yourself, this headline really makes me laugh
  
• I'm going to write a movie script. It will be called Croc Forest: Trees of Doom. You've been warned
  
• My friend Jennifer described this one thusly: “In totally unsurprising news, researchers find that feminism has NOT made women freak out en masse if a man opens a door for them”
  
• The last living survivor of the Holocaust has passed away. This actually really scares me because I feel as though we’re now on the brink of a long process of forgetting. How will the average person 50, 100 years from now comprehend the Holocaust now that it’s moved out of the realm of immediacy associated with it having still been rooted “in our time” with those who lived through it still among us?