In "The Medieval Canon", van Liere states that while a canon had been established during the Medieval period, non-canonical texts were popularly used because of their ability to fill in the gaps and answer questions about canonical texts. Van Liere also states that with the creation of the printing press in the Middle Ages, the inclusion of non-canonical texts dropped dramatically. I'd like to argue that the inclusion of non-canonical texts didn't disappear after the creation of the printing press, but that they moved to different mediums. A printing press meant that there was no way to add non-canonical texts into the canon as it was printed the same way every time, but the insight non-canonical texts provided were and are still valuable.
As Yoshiko Reed spoke about last week, we can still see how these non-canonical texts are used and interpreted today. Even depictions of canonical books, like the movie 'Noah' that we watched a clip from in class, push outside of what is written in order to explain things the canonical text cannot. If these interpretations are happening in our world, where a set canon is widely known and accepted, I find it very likely that non-canonical texts and interpretations of canonical texts were used for understanding even after the creation of the printing press in the Middle Ages.
No comments:
Post a Comment