MEDIEVAL HUMOUR? WOLFRAM'S PARZIVAL AND THE CONCEPT OF THE COMIC IN MIDDLE HIGH GERMAN ROMANCES

This article questions the common view that modern concepts of humour can easily be applied to the interpretation of medieval texts, and specifically examines the extent to which the idea of humour as Weltanschauung (as outlined in Jean Paul's School for Aesthetics) is applicable. I offer a different approach to Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, based on a rhetorical theory of the ridiculous as expounded in the Rhetorica ad Herennium, Cicero, and Quintilian. On this basis I reconsider the relation between delectatio and utilitas in the romance. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]