7 research outputs found
Fortune and desire in Guillaume de Machaut
Get PDFThere is a pervasive tendency, in Machaut scholarship, to read his poetry as having
value only insofar as it speaks to our postmodern age: either it is fragmented and
riven with ambiguities, or it celebrates eroticism and the things of this world for their
own sake; in any case, it resists religious and moral orthodoxy. Such readings, while
often valuable in themselves, fail to take sufficient account of the influence which
Boethian and Neoplatonic ideas had upon Machaut, and thus misunderstand his work
on a fundamental level. By paying attention to the Boethian content in the narrative
dits, and by analysing Machaut's verse more thoroughly than has been done before,
my thesis demonstrates not only this author's moral orthodoxy, but also his extremely
sophisticated didactic methods. I begin with the Confort d'ami, Machaut's most
overtly moral work. The Confort engages with the supposed 'worldly' perspective of
its imprisoned addressee, adapting biblical and classical exempla in order to coax
Charles of Navarre towards a deeper understanding of worldly fortune. In Chapter 2 I
show how, in the Prologue and the Dit du vergier, the ambiguity so beloved of critics
can serve as a moral commentary on the carnality and self-absorption of the erotic
and artistic points of view. Having established, in the preceding chapters, that this
author's approach to his subject is ambiguous and critical, in Chapter 3 I explore the
extremes of his pessimism, and show how his love poetry can incorporate
sophisticated philosophical ideas, through my analysis of the Jugement du roy de
Behaigne. The thesis culminates in a detailed reading of the Remede de Fortune.
Through his deliberately idealised statements about education, through his application
of these views to the art of courtly love, through his composition (and setting to
music) of a sequence of virtuoso lyrics, and through his explicit invocations of and
borrowings from Boethius, Machaut develops an empathic but ultimately, as I argue,
deeply sceptical vision of earthly love
Anthony Poole (c.1629-1692), the viol and exiled English Catholics
Get PDFThe bass violist and composer Anthony Poole was educated in the network of Catholic Colleges that the English Jesuits kept in Europe. He went on to be ordained a Jesuit priest and to make an outstanding contribution to the musical
life of the institutions he lived and taught in, notably the English College at Saint-Omer, in Spanish Flanders. Poole’s output will be shown to be of importance in the history of seventeenth-century instrumental music, especially in the context of the development of the sonata in England and division-viol music in Europe. His music has not been collected, catalogued or studied before,
and this thesis presents it against the backdrop of several generations of English musicians who spent all or part of their working lives abroad. The significance of migrant musicians is often neglected by comparison with that of native musicians, perhaps because the latter fit our perceptions of national styles better, and this thesis goes some way towards appraising that contribution.
The bass viol, or the ‘Brittanica Chelys’ in the words of the expatriate Latin poet Dr John Alban Gibbes, was an instrument with strong Catholic and Royalist resonances in England, and extemporising divisions on it became in post-Thirty-Years-War Europe a quintessentially English art, as will be shown in chapter one. Chapter two presents as full a biographical account as is possible at present, and chapter three considers all extant sources of Poole’s music, exploring how his works made their way to the exiled court at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, the library of Phillip Falle, the viol-playing circle of William Noble in Oxford, and elsewhere in England. This thesis contains therefore a significant contribution to our understanding of the history of English Jesuit music, the court of James II,
and the circulation of Continental music in Restoration England. Chapter four is a stylistic discussion of the music, its influences and reception, and the appendix
consists of a thematic index of Poole’s works
International copyright and the challenges of digital technology
No full textPhDDigital technology is challenging traditional copyright principles. Despite suggestions
from a number of commentators that copyright cannot survive the challenge, this
thesis aims to demonstrate that copyright can evolve and adapt rather than face
elimination. This hypothesis is tested and illustrated by means of an examination of
law in conjunction with technology, and by means of concrete examples.
Analysis of the author's position in the face of digital technology requires firstly, an
investigation of the way in which the existence and exercise of the author's copyright
itself is affected by such technology, and secondly, an examination of how the
author's standing in relation to dissemination of works generally is concerned (e.g. as
regards freedom of speech). It is with the first of these aspects that this thesis is mainly
concerned, although, for the sake of a more comprehensive view, some considerations
on the second aspect are also advanced.
This thesis examines challenges raised in the copyright field by digital technology and
the consequential problems in relation to classification of subject matter, identification
of authors, fixation and reproduction, the criterion of originality, the meaning of
publication, recognition of moral rights, recognition of economic rights, exceptions
and limitations, liability of service providers, authenticity of works, infringement,
feasibility of enforcement and conflict of laws. Broader issues relating to Government
and private control of access to the new media are also analysed.
The analysis is focused on copyright subsistence as well as infringement. Furthermore,
both the legal and the technological aspects are considered (with the aid of a
comprehensive glossary of technological terms). The approach is one of law and
technology in equal measure.
In the context of these problems there follows a critical examination and comparison
of the main national systems, the main international instruments, and the main
regional instruments. This systematic survey seeks to encapsulate the work of learned
authors in a concise manner, leading to certain proposals. The approach is one of
criticism and selection of feasible and practical solutions. Nearly all elements of the
proposed solutions exist already, albeit in a fragmented way. These solutions are
based on law and on technology, and are formulated to apply in both the analogue and
digital worlds.
The thesis concludes that for an effective solution of the problems raised by digital
technology, an international standard for copyright protection must be adopted, one
apposite for the digital world. The thesis puts forward detailed suggestions towards
the adoption of an International Digital Copyright Protection System, in the form
of definitional, obligational, conflict of laws and technological proposals, whose
common denominator is the will to find new answers for the digital challenges. The
definitional proposals will clarify conceptual questions arising from the digital
revolution. The obligational proposals will regulate the issue of exemptions from
liability and duties of Internet service providers. The conflict of laws proposals will
address the problems arising in connection with jurisdiction and applicable law on the
Internet. The technological proposals will give practical effect to the system by
focusing on deterrence and tracing of copyright infringement
Sir Hersch Lauterpacht as a prototype of post-war modern international legal thought: analysis of international legalism in the universalisation process of the European law of nations
Get PDFThis thesis explains how Sir Hersch Lauterpacht constructed his international legal theory in the universalisation process of the European law of nations. Introduction presents the general background of the universalisation process of the European law of nations. Chapter 1 discusses the situationality of Lauterpacht, which affected his life as an international lawyer, namely his Jewish background, the influence of Kelsen and the English tradition of international law. Lauterpacht's normative conception of the international community in the inter-war period is explicated in Chapter 2. hi Chapter 3,1 examine how Lauterpacht dealt with legal problems in the outlawry of war from the inter-war period to the end of the Second World War. Chapter 4 holds Lauterpacht's attempts to reconstruct the international community after World War E. Being opposed to political realism, Lauterpacht employed the Grotian Tradition in order to prove the historical value of his idealism. He moulded the function of states into the framework of his normative conception of the international community as civitas maxima with regard to recognition, collective security and the international protection of human rights. I demonstrate how Lauterpacht contributed to the work of the International Law Commission in Chapter 5 from 1952 to 1954. Chapter 6 examined the problems of the responsibility of international judges, namely their neutrality, legal reasoning, and the compatibility of’ automatic' reservation with the ICJ Statute. The conclusion is an appreciation of legalism within the framework of the universalisation of international law in the era of decolonisatio
