An Unofficial 'The Rest Is History' Reading List
151. Valentine's Day
February 14, 2022
Description
Books Referenced
Author: Cicero
Context:
Tom describes Chaucer reading this book in 'The Parliament of Fowls' - 'So the plot of it is that Chaucer is reading a book by Cicero, The Dream of Scipio. And he falls asleep.'
Author: Geoffrey Chaucer
Context:
Tom discusses this poem extensively as the first English literary work to mention Valentine's Day in connection with romance - 'the first kind of mention that we get in English poetry is in a poem by Chaucer called The Parliament of Fowls'
Author: Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun
Context:
Tom mentions Chaucer translating this medieval work when discussing the language of courtly love - 'Chaucer is very keen on that, translating the romance of the Rose'
Author: Robert Graves
Context:
Implied reference when discussing Emperor Claudius - 'the stutterer, the hero of Robert Graves' (transcribed as 'Grayson') - distinguishing the early Emperor Claudius from Claudius Gothicus
Author: Samuel Butler
Context:
Tom references this 18th century compendium when discussing Catholic attempts to explain Valentine's Day origins - 'Butler as in Butler's Lives, the great kind of compendium of saints' lives that gets written in the 18th century'
Author: Anonymous
Context:
Dominic mentions this 1797 publication as a manual for writing Valentine poems - 'somebody publishes a book called The Young Man's Valentine Writer. So a manual about how to write nice Valentine poems'
Author: Salman Rushdie
Context:
Referenced in discussion of the fatwa issued against Salman Rushdie on Valentine's Day - 'the issuing of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie by the Ayatollah Khamenei'