Narrative Frames in the Dialogues of Religious Controversy

Many fictional dialogues of religious controversy are embedded in narrative frames that provide the interpretative key for the fictional interreligious debate. The primary purpose of this article is to provide a taxonomic model to analyze and compare these frames, in order to identify structural patterns, potential lines of influence, and meaningful contrasts that may help us to establish clearer links and shed light on the development of this genre. To illustrate how this approach works and what kind of results it can yield, I compare the narrative frames of two dialogues produced at the opposite ends of the period we might consider the “long twelfth century”: the Disputatio Iudei et Christiani , by Gilbert Crispin—exemplary of this genre—and the Liber disputationum contra Symonem Iudeum , by Peter of Cornwall—“the latest representative in England of the tradition revived” by him. The comparison reveals evident parallels, alongside subtle shifts in tone and intent. The Liber disputationum is, in effect, an heir to Crispin’s model, while at the same time serving as a precursor to the more confrontational approaches to religious alterity that would come to define the thirteenth century

Alterity · Frame (networking) · Narrative · Order (exchange) · Period (music) · Tone (literature) · Karl Barth and Christian Theology · Medieval Literature and History · Medieval Philosophy and Theology

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