Overview:
Unquestionably one of the finest literary works of the Middle Ages, Piers Plowman has a legitimate claim to be regarded as the pre-eminent religious poem in English. The only known work of poet William Langland [1330(?)–1388(?)], Piers Plowman is extant in three, potentially four, distinct versions: conventionally designated as the A, B, C, and Z – texts; and witnessed in over fifty-five manuscripts. Whilst it can be described in the broadest terms as an allegorical dream-vision written in alliterative verse, the poem incessantly challenges the boundaries of generic conventions, and its idiosyncrasies do not readily lend themselves to pat literary classification. The poem's narrative impetus (such as it is) is provided by the narrator Will's question to the personification
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Citation: Stevenson, Kath. "Piers Plowman". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 01 April 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=2810, accessed 26 November 2024.]
