Langland's Piers Plowman is a profoundly Christian poem, which nevertheless has enjoyed a wide general appeal. Readers – both religious and non-religious – have been drawn by the power of Langland's fictive imagination, the rich variety of imaginary worlds in his great dream poem. This book examines the construction of the ten dreams which make up the B Text of Piers Plowman, and explores the relation of these dream-fictions to those realities with which the poet was chiefly preoccupied. This relationship is discussed under three main headings: ‘fictions of the divided mind’, in which the poet ... More

Langland's Piers Plowman is a profoundly Christian poem, which nevertheless has enjoyed a wide general appeal. Readers – both religious and non-religious – have been drawn by the power of Langland's fictive imagination, the rich variety of imaginary worlds in his great dream poem. This book examines the construction of the ten dreams which make up the B Text of Piers Plowman, and explores the relation of these dream-fictions to those realities with which the poet was chiefly preoccupied. This relationship is discussed under three main headings: ‘fictions of the divided mind’, in which the poet's mixed feelings about matters such as the value of learning find expression in imagined scenes and actions; ‘fictions of history’, in which the main events of salvation history are relived in the parallel worlds of dream; and ‘fictions of the self’, in which Langland's doubtful sense of his own moral standing as a man and a poet apparently finds expression. This chapter also addresses the controversial question of ‘autobiographical elements’ in the poem.