This question is intended to stimulate some discussion on REED-L
concerning a subject which may invite some speculation.
One of the primary editorial principles for selecting records
for REED volumes lies in the criteria that a potential record should
reflect PERFORMANCE. In principle, this means that records that can
directly or indirectly indicate an activity with either a mimetic
and/or a musical component are included. These records are undoubtably
the core of the present REED volumes: payments to minstrels,
inventories of costumes etc... It is often the case, however, that
questions of suitability are raised concerning records that help fill
the social context of those performances or performers. For instance,
in the REED: Lancashire vol., records that mention performers as
"witnesses in court cases unrelated to performance or as tax-payers or
landowners" are excluded. Richard Rastall argues, in a recent review
of REED: Lancs. (Music and Letters 74(Aug. 1993),417-21) that this
excluded material is "precisely what we need to build up pictures of
artistic life through the biographies of players and musicians". His
comment, perhaps rightly, calls into question the adequacy of the
performance-only policy. Granted that a policy that includes all
possible records would greatly increase the size of future REED
volumes, is there a legitimate place for context alongside records of
performance?
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____________________ ____________________
_| \ / |_
_|| Steven J. Killings | Omnis Mundi ||_
||| Centre | Creatura |||
|||For Medieval Studies| |||
||| University | Quasi Liber et |||
||| of Toronto | Pictura |||
||| | |||
||| killings@ | Nobis est et |||
||| epas.utoronto.ca | Speculum |||
|||___________________ | ___________________|||
||____________________\|/____________________||
|_____________________\|/_____________________|
