The Stag of Love: The Chase in Medieval Literature. Cornell University Press 1974. 249pp. 19 illustrations.
A sport and a military exercise, the hunt became a forceful metaphor in hundreds of literary texts from classical antiquity to the medieval romances in French, German and English. Hunting could represent any eager pursuit, or disaster, but none so prevalent as the arts and mystique of love. Following a chapter on how people hunted, the book discusses Ovid, the continental romances, and English poems from Beowulf to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
