Saltar para o conteúdo principal

FCCNFCT Digital Services

Access the national information on scientific and technological funding in Portugal

Activity Funded

Muses at the cloister. The poetic work of Violante do Céu: Literature, music and spirituality at the monastery of Rose, in Lisbon

Musas na clausura. A obra poética de Violante do Céu: Literatura, música e espiritualidade no Mosteiro da Rosa de Lisboa

Reference
2022.08369.PTDC
Project Start Date
2023-03-01
Project End Date
2027-02-28
Principal Investigator
Coinvestigator
Scientific Area
Humanities
Funding Program
Concurso de Projetos de I&D em Todos os Domínios Científicos - 2022 - ICDT

Abstract

WHY THIS PROJECT AND AUTHOR Despite the efforts of the last 15 years to reinvigorate and study the feminine writing of Modern Age, the understanding of women’s influence in the society of that time, the literature of female authorship remains far from Literary History and Criticism. Individual and in-depth studies are lacking for each author and each work. Since HATHERLY started this research area (1990) to MORUJÃO's broad study on themes, forms, and Portuguese nun’s authors (2005) and to RAMÓN PhD on nun’s narrative, much work has been done, but much more remains to be done, until we reach an acceptable level of knowledge, dissemination and recognition of these female voices. Violante do Céu (VC) is one of those names that should be investigated. Despite a few studies that some Portuguese and Spanish researchers have dedicated to her (cf. Bibliography), there is still a vast array of themes, genres, problems, and texts that need to be highlighted through solid teamwork. VC, known as the tenth muse, configurates a confirmed celebrity in the proliferation of manuscript copies as well as in the prizes obtained in poetic contests. Her poems appeared in the preliminary of the best poets’ editions of her time (Lope, Paulo G. Andrade...) Her importance is also enhanced by the fact of being a female voice with a vast poetic production, at a time when women writings were highly unlikely, due to the social constraints that then influenced women’s action. Despite this relevance, her work has not yet been subject of a thorough and multidisciplinary study, which may capture her work both in her individuality and in the dialogue with her  contemporary authors, return it to the major canon of Portuguese literature. The excellence of VC and her importance in Portuguese culture of the Modern Age demonstrate the need for a new edition of her work and its detailed study, because only accessible texts may be read, studied and disseminated, an essential condition for its re-entry into the canon. In 1993, a part of VC work ( Rimas Várias ) was republished but this edition has long been sold out. Despite this effort, the knowledge that the current reader has of VC is limited to a very scarce number of poems, practically repeated in all anthologies and limited to those in Portuguese, even when a large part of VC production was written in Spanish, during the dual monarchy period, which is why this author is of international interest. WHAT DO WE WANT TO ACHIEVE? MOISTER aims to achieve an annotated edition of the complete work of VC (promoting a new re-edition of Rimas Várias and the 1st re-edition of Parnaso Lusitano ), together with a broad study of VC work. MOISTER also aims to reconstruct the musical text associated with the author's vilancicos and proceed with the recording of her sung performance, in an historical reconstitution of the practices of her time. WHAT IDEAS DO WE HAVE? MOISTER proposes:1) to evaluate the dialogue of VC with Portuguese and Castilian poets; 2) to explore the intertextuality between Rimas Várias and Parnaso Lusitano ; 3) to reconstruct the social networks that made possible VC production and dissemination; 4) to study the construction of female identity in VC’s poetic discourse; 5) to analyse the attitude of the poetic subject both in love and in hagiographic poetry; 6) to explore the links between the poetical and musical discourse in VC’s vilancicos . For this last aspect, the approach to VC’s vilancicos is based on an innovative inter-arts’ perspective, aiming to understand this mixed genre in the context of the musical practice of the Monastery of Rosa (where VC professed her vows), trying to ascertain whether VC was also the musical author of her own vilancicos . MOISTER will relate the poetic production of VC with the spiritual and devotional environment of her time, city, convent and religious Order. MOISTER seeks to reconstitute the cultural and devotional environment of this Dominican convent in Lisbon, based on this nun’s work taken as case study. Many of VC poems reveal the author's relations with the surrounding social environment (via circumstantial poems and dedications), something that will be addressed from the Networks Theory method, allowing to better frame the work and the author in the 17th-century literary and cultural scene. WHY WE CAN DO IT? To carry out this project, the team includes proven researchers familiar with the work of VC, who are solidly equipped with Literary and Linguistic knowledge (LEÓN;DONO;BARROS; MORUJÃO;MARTOS;RAMÓN;REIS), experts in Textual Criticism (LEÓN;DONO;MORUJÃO, MARTOS;RAMÓN), in Text Linguistics and Historical Pragmatics (BARROS), in Text Editing (MARTOS;DONO;MORUJÃO;REIS), in female monastic culture (MORUJÃO;RAMÓN;MARTOS; REIS) and in the specific area of Musicology (FERREIRA;CASTRO). A multidisciplinary methodology will be used, which links Literary Studies, Textual Criticism, Linguistic Studies, Network Theory, Digital Humanities.

Institutions

Main Institutions

  • Universidade do Porto Faculdade de Letras (UP FLUP)

Other Institutions

  • Escola Superior de Música (ESM/IPL)
  • Universidade do Minho Centro de Estudos Humanísticos (UMinho CEHUM)
  • Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED)
  • Instituto Politécnico do Porto Escola Superior de Música e das Artes do Espectáculo (IPP ESMAE)

Funding 161.058,30 €

Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) - Portugal

161.058,30 €