Echo’s Testimony and the Narcissus Myth in Alfonso X the Wise’s General History

Speaker:

Nicholas Ealy is Professor of English & Modern Languages at the University of Hartford (Connecticut, US). His research focuses primarily on the literature of erotic and spiritual love from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries. He is the author of the monograph Narcissism and Selfhood in French Medieval Literature: Wounds of Desire (Palgrave 2019) and is currently writing a monograph that examines narcissism and testimony in medieval and Early Modern Spanish literature.

Abstract:

Artists, writers and thinkers have long considered Ovid’s myth of Narcissus as a foundational text containing answers to questions regarding human selfhood and desire. The General History (ca. 1270), a universal history written under the direction of Alfonso X the Wise, contains an Old Spanish version of the myth that at times diverges significantly from Ovid’s account by adding scenes, related myths and commentary. This talk will address the uniqueness of this version’s account by focusing on the figure of Echo who, in love with Narcissus, can only repeat his words as she tries, in vain, to find a voice that might actualize her desires for reciprocal affection. As such, I will explore how we can look to Echo’s iterative speech as a type of testimony that, while speaking to her experience, must alter, resist and silence that of Narcissus – in ways that call into question the very nature of testimony.