Resumen de Ruined landscape: images and mirages in the study of Castilian manuscript production (1284–1369)
In the present essay, I argue that the analysis of long-neglected manuscript works from thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Castile allows us to articulate “closeness” as a critical tool for the study of Iberian manuscript culture in manifold ways. To begin with, the study of these incomplete or ravaged manuscripts confers a new meaning to the idea of “close reading” of both texts and images (consistently segregated along disciplinary lines), since scholarly work ends up being nothing short of a sleuth-like search. On the other hand, however, this minute research also forces one to explore the subtle divide between intimacy and critical distance, between the illusion of unrestricted access to the past and the theoretical discomfort provoked by the impossible task of bringing these objects back to life.
