The Clock and the Rose: Time and self-transformation in the 'Romance of the Rose' and the 'Divine Comedy'

This is a study in comparative literature and the history of ideas, focusing on shifting time consciousness at the turn of the fourteenth century. The invention of the mechanical clock is thought to have created a new paradigm characterized by quantification in science and commerce. The real paradigm shift, with deep roots in language and literature, is a movement from the inward otherworldly view whose metaphor is the Rose and toward an ontological understanding that is based upon history, experience, memory and this life, whose metaphor is the Clock.; Chapter 1 reviews time scholarship emphasizing the role played by The Rule of St. Benedict. There is an in-depth etymological survey of the word, hour, that points to the importance of the Feminine in border areas between states of being. Chapter 1 establishes the clock as the metaphor of time and links the evolution of timekeeping with the spiritual quest.; Chapter 2 reviews Guillaume de Lorris' Romance of the Rose. It explores the shamanistic spiritual journey and the dream vision. There is an in-depth analysis of the gate surrounding the Garden, and the images of Viellesce and Tens. Jean de Meun's continuation is the subject of Chapter 3. It focuses on the emerging self-consciousness of the author. Jean de Meun's journey is a spiritual trip gone wrong; it is a journey into sin, a paysage moralise.; Chapter 4 explores Dante's Divine Comedy, the medieval summa of time and self-transformation. It includes an in-depth analysis of the first terzina utilizing an original constructivist literary analysis technique that examines the importance of the internal translation process. This chapter also focuses on the border areas, particularly Inferno's dark forest and the final cantos of Paradiso. It compares Inferno to the Rose journeys. The chapter culminates with the squaring of the circle and the themes of the mechanical clock and the celestial rose at the moment of creation.; The book concludes with a summary chapter on the relationship between the Clock and the Rose metaphors in literature and architecture.