"With this collection of Latin texts and facing page English translations, Cecilia Gaposchkin and Phyllis Katz offer a valuable treasure to scholars and students of medieval Europe—the hagiographic, liturgical, and homiletic texts that actually played a role in shaping the memory of the sainted king of France, Louis IX. For too long, we have been mesmerized by the eloquent words of the privileged noble, Jean de Joinville, whose memoir had no impact at all during the Middle Ages. Gaposchkin and Katz help to break Joinville’s spell, and thus to place us much closer to the ways in which late medieval people perceived and remembered Saint Louis." —Sharon Farmer, University of California, Santa Barbara
"With Blessed Louis, the Most Glorious of Kings, M. Cecilia Gaposchkin makes a groundbreaking contribution to the fields of medieval history, hagiography, and historical memory. Of the five main texts she edits and translates here, four are appearing in print for the first time, and none has ever before been translated into English. These exciting new texts give us a fresh understanding of how Saint Louis was represented in the century after his canonization." —Sean L. Field, University of Vermont
"Joinville's portrait of his royal friend Louis IX remains understandably appealing to modern readers, but the Roman Church did after all canonize the king, and it is from the texts gathered here that we gain valuable insight into how members of the royal court and of the Franciscan and Dominican orders, some of whom had labored on behalf of his canonization, remembered and honored Saint Louis in the first few generations following his death." —Lester K. Little, Smith College
“Gaposchkin introduces the reader to the hagiographical tradition of St. Louis, the manuscript tradition of these particular texts, and the themes that featured so prominently in these early lives: his humility and other virtues, devotion to the cross and relics, his ascetic practices, his crusading and, of course, the divine providence and protection during his life and the miracles that were immediately reported after his death.” —H-France Review
“An extraordinarily rich and useful resource to scholars working on Saint Louis as well as on medieval hagiography and the cult of saints. . . . A treasure trove of information.” —Renaissance Quarterly
“This collection of primary texts offers readers a vivid sense of the various hagiographic and liturgical materials that might have formed part of the devotional tradition surrounding a saint in the later Middle Ages. . . . this collection makes accessible to a wide range of people a vibrant and rich portrait of medieval devotion to Saint Louis.” —Renaissance and Reformation
