Piers Plowman the A Version: Passus 7, lines 171-196

Abstract

This translation assignment provided an opportunity to dismantle the mystique around Middle English and allowed for me and my classmates to add to the conversation started by William Langland in the late 14th century. In Passus 7, Piers struggles to motivate the now complacent field of folk to work as they have swapped their farming implements for mugs of ale at the tavern. Exasperated and out of options, Piers summons Hunger to lay waste against the wasters, swindlers, and “fakers” who have been idling away and threatening the safety of the community by ignoring their obligations to tend the crops. The context of this particular episode shared historical parallels with the era of the Great Depression, and specifically the Dust Bowl, which affected much of the Great Plains region in the United States. Building from this parallel, I decided that translating the dialogue between Piers and Hunger in the style of 1930s parlance would be not only thematically appropriate but creatively intriguing as an adaptation.