Medieval Festival
The Medieval Festival spanned the entire 1983-84 school year, celebrating medieval life and culture with a robust itinerary of music, dance, drama, lectures, dinners, games, and more. The festival was organized by Professors Milla Riggio of the English Department, Roger Shoemaker of the Theater and Dance Department, and Borden Painter of the History Department. Lectures on medieval life and society were planned throughout the semester, delivered by various faculty members, and the festival concluded with a May Day celebration on May 5. Among other festivities, a highlight of the events was the performance of the 15th century morality play Wisdom, one of the earliest surviving medieval plays. The play was directed by Shoemaker and Riggio and performed April 13-14, 1984 during a symposium on medieval life and culture, as well as on May 5 in the context of the May Day festivities.
The 1983-84 festival was supported by the Hewlett-Mellon fund, the Cesare Barbieri Center of Italian Studies, and the Connecticut Humanities Council. With the help of this funding, the festival sponsored a Wisdom Symposium, gathering several distinguished scholars on medieval drama to the campus on April 14, 1984. Among them: David Bevington, University of Chicago; Donald C. Baker, University of Colorado at Boulder; Gail MacMurray Gibson, Davidson College; Alexander Johnston, University of Toronto; and David Parry, Cambridge University. Events were open to the public. Following the symposium, Riggio published a collection of essays about the play, called “The Wisdom symposium: papers from the Trinity College Medieval Festival,” a copy of which is available in the Trinity Library.
The festival culminated in a raucous May Day Festival, held in the main quad on May 5, 1984. Singers, dancers, actors, musicians, fencers, and jesters performed throughout the day, and 25 vendors sold their art as part of an outdoor craft fair. Medieval culinary delights included roast beast, scorched capon, wildberry punch, vegetable gruel, beef pie, and sherry trifle. Open to the public, events were geared towards children and adults alike, from juggling, fencing, and maypole dancing to dramatic productions and 15th century music performed in the Chapel by Siena Music Consort, Bel Courtoisie, and Trinity’s Concert Choir. The Trinity Jesters performed the Second Shepherds’ Play, directed by Matt Moore ‘85, and Wisdom was performed for the third time in Hamlin Hall, as it had been in April.
It was decided that Wisdom should be staged in Hamlin Hall, which most closely resembled a 15th century “Great Hall” as it is referenced in the play. In an article edited by Riggio about the staging of the play, she noted that the banquet tables in Hamlin Hall proved crucial to the production of the play and the development of its themes in performance. As the audience feasts alongside the players, Riggio wrote, “An interesting irony develops, too; feasting and drinking are emblems of sin in a play presented to feasters. The play acknowledges the audience (here indirectly), only to implicate them in the world of sin.” Wisdom’s moral tension comes from the personification of the three “Mights” - Mind, Will, and Understanding - as each in tandem falls prey to the allure of sinful behavior. Inspired by Catholic doctrine, the play has historically been considered overly didactic, “too ritualized to be successful,” as Riggio wrote. However, her and Shoemaker’s goal in producing this play was to demonstrate the play’s salience contrary to these disparaging judgments.
Sources
Trinity College in the Twentieth Century: A History (2000) by Peter and Knapp, pp. 474-481.
The Wisdom Symposium: Papers from the Trinity College Medieval Festival (1986) by Mila Riggio.
The Trinity Reporter, Spring 1984.
The Trinity Reporter, Winter 1984.
Trinity Tripod, 11-15-1983.