Answering these questions enables you to relate material from the text to your own personal experiences.
Disease and plague inevitably affect the life and culture of a society. Do you detect any similarities between the impact of the Black Death and that of the modern-day AIDS phenomenon? Discuss.
What kinds of music from your own day and time might you characterize as ars nova? What musical techniques, rhythms, lyrics, or instrumentation make this music new?
Why do you think mysticism was so common in the 14th century? Do you see any parallels between early modern mysticism and its “New Age” counterpart?
Describe a contemporary character “on pilgrimage” in the style of Chaucer.
What might Christine de’ Pizan have to say about 21st-century women?
