ABSTRACT
There are two main reasons why medieval literary critics should reevaluate the role of medicine in literature. The first is that most scholarship about medieval medicine has appeared since 1980; therefore, a lack of material is no longer a valid excuse for misunderstanding medical discourses. The second is that while most of the work about medieval science and literature emphasizes Chaucer and astrology, there is more to science than stargazing. Now that historians know a good deal more about medieval medicine, its relation to society, and its complex role in medieval thought, one can begin to understand how medical discourses interacted with other discourses which in turn shaped social responses to disease. These social responses to disease are influenced by a variety of disciplines, including the medical, theological, and literary.
