Metro Wines Blog

News Release: March 14th, 2022

About: Christopher Mead Armitage Book Signing: Unlocking My WordHoard

Please join us at the newly renovated MetroWines on Saturday, April 23rd at 6pm, to meet Christopher Mead Armitage who will present and sign his new book of poetry, Unlocking My WordHoard.

 

The event is open to all and there is no charge. No reservations necessary. And as always, wine, beer and sparkling water will be available for purchase at the bar. 

Christopher Mead Armitage, who joined the UNC-Chapel Hill faculty in 1967, specializes in seventeenth- and twentieth-century English and Canadian literature. His lively style and personal interest in his students have earned him several awards for excellent teaching: UNC Board of Governors Award for career excellence in teaching in 2009, a Tanner Award for excellence in undergraduate instruction in 2003, his second Bowman and Gordon Gray chair (1986-1989, 2005-2010) for excellence in inspirational teaching of undergraduates, the first UNC Professor of Distinguished Teaching in 1995, and the Nicholas Salgo Award in 1981.

 

Armitage earned a bachelor’s degree with honors (1954) and a master’s degree (1958) from Oxford University. He earned a second master’s degree from the University of Western Ontario in Canada in 1964, and a doctorate from Duke University in 1967. Since 1970 he has returned annually to England to conduct a six-week study program on “Shakespeare in Performance” for students and alumni. In addition, Armitage lectures frequently for the Carolina Speakers program. He appeared on horseback and in eighteenth-century costume to represent William R. Davie at UNC’s Bicentennial and on later occasions.

 

His recent publications include The Poetry of Piety: An Annotated Anthology of Christian Poetry, which he compiled with UNC alumnus Rev. Dr. Ben Witherington; and “Blue China and Blue Moods: Oscar Fashioning Himself at Oxford” in Oscar Wilde: The Man, His Writings and His World, ed. Robert N. Keane.

Unlocking My Wordhoard: Poems and Prose with Illustrations is in plain formal English. Historical references are explained in notes below a poem as are sources of quotations. 

The title, Unlocking My Wordhoard, is modern English for the phrase wordheord onleoc meaning the poet “unlocks his word-hoard.” It recurs in Old English poems such as Beowulf, line 259, and Widsith, line 1. Old English is the English language used in Anglo-Saxon England prior to 1066 when the Norman-French conquest of England started a long process of modifying the language by absorbing French linguistic practices. They influenced the Middle English spoken and written by Chaucer and other medieval writers. Linguists consider that Shakespeare’s works represent Early Modern English. As the international language of the modern world, the English language is continually evolving.

The poems are in three divisions; the first is related to historical and public matters, the second, to famous poets or their work, the third, more personal, with some heartfelt poems, others jesting. Most of the poems are short and attempt to concentrate on the essence of events such as falling in love or the German invasion of Russia in World War II. The prose that follows explores such subjects as the author as a child exposed to war; studying with C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien; and participation in sports and theatrical productions.

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