Presents a study of intellectual life - teaching, preaching, the production of books, and the pursuit of scholarship - at one of England's greatest monasteries at the end of the Middle Ages. This study demonstrates the vitality of education and learning in English cloisters.

A Monastic Renaissance at St Albans is a study of intellectual life - teaching, preaching, the production of books, and the pursuit of scholarship - at one of England's greatest monasteries at the end of the Middle Ages. It has always been assumed that the monasteries fell into decline long before the Dissolution, but this study demonstrates the continuing vitality of education and learning in English cloisters and even uncovers evidence of a revival in Classical studies comparable to the continental Renaissance.

This is likely to prove an important book. Intellectual and institutional history are both greatly advanced in Clark's analysis by being married to one another, and late medieval monastic history is rescued from the slough where it has languished due to the abiding influence of Knowles and Coulton.