Considers TC, MLT, and LGW in the larger context of the idea of "raptus" (rape or abduction) and its implications for national and other borders and for female status.
Gillespie, Vincent.
Mary Carr, K. P. Clarke, and Marco Nievergelt, eds. On Allegory: Some Medieval Aspects and Approaches (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2008), pp. 231-56.
Surveys distinctions between the restrictive "allegory of theologians" and the expansive "allegory of the poets," arguing that Chaucer's poetry is a radical form of the latter. Chaucer's works decenter the author and thereby pose "new kinds of…
Harriss, Gerald.
Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Harriss studies English social and political history from the Hundred Years' War to the Wars of the Roses as a period of cultural transformation that established the "shape of English society and government" that "it was to retain until the Civil…
Hernández Pérez, Ma Beatriz.
Liminar: Estudios sociales y humanisticos 6.2 (2008): 15-30
Examines Chaucer's works, particularly BD and LGW, in connection to female patronage networks in the late fourteenth century in England, France, and the Iberian Peninsula. Argues that the new cultural and political role of many aristocratic women had…
Denny-Brown analyzes sartorial changes accompanying the figure of Fortune from the twelfth century through the late medieval period, considering (along with works by other authors) Chaucer's For, Bo, Form Age, Wom Unc, BD, and MerT. Chaucer's uses of…
Corrie, Marilyn, ed.
Oxford: Blackwell: 2007; Reissued as a print-on-demand volume, Malden, Mass.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009.
Eleven essays on topics concerning late medieval English literature and its contexts: Signs and Symbols (Barry Windeatt), Religious Belief (Marilyn Corrie), Women and Literature (Catherine Sanok), The Past (Andrew Galloway), Production and…
Cooper, Lisa H., and Andrea Denny-Brown, eds.
New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.
Eight essays by various authors, an introduction by the editors, an afterword by D. Vance Smith, and an index. The essays consider Lydgate's poetry in relation to "the role of material goods and the material world in the formation of late-medieval…
Cole, Andrew.
Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
Post-Wycliffite writing has a different character from that which preceded it. Writers of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries, including Chaucer, produced works with this novel character, often defined as heretical. Cole connects…
Clifton, Nicole.
Literature Compass 5.1 (2008): 158-64.
Pedagogical portfolio (containing material such as bibliography, sample syllabi, and discussion questions) for study of Middle English romances, including several works by Chaucer.
Surveys the forms, topics, and contexts of Middle English writing, clarifying its construction from various literary traditions set against a number of social, economic, and political conditions. The discussion is divided into five broad categories…
Chaucer and other writers of the "middle strata" of English society (Gower and Langland) "imagine economic activity" in ways that are much like the views recorded in documentary writing. Such writings by societal, administrative, and governmental…
Bovaird-Abbo, Kristin Lee.
DAI A69.06 (2008): n.p.
Considers Chaucer's use of Arthurian legend, from his use in TC of the traditional French conception of Lancelot for Troilus to his examination of the subtext the legend provides for the fabric of fourteenth-century English society. In particular,…
Anderson, Miranda.
Miranda Anderson, ed. The Book of the Mirror: An Interdisciplinary Collection Exploring the Cultural History of the Mirror. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2007, pp. 70-79.
Anderson illustrates the use of mirror metaphors, common in medieval literature and theology alike, in Chaucer's texts (e.g., SqT, KnT, Rom, For, and Wom Unc). Humanity's internal mirror should reflect the image of God, but human reason can be…
Bale, Anthony.
Literature Compass 5.5 (2008): 918-34.
Surveys medieval notions of authorship from the twelfth century to the late fifteenth century, commenting on topics such as anonymity, laureateship, Mandeville's "Travels," "The Cloud of Unknowing," "The Book of Margery Kempe," and the development…
Bate, Jonathan, and Susan Brock.
Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture 7 (2007): 341-58.
Overview of workshops conducted under the auspices of CAPITAL (Creativity and Performance in Teaching and Learning), a combined effort of the University of Warwick and the Royal Shakespeare Company. The authors also comment on a "study day"…
Bliss, Jane.
Rochester, N.Y.; and Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2008.
Bliss surveys the variety of ways that names, naming, and namelessness in romance "contribute to our understanding" of the genre, focusing on Middle English narratives but also discussing French and Anglo-Norman analogues. She identifies a number…
Bloom, Harold, ed. [Cornelius, Michael G., vol. ed.]
New York: Infobase, 2008.
An anthology of eighty-three responses to Chaucer and his works excerpted from commentaries written from the fourteenth through the twentieth centuries: fourteenth (2), fifteenth (9), sixteenth (20), seventeenth (4), eighteenth (10), nineteenth (35),…
Pakkala-Weckström, Mari.
Andreas H. Jucker and Irma Taavitsainen, eds. Speech Acts in the History of English (Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2008), pp. 133-62.
Pakkala-Weckström examines the speech act of promising and the special conditions needed to constitute a binding promise in Middle English, drawing examples from several of Chaucer's works: FranT, ClT, WBT, TC, FrT, and ShT. Certain formulaic words…
Addresses word choice in Thomas Hoccleve's English translation of Henry Suso's "Ars moriendi," a Latin text. Chaucer's use of the word "similitude" shows that it had entered the English language; however, Hoccleve translates both imago" and…
Sauer, Hans.
Masachiyo Amano, Michiko Ogura, and Masayuki Ohkado, eds. Historical Englishes in Varieties of Texts and Contexts: The Global COE Programme, International Conference 2007 (New York and Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2008), pp. 387-403.
Surveys the structure, frequency, and functions of interjections in the English language, tracing discussion of this word class in linguistic commentary and in Beowulf, MilT, and modern comic books.
Looks at flattery "as a practice" (for communicating with superiors) and "as a discourse" (the conventional railings against the practice) in a variety of Middle English texts. Chapter 3 examines Mel, MerT, and NPT as "conjunctions of flattery and …
Allen, Valerie.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Introduction and study guide to Chaucer and his works (especially CT), with emphasis on connections with contemporaneous history and literature. Includes advice on how to approach medieval texts; extracts from the literature with discussion; a …
