Zeeman, Nicolette.
Paul Strohm, ed. Middle English (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 222-40.
Zeeman treats the "chanson d'aventure" as an imaginative (rather than expository) articulation of literary theory, focusing on use of the device in BD, LGWP, the opening of Piers Plowman, and other works.
Templeton, Willis Lee, II.
DAI A67.07 (2007): n.p.
Compares the "displays of masculine grief" in BD, the "Alliterative Morte Arthure," and "Sir Orfeo" with "norms of chivalric masculinity," investigating them in light of theories of Judith Butler and Jacques Derrida.
Facing-page translation of BD, based on the Riverside edition and rendered in modern octosyllabic couplets. Includes brief notes, a biographical note about Chaucer, an introduction by the translator, and a foreword by Bernard O'Donoghue.
Johnson examines Chaucer's attitudes about and representations of the "workings of the soul in stirring itself towards God," comparing Bo to its Boethian original in light of late fourteenth-century pastoral instruction and tracing similar sentiments…
Given its resonance with references to duties of friendship that preface many astrolabe treatises, Chaucer's reference to his young son Lewis as his "frend" may accede to the wishes of adult friends who also wished for "a companionable guide to…
Eagleton, Catherine.
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 38 (2007): 303-26.
Evidence from diagrams in the manuscripts of Astr suggests that the diagrams may have influenced construction of later extant medieval astrolabes, perhaps encouraged by Chaucer's "posthumous fame." Includes black-and-white and color illustrations.
Basquin, Edmond A.
Technical Communication 28 (1981): 22-24.
Summary description of Astr that describes Chaucer's "admirable textbook method" and comments on his "rules of good technical writing," including simple diction and syntax, awareness of audience, repetition for emphasis, and copious illustrations.
Kelly, Stuart.
Stuart Kelly. The Book of Lost Books: An Incomplete History of All the Great Books You Will Never Read (New York: Random House, 2005), pp. 105-09.
Comments on implications of the lists of works in Chaucer's Ret and their relationship to the fragmentary nature of CT.
McCormack, Frances.
Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2007.
Investigates Lollard vocabulary, translation strategies, and rhetorical tropes, arguing that the Parson and ParsT cannot categorically be identified as Lollard. Nonetheless, unmistakable elements of Lollardy undercut the hermeneutic stability of what…
Phillips, Susan E.
Paul Strohm, ed. Middle English (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 476-90.
Gossip transgresses the servant-master relationship in CYP, and CYT indicates that gossip underpins the discourse of official culture as well. Gossip is also fundamental to the exemplarity of Robert Mannyng's Handlyng Synne.
O'Connell, Brendan.
Kathy Cawsey and Jason Harris, eds. Transmission and Transformation in the Middle Ages: Texts and Contexts (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2007), pp. 131-56.
Chaucer addresses the "late medieval attack on analogical thought through his discussion of the failure of alchemy." SNT presents analogical thinking through its clear, but bridgeable, contrasts of spirit and body, whereas CYT offers an uncertain…
Davis, Isabel.
New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
Davis explores "intersections between medieval masculine subjectivity and the ethics of labour and living" in Langland's "Piers Plowman," Usk's "The Testament of Love," Gower's "Confessio Amantis," the poetry of Hoccleve, and Chaucer's CYPT. Reads…
Bishop, Louise M.
Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2007.
Surveys medical metaphors and the rise of English vernacular writing to trace diminution of belief in the "intrinsic healing quality" of words. As the healing power "evaporates," we find the separation of material and immaterial things, healing and…
Treanor, Lucia.
Santa Casciani, ed. Dante and the Franciscans. The Medieval Franciscans, no. 3. Boston and Leiden: Brill, 2006, pp. 229-88.
Pope Innocent III explicitly recognized the Greek letter 'tau' as representing the form of the cross and saw it as a sign of renewal in the church. Likewise the syllable 'te' was interpreted as a sign of the cross. Treanor explores graphic…
Compares "The Owl and the Nightingale" and NPT as the "best beast fables" in Middle English, examining how the diction of each poem helps to create "voice" and thereby engage an audience.
Brantley, Jessica.
Paul Strohm, ed. Middle English (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 315-34.
Brantley describes "texts that record acts of looking" as a "distinct medieval literary genre and a distinctly medieval way of knowing," addressing dream visions (including BD, PF, HF, and LGWP), mystical visions, and the parody of a visionary…
Adamina assesses the trickster qualities of the fox and of the Nun's Priest, including various kinds of linguistic slipperiness, doubleness, and flattery.
Fizzard, Allison D.
Journal of British Studies 46 (2007): 245-62.
Fizzard considers Chaucer's GP description of the Monk among other satires and accounts of monastic dress, exploring in particular debates about standards of dress among Augustinian monks.
Despite their diverse emphases, critical responses to the Monk's portrait in GP evince the same "close reading instinct" that generated E. Talbot Donaldson's "Chaucer the Pilgrim" essay and that has persisted "in an almost universal unwillingness . .…
Forhan, Kate L.
Henrik Syse and Gregory M. Reichberg, eds. Ethics, Nationalism, and Just War: Medieval and Contemporary Perspectives (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University Press, 2007), pp. 99-116.
Forhan summarizes the "dynastic quarrel" of the Hundred Years' War and describes the pacifist recommendations as prudent in Chaucer's Mel and in several works by Christine de Pizan. Treats the two writers as "catalysts" in the late medieval…
Symons, Dana M.
Sandra M. Hordis and Paul Hardwick, eds. Medieval English Comedy (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2007), pp. 83-109.
Symons compares and contrasts the comic inaction of Th with comic spectacle in MilT and in the popular romance "Sir Tristrem." A "sophisticatedly 'bad' poem," Th depends for its success on expectations that differ from those of popular literature.
Bell, Kimberly K.
Eileen A. Joy, Myra J. Seaman, Kimberly K. Bell, and Mary K. Ramsey, eds. Cultural Studies of the Modern Middle Ages (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), pp. 23-47.
Bell argues that "The Joe Schmo Show" and Th "use metafictional parody to 'refunction' generic forms and critique stereotypes of masculinity."
Rudat, Wolfgang E. H.
CEA Critic 58.2 (1996): 35-47.
Allusive echoes among the GP description of the Prioress, WBP, and the biblical Proverbs suggest that Chaucer subtly condemns the Prioress for sexual excess.
