Engelhardt, George J.
Mediaeval Studies 37 (1975): 287-315.
Each of the ecclesiastical pilgrims of CT is related to a type of ethos codified in church commentary. The Clerk, who gladly teaches and learns, is a kind of "hilaris dator". The Monk is a "praelatus puer" whose passion for hunting makes him a…
The Narrator's recollection of the Pilgrim's talk and the intonations of his own voice leave their sounds in all subsequent English poetry. These sounds are the result of the brilliant combination of conventional features.
Branch, Eren Hostetter.
Dissertation Abstracts International 35 (1975): 7861A.
Boccaccio's "Teseida" is about social relationships and its theme is the proper behavior of rational people in a rational society. The KnT also treats social behavior, but its concern is people's attitude towards irrational, superhuman forces.
Cowgill, Bruce Kent.
Philological Quarterly 54 (1975): 670-79.
The tournament described in Part IV is archaic. Chaucer's purpose is to dissociate the Knight from the ideals of his age and thus align the tale with its narrator's portrait in the GP as an implicit reproval of the Hundred Years' War.
Chaucer, possibly familiar with the concept of the "poeta-theologus" current in fourteenth-century Italian poetics, actually structures KnT "in a fashion which parallels or imitates divine creation"; perfection of structural order counters the…
Green, John Martin.
Dissertation Abstracts International 35 (1975): 5403A
KnT explores four hypothetical world views: the world ruled by Fortune, exemplified by Theseus and the Theban widows; man bewailing his helplessness, Palamon and Arcite in prison; man attempting to control social disorder, the tournament; man…
Though similarities have been found, Mercury's appearance to Arcite in KnT cannot be traced to a single specific source. One should view the scene in the broad context of the theme of epic descent from which Chaucer draws several effects.
Clark, Roy Peter.
Dissertation Abstracts International 35 (1975): 6091A
The scatalogical language and happenings in MilT and SumT can be interpreted as a serious commentary. The farting, kissing, and symbolic sodomy recall the anal character of demonic ritual. The friar's misuse of the gift of tongues may reflect the…
Hirsh, John C.
English Language Notes 13 (1975): 89-90.
In forecasting Monday as the date of the flood, Nicholas seized on John's belief in current superstitions of the day's ill reputation, due both to its etymological association with the unstable moon and to the tradition of certain "perilous Mondays,"…
Chaucer's catalogues of feminine delights seem totally original, but upon closer scrutiny they reveal techniques employed by many other poets both serious and humorous.
Richards, Mary P.
Chaucer Review 9 (1975): 212-15.
Since chronicle accounts of St. Neot's habits are contradictory, three extant recensions of the saint's life provide the best explanation of Chaucer's allusion in MilT. These recensions suggest that the poet establishes an ironic parallel between…
The long tradition describing the relationship between rhetoric and emotion is reflected in Chaucer's pathetic tales. Particularly in MLT, narrative comment upon the action and vivid description are the conventional strategies used to lead the…
The dialogue between Virginius and Virginia and other intensely religious elements suggest that Chaucer's PhyT was directly influenced by the account of Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac given in contemporary mystery plays. This dramatic influence is…
McKenna, Isobel
Revue de l'Universite d'Ottawa 45 (1975): 244-62.
Investigates the relations between the sketch of the Sergeant of the Law in GP and historical evidence of contemporary members of the "Order of the Coif." Surveys the nature, activities, garb, and affiliations of fourteenth-century legal sergeants,…
The Man of Law in his Prologue, in his characterization of Custance, and in his concept of Christ's "prudent purveiaunce" consistently revises his sources, especially Nicholas Trevet, into the materialistic terms of the world governed by Fortune. …
Weiss, Merle Madelyn.
Dissertation Abstracts International 36 (1975): 2861A.
In MLT and ClT scenes are juxtaposed and time spatialized. Dramatic moments never occur. In both tales, the shaping of expectations underscores the artifice of the poet.
Delany, Sheila.
Minnesota Review, New Series 5 (1975): 104-15.
The Wife of Bath turned the sexual economics of her time to her advantage. Margery Kempe could not so capitulate. Religion became her way of asserting ownership of herself.
By subtle allusions and a skillful balance of opposites, Chaucer reveals that the Wife of Bath conspired with Jankyn to kill her fourth husband, caused Jankyn's death by betraying him to her friends, and became a garish, cynical old woman incapable…
Verbal echoes and character parallels such as the Wife's hag and the Friar's yeoman/fiend indicate that the Friar's purpose is parody. He uses his theme of moral "maistrie" to debunk the Wife's marital "maistrie." His view of human nature is…
Reads Dryden's version of WBT (from his "Fables") and his comments on the tale as reflections of his sensitivity to Chaucer's wit, humor, "genial irony," "gentle sarcasm," and especially his clever juxtapositions--the "imaginative setting of one…
McVeigh, Terrence A.
Classical Folia 29 (1975): 54-58.
Tradition relates the sin of simony to leprosy and sodomy, as evidenced by John Wyclif's "Tractatus De Simonia." The physical abnormalities of the Pardoner and Summoner in CT can thus be seen as symbolic of their simony.
Beall, Chandler B.
English Language Notes 13 (1975): 85-86.
The famous descriptive epithet of the Clerk, "And gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche" (GP, 308), may have been suggested by a sentence from Seneca's epistle to Lucilius (VI,4): "Ego vero omnia in te cupio transfundere, et in hoc aliquid gaudeo…
Although allegorical and historical justifications have been given for Griselda's suffering in ClT, the story is Chaucer's attack on the tyranny and injustice of her situation. In a different way, Webster condemns tyrannical persecution in the…
