Untermeyer, Louis.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1959.
Surveys major British and American writers from Chaucer to Dylan Thomas. Praises Chaucer for his lively characterizations and his "variety and vitality" of narration, with particular attention to CT, but including commentary on the poet's life and…
Weber, J. Sherwood, Jules Alan Wein, Arthur Waldhorn, and Arthur Zeiger.
New York: Holt, 1959.
Chapter 12 opens with an introduction to Chaucer's life and works, followed by appreciative commentary on CT as a comedy that is "social, not divine." Includes "Questions for Study and Discussion" on CT generally, and focused questions on KnT, MilT,…
Cautions that familiarity can blunt readers' awareness of the subtleties of satire in GP, recommending renewed attention to the characterization of the pilgrim narrator and differences between this character and "Chaucer the poet" as aspects of…
Describes and critiques a number of the paratextual notes and hard-word glosses that Thomas Speght included in his editions of Chaucer's works, noting many inaccuracies, but also demonstrating Speght's efforts to clarify words and references for his…
Ruggiers, Paul G.
College English 19 (1958): 296-302.
Assesses Chaucer's uses of Boccaccio and Boethius as source material in KnT, addressing the omission of Arcite's apotheosis and the subordination of the pagan gods to providential order. Focuses on Palamon's and Arcite's prayers and Theseus' final…
Schmidt-Hidding, Wolfgang.
Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer, 1959.
Opens with a chapter on Chaucer (pp. 9-35)--followed by ones about William Shakespeare, Henry Fielding, Thomas Sterne, Charles Lamb, Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain--surveying his self-portraits, narrative poses, characterizations, ironies, and the…
Thompson, Louis Felsinger.
Dissertation Abstracts 20.05 (1959): 1771.
Compares TC with Boccaccio's "Filostrato," arguing that Chaucer "adapted more portions" of it "than has previously been noticed," subordinating formulas, conventions, thematic concerns, and moral concerns to artful construction and "psychological…
Wilson, William Smith
Yale University Dissertation, 1960. Dissertation Abstracts International 31.06 (1970): 2893-94A. Full text available at ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.
Considers HF to be an occasional poem, perhaps "written for Christmas Revels at the Inner Temple," and reads its three parts an "an allegorical representation of the trivium" that pertains to poetry, "testing the trivium, and rejecting it, and…
Hodgson, Phyllis, ed.
[London]: University of London. Athlone Press, 1960 and 1973.
Textbook edition of FranPT and the GP description of the Franklin, with text in Middle English, notes and glossary, and discussion of the Franklin's character, possible sources of FranT, and Chaucer's "inventiveness." Includes several appendixes:…
Musgrave, Thea, composer.
London: J. & W. Chester, 1960.
Sets MerB to orchestral music, sung by tenor; text in Middle English. A Special Oder Edition / Study Score was commissioned by the Saltire Music Group, apparently in 2009.
Baker, Donald C.
University of Mississippi Studies in English 1 (1960): 97-104.
Argues that "the role of the artist as purveyor of Fame" is the fundamental unifying theme of HF and suggests that Chaucer may have intended to resolve tensions between Dantean and Boethian views of the poet (as teacher and misleader, respectively)…
Baugh, Albert C.
Wolfgang Iser and Hans Schabram, eds. Britannica: Festschrift für Hermann M. Flasdieck (Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1960), pp. 51-61.
Reviews discussions that consider Nicole de Margival's "La Panthère d'Amous" to be a source of HF, challenging most of them for lack of specificity or because shared details are conventional. Only two brief passages evince Margival's influence and…
Bayley, John.
John Bayley. The Characters of Love: A Study in the Literature of Personality (London: Constable, 1960), pp. 51-123.
Explores the characterizations in TC of Troilus, Pandarus, and, most extensively, Criseyde, explaining how Chaucer modifies their antecedents in Boccaccio's "Filostrato" by adapting the conventions and rhetoric of courtly love and creates rich…
Beichner, Paul E.
Richard J. Schoeck and Jerome Taylor, eds. Chaucer Criticism, Volume I: "The Canterbury Tales" (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1960), pp. 117-29.
Praises the "high organic unity" of MilT, attributing it to effective characterization of the major actors: "by making him 'hende' in one sense or another, Chaucer has motivated each incident of the plot involving Nicholas; and similarly, he has…
Bethurum, Dorothy, ed.
New York: Columbia University Press, 1960.
Six essays by various authors and a summary Introduction by the editor. For five essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature under Alternative Title.
Donaldson, E. Talbot.
Dorothy Bethurum, ed. Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature: Selected Papers from the English Institute, 1958-59 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), pp. 1-26.
Challenges patristic criticism for its claim that medieval literature is univocally concerned with asserting Christian "caritas" allegorically, arguing instead that poetry has a right to "say what it means and mean what it says." Illustrates the…
Kaske, R. E.
In Dorothy Bethurum, ed. Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature: Selected Papers from the English Institute, 1958-59 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), pp. 27-60.
Exemplifies the wide-ranging importance of "exegetical tradition" in explicating images and allusions in medieval literature, drawing examples from "Piers Plowman," from the Summoner's taste for garlic, onions, and leeks (GP 1.634), and from various…
Utley, Francis Lee.
Dorothy Bethurum, ed. Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature: Selected Papers from the English Institute, 1958-59 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), pp. 83-109.
Examines critical opinions about the presence of mythic, folkloric, and ritualistic images and allusions in medieval English literature, commenting on various works and critical views of them: "Beowulf," "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," accounts of…
Green, Richard Hamilton.
Dorothy Bethurum, ed. Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature: Selected Papers from the English Institute, 1958-59 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), pp. 110-33.
Summarizes theories and meanings of conventional mythographic images and allusions in medieval literature, derived from classical fables and allegorized in late-classical and medieval commentaries on such fables. Includes comments on the allusion to…
Schless, Howard.
Dorothy Bethurum, ed. Critical Approaches to Medieval Literature: Selected Papers from the English Institute, 1958-59 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), pp. 132-54.
Advocates a "contextual" approach to source study, arguing that several discussions of Dante's influence on Chaucer depend upon weak correspondences, better treated as shared tradition than direct influence. Discusses the lists of lovers in PF and…
Explores the denotative, connotative, figurative, and ironic implications of the GP description of the Wife of Bath as one who knows "muchel of wandrynge by the weye" (1.497).
