Explores the relationship between reality and romance in KnT, comparing the Tale's presentation of details and ideals with those found in Froissart's "Chronicle," and arguing that the Knight operates with the "assumptions of chronicle history" and…
Distinguishes between the "clerical" and "non-clerical" traditions of "de casibus" tragedy in medieval tradition, observing the emphasis on the goddess Fortuna in the latter, and claiming that MkT "belongs to the non-clerical tradition." In ignoring…
Jordan, Robert M.
Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and the Arts 2 (1960): 278-305.
Challenges the universal applicability of the "organic" ideal (form equating to content) of New Criticism, arguing that it is applicable to modern novels but not earlier narratives. Explores Chaucer's and his audience's "lively consciousness of his…
Grennen, Joseph E.
Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and the Arts 4 (1962): 225-40.
Identifies alchemical puns and their thematic/metaphoric potential in CYPT, focusing on "multiplie," "fire," and the figure of the "cosmic furnace" in 8.1407-8. Provides conceptual and contextual backgrounds from alchemical commentaries and suggests…
Pratt, Robert A.
Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and the Arts 5 (1963): 316-2.
Discusses medieval manuscripts that combine materials from Walter Map's "Valerius," the "golden book" of Theophrastus, and excerpts from Jerome's "Adversus Jovinianum," focusing on the seven manuscripts that include the latter two, and showing how…
In CYPT, one finds a "rhetorical demystification of alchemy's textual mystification of work and material production" and a commentary on counterfeiting and the impotence of alchemy as a "projection of masculine fears of sexual impotence."
Beach, Charles Franklyn.
CSL: The Bulletin of The New York C. S. Lewis Society 26. 4-5 (1995): 1-11.
Describes C. S. Lewis's formulation of courtly love and applies it to TC, arguing that Chaucer exaggerates certain of its features to show its "weaknesses" (particularly through humor, Pandarus, and the narrator) and to replace it with divine love.
Ruiz Sánchez, Marcos.
Cuadernos de filologia clásica: Estudios latinos 34.02 (2014): 241-65.
Studies several versions of the story of PardT, identified as tale type AT 763 ("The Treasure Finders who Murder One Another"). Assesses the functions of the characters, the genres in which it has been written, and the purposes of the story…
Coletes Blanco, Agustin.
Cuadernos de Filologia Inglesa 2 (1986): 63-81.
MilT is a typical fabliau in form and content, but it goes beyond the conventions of the genre in its links with the rest of CT, its metafictive deep structure, and its riches of lexicon parody.
Martínez López, Miguel.
Cuadernos del CEMYR (Centro de Estudios Medievales y Renacentistas) 27 (2019): 109-44.
Examines "exceptional crimes" in CT in the context of the main English legal texts that regulated, prosecuted, and punished medieval criminals. The procedural singularities of this type of prosecution are explored first through the analysis of the…
Sánchez-Martí, Jordi.
Cuadernos del CEMYR 20 (2012): 93-102.
Analysis of literary patronage from the Anglo-Saxon times until the end of the fourteenth century, when royal patronage was essential for authors such as Chaucer.
Gómez Lara, Manuel José.
Cuadnernos del CEMYR (Centro de Medievales y Renacentistas) 16 (2008): 117-44.
Studies the relationship between sex and laughter in CT both as a way of conveying a didactic purpose and as a manner of representing society and social relations--mostly across gender lines.
Cheney, Patrick.
Curtis Perry and John Watkins, eds. Shakespeare and the Middle Ages (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. 103-25.
Cheney examines how Shakespeare's "The Phoenix and Turtle" echoes PF, particularly as "a poem about the politics of authorship." As a "great poet of self-crowning," Spenser responds to Chaucer's self-effacing pursuit of fame. Shakespeare sets these…
Boenig, Robert.
Curtis Perry, ed. Material Culture and Cultural Materialisms in the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Arizona Studies in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, no. 5 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001), pp. 1-15.
For medieval poets, the "hyperreality of musical instruments" was "more significant" than was their reality. In "Beowulf," the harp signifies Hrothgar's agenda of political conquest and order; in Machaut's "Remedy of Fortune," the "instruments…
Runstedler, Curtis.
Curtis Runstedler. Alchemy and Exemplary Poetry in Middle English Literature (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023), pp. 89-129.
Explores the "moral value for Chaucer's audience" of CYPT and articulates "alchemical connections" elsewhere in CT, especially SNT. Focuses on the diction and imagery of CYP, on CYT as a negative exemplum, and on the Yeoman's final rejection of…
Traces the development of "all" and "quite" in English usage, focusing on Spenser's uses of them as adverbs and adjectives, and investigating Chaucer's usage as precedent. Tabulates the usage of both poets. In French, with an English summary.
An abstract of a paper that considers ClT and Petrarch's version of the Griselda tale in comparison with "Laxdaela Saga" and Marie de France's "Le Fresne". In all, the central female figure "possesses a greater value than may at first appear."
Scott, Anne.
Cynthia Kosso and Anne Scott, eds. The Nature and Function of Water, Baths, Bathing, and Hygiene from Antiquity Through the Renaissance (Boston: Brill, 2009), pp. 407-26.
Scott addresses use of water imagery in medieval narratives. In MilT, flood imagery affects all classes of society and provides a common experience through which the satire of each individual class can occur.
Carlson, Cindy.
Cynthia Kuhn and Cindy Carlson, eds. Styling Texts: Dress and Fashion in Literature (Youngstown, N.Y.: Cambria Press, 2007), pp. 33-48.
Carlson examines motifs of shame and covering in the two disrobing scenes in ClT, arguing that Griselda's request for a smock to cover herself before she leaves Walter indicates that she has "shown a self that cannot be shamed by Walter, by poverty…
Russell, G. A.
D. A. Pearsall and R. A. Waldron, eds. Medieval Literature and Civilization: Studies in Memory of G. N. Garmonsway (London: Athlone, 1969), pp. 211-27.
Considers PrPT in light of the GP description of the Prioress and ShT, arguing that the tone, style, verse form, and liturgical echoes of PrPT are appropriate to the vocation of the Prioress and create a powerful impression of strength, humility, and…
Rothwell, William.
D. A. Trotter, ed. Multilingualism in Later Medieval Britain (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 2000), pp. 213-32.
Studies the "York Memorandum Book" for examples of the ways Latin, French, and English "intertwined" in medieval England. Rothwell opens with commentary on the vocabulary of a passage from MLP in which Chaucer "Englishes" several French words and…
Burnley, J. D.
D. Alan Cruse et al., eds. Lexikologie: Ein Internationales Handbuch zur Natur und Struktur von Wortern und Wortschatzen/Lexicology: An International Handbook on the Nature and Structure of Words and Vocabularies. 2 vols. . Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2002, 2: pp. 1468-71.
Describes the historical and regional characteristics of Chaucer's vocabulary, his particular uses of various registers, and how he adapts them to circumstances and contexts.
Cullum, P. H.
D. M. Hadley, ed. Masculinity in Medieval Europe (London and New York: Longman, 1999), pp. 178-96.
Uses several case studies to assess medieval male clerical behavior and its transgressions. Briefly discusses Nicholas and Absolon of MilT as an illumination of the dilemma of young medieval clerics, caught between their vows of celibacy and their…
Everitt, Charles.
D. Phil. Thesis. Oxford University, 1985. Copyright 1986. Fully accessible via http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:69a69618-50df-4f27-8291-98546df046eb (last accessed January 22, 2026)
Studies the "ars dictaminis" in late-medieval England, focusing on its influence and uses in administrative circles, ecclesiastical and secular, with particular attention to the career of Gilbert Stone, an "episcopal chancellor." Includes discussion…
