Browse Items (16472 total)

Beginning with Boethius's feminine Philosophia, Simeroth examines "her" transformation in such texts as the "Roman de la Rose" (where she becomes Reason); Boccaccio's "Convivio" (where she is a gentle lady); and HF, where Chaucer merges Philosophia…

Explores fusions of penitential values and Wycliffite ideals in Chaucer's LGW, ParsT, and Ret, arguing that he used them to counter Richard II's use of exempla to suppress political dissent.

Identifies and analyzes the motifs and imagery of death in England in the fourteenth century to the sixteenth, including discussion of the relatively positive depictions of death in TC and CT.

Examines "how the non-human (the natural, not the other-worldly) world and its creatures were voiced in several late medieval English texts," including NPT and ManT.

Studies caves in medieval literature as "agential bodies" that challenge "us to reconsider the stories of the women, monsters and marginalized beings who are made to inhabit subterranean spaces" Includes discussion of Emelye's address to Diana as…

Presents a novel modeled on CT that emulates Chaucer's frame-narrative collection of stories, "reinventing" his setting at a modern murder trial, and using a variety of narrative forms to represent the tales of the jury. The accompanying analysis…

Examines the characters of Griselda and Walter in ClT, with particular attention to the diction associated with them: "bountee" and "sadnesse" for Griselda and "shapen" for Walter. Also examines the words the characters do and do not use.

Interdependence of parts and wholes in Chaucer's works anticipates a sustained concern with fragments and remnants in later literature, especially among Reformation bibliophiles who were struggling to "re-member" the past as a form of nascent…

Bergeson explores the semantic and dramatic range of Middle English "reden"--advise, counsel, read, interpret--as it is used and enacted in BD, HF, PF, and TC.

Bahr explores parallels between manuscripts as compilations and groups of people as affinities in late medieval London. Chaucer in CT and Gower in Confessio Amantis differ in how they conceive of literary and social organization.

Meyer examines confessional discourse in John Gower's "Confessio Amantis," Chaucer's LGW, "The Book of Margery Kempe," and Robert Henryson's "Testament of Cresseid," assessing how this discourse "produc[es] truth" and conveys "textualized bodies."

Wadiak considers how Middle English romances focus on "giving and spending" as a questioning of the emergent capitalistic system, examining romances from "King Horn" through KnT and arguing that these works simultaneously shape and reflect the move…

Withers examines medieval writers' interest in the effect of medieval warfare, tactics, and technology on "the natural world," arguing that several works (including Lydgate's "Siege of Thebes," the "Alliterative Morte Darthur," and KnT) paid…

Examines the uses of memory and place to develop authoritative "ethos" in John Mandeville's "Travels," Margery Kempe's "Book," WBP, and WBT. The Wife relies on medieval commonplace texts and essentially turns her own experience into such a text.

Huber uses BD as a case study in a larger examination of depression and self-scrutiny (especially as embodied in confession) in Middle English texts.

Benton contrasts SqT and the work of the "Gawain"-poet with popular romances as a way of understanding how romances employ descriptive passages as an essential "formal and conceptual" element.

As part of an exploration of medieval efforts to understand a physical/spiritual dichotomy, the dissertation sets BD in conversation with Margery Kempe, with an eye toward development of a "unified selfhood."

In discussing Lydgate's "architectural-decorative" verses, the dissertation reflects on connections between literary and physical spaces in BD.

Using figures from Middle English literature (including Chaucer's Constance and Medea), Urban argues that the literature both dramatizes and "interrogate[s] the prevailing gender ideology."

Nakley uses postcolonial theory to consider a Chaucerian dialogue with ideas of "nationhood," examining GP, KnT, WBP, WBT, and MLT en route to arguing that CT presents England as nation, "community," and "homeland."

Considers Machaut's allusions to earlier works in his lays (e.g., "Roman de Fauvel" and "Remede de Fortune") and gauges Machaut's impact on English court poetry, using Chaucer and Froissart as examples.

Suggests that Ret should be considered as a rhetorical appeal for the prayers of readers, who are encouraged to reflect on their own readings of CT and to engage in the self-scrutiny that Ret exemplifies.

Analysis of the two fundamental CT manuscripts indicates "that the organization and theme of the individual tales affected" copy quality; for example, scribes copied moral tales more conscientiously than they copied bawdy ones, and prose tales were…

Knutson examines medieval ideas of innocence associated with penitential forgiveness in CT, "Pearl," and medieval pageant plays, suggesting that a later concept of innocence--a lack of "knowledge or experience"--shaped William Godwin's and Mary Eliza…

Considers Astr and CT within a larger analysis of the formation of intra- and extra-familial kinship bonds. Such bonds are rooted in education and common experiences.