Laird, Edgar S.
Chaucer Review 6.3 (1972): 229-31.
The astrological details of "Complaint of Mars" indicate that in the anthropomorphic action of the poem Venus betrays Mars and becomes the mistress of Mercury, "eternally re-enact[ing] the eternal myth."
Khinoy, Stephan A.
Chaucer Review 6.4 (1972): 255-67.
Assesses the Pardoner as a "puzzle" posed by Chaucer to challenge his audience to consider the relationship between morality and story-telling. The Pardoner's dazzling rhetoric, his relics, and the tensions between his immoral prologue and moral tale…
Harwood, Britton J.
Chaucer Review 6.4 (1972): 268-79.
Tallies Chaucer's modifications of his sources in ManT, especially the digressions he adds, to show that the "subject of the tale is language." In his tale, the Manciple "sneers at" people who "can be distracted from empirical reality by language,"…
Cherniss, Michael D.
Chaucer Review 6.4 (1972): 235-54.
Argues that the Clerk's Envoy "generates a unifying theme which runs through" MerT--the possibilities of "perfection and imperfection in marriage, expressed as paradise and purgatory"--an echo of the concern with "purgatory" in WBPT. Explores the…
Stevens, Martin
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 118-31.
Rejects readings of MerT as "savage and mordant self-revelation" of the Merchant, characterizing the Merchant's wife as more similar to the Wife of Bath and the Host's Goodelief than to May. MerP is an extension of the Clerk's Envoy, the Merchant…
Kiessling, Nicolas K.
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 113-17.
Argues that the Wife of Bath's reference to an incubus (3.880) is not an aggressive critique of the Friar's "deficient virility" as editors assume but instead a gentle and teasing jibe.
Hanson, Thomas B.
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 132-39.
Compares PhyT with its sources in Livy and the "Roman de la Rose" to argue that Chaucer's retelling characterizes the Physician as amoral, consistent with the GP description.
Gallagher, Joseph E.
Chaucer Review 7.1 (1972): 44-66.
Reads TC as a sinful poetic act, acknowledged as such by Chaucer in Ret (CT 10.1086). Passionate love and Christian love are "irreconcilable" in the poem, and from the Proem of Book 3 forward, Chaucer employs an "intensifying program of disguise" of…
Elbow, Peter H.
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 97-112.
Tallies similarities and differences in the characterizations of Palamon and Arcite in KnT, arguing that there is no way to resolve the "demande d'amour" that closes Part 1--"who is more worthy?" Theseus's rational decision making, the intervention…
Doob, Penelope B. R.
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 85-96.
Interprets Pandarus's reference to "corones tweyne" (TC 2.1735) in light of lapidarian tradition, suggesting that it refers to the two kinds of "caraunius" (thunderstone), differently colored gemstones that emblematize Criseyde's beauty, lightning,…
Cotton, Michael E.
Chaucer Review 7.1 (1972): 37-43.
Treats the "psychological realism" and "moral allegory" in TC as complementary, analyzing the imagery and themes of ancient gods, the moon, and mutability, associated with Criseyde. Images of hell and torment in the final two books, differing from…
Argues that Troilus' ascent to the eighth sphere (TC 5.1807-27) combines Christian and pagan elements--the classical pagan notion of immortality among the stars transmitted to Chaucer via Alain de Lille, Dante, and Boccaccio, and the Christian…
Argues that Chaucer intended to complete SqT, evident in the fact that the Franklin's interruption is unjustified or inconsistent with the characterization of the Franklin in several ways.
Campbell, Jackson J.
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 140-46.
Reads ManT as an example of successful "characterization through narrative technique," assessing its paucity of actual storytelling relative to the amount of moralizing. This tedious moralizing is comic and results from Chaucer's adaptations of his…
apRoberts, Robert [P.]
Chaucer Review 7.1 (1972): 1-26.
Suggests that Chaucer purges "sensuality" from Boccaccio's "Filostrato" when he adapts it as TC, and demonstrates in detail where the quality is consistently present in the Boccaccio's poem.
