Browse Items (16381 total)

Examination of social spaces and residential settings that Criseyde inhabits reveals that she is not isolated (as generally argued) until she enters the Greek camp. She conforms to the social expectations, the "habitus," of her social sphere, even as…

Reiff examines uses of second-person singular pronouns "thou" and "you" to indicate relationships among characters in KnT, particularly idealized chivalric relationships, Theseus's changing attitude toward the knights, the unfaltering brotherhood…

Explores some possible uses for newly developed digital technologies in the teaching of CT, presenting the data for "and," Chaucer's most used word, suggesting the types of questions that might arise from word count and word usage data. This data can…

Examines fifteenth-century scribal responses to sexual language in the CT, noting that some manuscripts either replaced obscenities or added to sexual language. Observing that female narrators in the CT are restricted in their use of vernacular…

This introduction to a collection of essays on "Representing the Middle Ages" begins by providing an overview of representations of experience in the NPT. After presenting an overview of key criticism, the article asserts that the tale seeks to…

Argues that Chaucer depicts an idealized earthly love in books 1-3 of TC, an expedient pseudolove in Criseyde's relationship with Diomede, and a transcendent love in Troilus's continuing love for Criseyde.

Assesses CYPT as an example of confession and contrasts it with SNT, demonstrating their different kinds of "bisynesse." By placing CYPT near the end of CT, Chaucer invites comparison between alchemy and poetry.

In PardPT, Chaucer inverts three major precepts of Augustinian sermon rhetoric ("De Doctrina Christiana"): the preacher must pray before preaching, the preacher must maintain a grave and appropriate demeanor, and the preacher must maintain Christian…

Explains Chaucer's humor as the "healthy expression of a spiritually sound man" faced with a decadent world and surmises that Chaucer was publicly cuckolded by Philippa and John of Gaunt.

Explores how the Miller might be interacting with the Wife of Bath when he presents Alisoun, whose description "represents an attempt to control and win the Wife of Bath's sexual attention while undercutting any agency or interiority she may have."

Surveys how pity functions as a lover's emotional ploy that establishes a power relationship in CT. Focuses on MerT and FranT and explores to what extent May and Dorigen create agency for themselves by participating in the exchange of suffering for…

After examining weather patterns during the Middle Ages, suggests that the late fourteenth century experienced lower than normal temperatures and increased precipitation that would have affected harvests. Since inclement weather plays a role in BD,…

Examines how "knights are reformed" and some are "even saved by the women who tempt them" in several medieval romances, including Chretien's "Knight of the Cart"; Marie de France's "Lanval"; "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight"; and FranT, where Dorigen…

Focuses on the relationship between WBT and its analogue, "The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle," to show how such a study traces cultural shifts.

Argues that the birdsong of GP, line 9, and the silencing of the crow in ManT indicate "the permeable animal/human boundary" in CT, evidence of a mutual "soundscape" or a shared "acoustic community." Includes comments on avian and human communication…

Argues that FranT should be added to "the Chaucerian pandemic canon" for its depiction of pandemic trauma and recovery.

Focuses on two texts that feature violence against women to examine how the violated woman functions as a tool for political change. Both Chaucer and Gower foreground the suffering that men experience in response to the violated female body, leading…

Explores Chaucer's uses of the word "gloss" to argue that he followed the model of the Roman de la Rose and included glosses in his own texts-marginal glosses at times, but also glosses incorporated into his texts to guide interpretation. Draws…

Analyzes the "sentence" of BD through its sentence structure. Any idea of "tragic reversal" disintegrates under the pressure of "forward-looking" consecutive sentences.

Reviews the work of Earle Birney (1930s, 1940s) on Chaucerian irony: dramatic, verbal, structural.

A discussion of the characteristics of Nature in PF.

Discusses ambiguity arising from the polysemy of "sely" in Middle English.

Documents that the honorific "sir" plus a "knight's name" occurs twelve times in Th and "not once elsewhere" in Chaucer's works, suggesting that, confined to a "burlesque context" and similar to historical French practice, this usage should be…

Assesses the conventionality and originality of PF in form or genre, matter, and rhetorical style, arguing that the poem is a "delicately ironical fantasy on the theme of love," both courtly and natural, presented largely through a "series of…