Browse Items (16381 total)

The dream in PF is a "populist countervision" both to Cicero's "Dream of Scipio's" "stoicism that excludes love" and to the tercelets' 'fine amour that abuses (love)." Ultimately, "it is precisely the earthy and earthlythat are shown to serve...the…

Poetic truth cannot be confined by rigidly orthodox theories of literary criticism. D. W. Robertson, Jr.'s reading of ClT, for example, as a moral fable of "the duties of the Christian soul as it is tested by its Spouse" effectively inhibits any…

Although allegorical and historical justifications have been given for Griselda's suffering in ClT, the story is Chaucer's attack on the tyranny and injustice of her situation. In a different way, Webster condemns tyrannical persecution in the…

Explores the Augustinian "figurative implications" of PrT, identifying a "clear symbolic pattern" evident in interpreting it Scripturally--the "childishness" of the teller and her protagonist, the literalness of the Jews, echoes of the liturgy of the…

The works of Chaucer's contemporaries (Clanvowe, Lydgate, Dunbar) and later admirers (e.g., Henryson) show varying responses, especially to HF and PF.

Examines postmodern elements in two pseudomedieval films, arguing that awareness of film theory and formal film analysis are more illuminating than comparison with medieval sources. Jerry Zucker's First Knight is a "star vehicle" and a "director's…

Haydock examines poetic authority in Henryson's "Testament" as it simultaneously affirms and seeks to replace TC, in effect treating Chaucer's poem in Chaucerian fashion. One of Henryson's three major works, "Testament" is part of his effort to…

Haydock reads Caxton's spurious ending and epilogue to HF in the 1483 Book of Fame as a "canny as well as sympathetic reaction to the poem's ubiquitous concern with the transmission of literature."

A selection of poems by various authors from Virgil to the twentieth century. Includes a selection from SNP (8.36-56) and its source, i.e., a facing-page selection from Dante's "Paradiso." Illustrated by José Erasto. Selection slightly revised from…

Discusses Chaucer's accomplishments in the development of lyric poetry, with commentary on Machaut, Deschamps, Hoccleve, Lydgate, and Villon. Chaucer is the "high point" of the English tradition inspired by the French.

Studies the tradition in which God speaks through humans and the proto-reformation implications of literary texts where the laity use speech usually reserved for priests. Chapter 4, "Cursed Speakers," considers the carter's and old woman's curses in…

Allusions in SumT to the "silent canon" - the clerical practice of offering the Eucharistic consecration prayers silently - open a window on "lay-clerical relations," exposing the politics governing access to the secrets of the Eucharist. Through its…

Affirms Chaucer's familiarity with native English romances by identifying a number of formulaic phrases (some of them oral remnants) that recur in native romances and in a variety of Chaucer's works. Includes comments on Thop as evidence of Chaucer's…

Item not seen; no abstract available. Record derived from UCLA Library Catalog.

Chaucer's MerT may have influenced William Faulkner's "The Sound and the Fury." Each work presents the pear tree as a central symbol in a plot focused on greed and deception, one comic and the other tragic. Chaucer's and Faulkner's narratives also…

Analyzes two works each from late-thirteenth-century Florence and late-fourteenth-century England in relation to the "Roman de la rose" as expressions of political factionalism in the vocabulary of desire. Concludes that "a loyal citizen is still a…

Assesses Criseyde in TC and other widowed protagonists in medieval romances (Roman de Thèbes, Chértien's Yvain), exploring how "necessity of possession and ideals of chastity" are the prevailing stereotypes of the literary tradition. Unlike…

Source study of "Ywain and Gawain," "Sir Launfal," and NPT that explores how the process of appropriation reflects social, economic, political, and ideological continuities and transformations.

Explores how the character Theseus in KnT does and does not embody principles of political philosophy found in Boethius's "Consolation of Philosophy." Combining "idealism and political exigency," Theseus fulfills the "composite model of an ideal"…

The widow's poverty in NPT indicates the cloistered clergy's failure to practice humility, poverty, and charity. Altering his source materials, Chaucer highlights the contrast between the lifestyle of the Prioress and that of the widow and creates…

Describes various kinds of poverty in England in the second half of the fourteenth century, summarizing economic and social factors and assessing their representation in various works of literature in English and Latin across a range of genres.…

Edits "two glossed texts" of the "Disticha Catonis," constructed for use by students of Chaucer, Langland, and Gower. The Introduction juxtaposes passages from their poetry with "Catonian materials" to indicate the "poets' indebtedness" to the text…

Assesses ManT in light of its sources and analogues to reveal a "tissue of comic devices--of controlled incongruities, of hyperbole, of antiphrasis, of equivocations, allusions, and purposeful distortions" that "produce a parodic version of the…

Explores the range and depth of Chaucer's familiarity with the "Liber Catonis," its commentaries and glosses, and the likelihood that he memorized portions as a schoolboy. Identifies verbal echoes of "Catoniana" in Chaucer's works; then focuses on…

Offers in parallel columns passages from ParsT, the "Moralium Dogma Philosophorum," and the French translation of the Latin text to argue that the "Moralium" is the ultimate source of portions of ParsT (especially the "Remedia" of the vices), even…