Browse Items (16382 total)

Discusses Criseyde's "slipperiness and unreliability" in TC, focusing on her last letter to Troilus, which is "Chaucer's own addition," as a way of understanding her character.

Reads NPT in light of the Nebuchadnezzer account in MkT--the only one of the Monk's tragedies with a "happy ending," the result of a lesson learned. Contrasts MkT as an early work of Chaucer's with NPT as one of his maturity, focusing on the "rival…

Compares Milton's portrayal of Dalila in "Samson Agonistes" with earlier representations by Boccaccio, Chaucer, Lydgate, and Swetnam. Chaucer offers no analysis of her motives; Milton condemns her actions, not her gender.

Investigates the logic of "sovereignty" in PhyT, and how sovereignty is transferred from God, to nature, then to Virginia, and back to the people who "subvert the
entire political order" toward the end of the tale. Sovereignty is directly associated…

Intersectional analysis of four character types in medieval romance. Includes discussion of the loathly lady, WBT, and its analogues, arguing that Chaucer's version offers a figure of power, ambiguous because we remain "unsure whether she will use…

In his tale, the Monk selectively edits the legend of Croesus from Jean de Meun's "Roman de la Rose" to "lessen the dreamer's responsibility for his fate" and thus to "fit Croesus into his gallery of tragic figures."

In MerT, Chaucer presents a version of the Edenic Fall that emphasizes the roles of language and writing in seduction. Especially in the pear-tree episode, the Merchant's "dark vision" dramatizes Augustinian commentary on the Fall as an abuse of…

Jager draws upon commentary by Jacques Le Goff and Gerhard Dohrn-van Rossum regarding how time was measured in the late Middle Ages. He argues that ShT indicates how merchant time, space, and values triumph over those of the Church, because of an…

A discursive bibliography of Chaucer studies for 2009, divided into four subcategories: general, CT, TC, and other works.

Jager contends that medieval English poetry occupied a "hybrid" oral/written cultural space and that the poems "posit an artisanal, poetic masculinity." She uses Th, along with "Piers Plowman," "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," and other works,…

Reads Th and its narrator's dialogue with the Host as Chaucer's commentary on gender, vernacularity, and the public role of the poet in his contemporary world.

Challenges the limitations of traditional source-and-analogue study, exploring resonances between SqT and the "Kitab al-Manazir" of Ibn al-Haytham /Alhacen to which it alludes (see SqT, 232–45), including discussion of mediating sources in Latin…

Responds to essays included in a special issue of "postmedieval," and comments on SqT, identifying ways that the work and its brass steed--"belong to a world of the "sıra" in ways that reflect the entangled and often diffuse ways that fictional…

Demonstrates that "Chaucer's portrayal of fin' amors is informed by Arabic learning in the related fields of medicine, natural philosophy, astrology and alchemy, disseminated through Latin translations from the Iberian Peninsula in particular."…

Describes and exemplifies the Renaissance genre of epyllion (minor epic), including, as background, discussion of KnT and TC as examples of works that dramatize a hero's "confrontation with the tragedy of mutable love" presented by a distancing…

Ten essays by various authors on topics in Middle English and Anglo-Norman studies, with an introduction by the editors and a comprehensive index. For three essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Gender, Poetry, and the Form of Thought in Later…

Studies a late medieval manuscript, San Marino, Huntington Library, HM 144 (c. 1500), which is a compilation of works chosen for their devotional and/or ethical content. Uses Mel to show how the scribe--by omitting portions of a text and…

Analyzes the epistemology of form as theorized by Boethius, Chaucer, and Kant, particularly in relation to the apprehension of natural beauty. Reads Form Age and For, in the manuscript setting of Cambridge University Library, MS Ii.III.21, as…

Includes comments on the "feature-by-feature account" of the Prioress's face in GP 1.151-56, and suggests that "a description of this kind is less likely to produce a vivid response than one that relates the features to one another."

The Miller's narrative manner is adapted to the level of discourse expected of his social status. The disorganized syntax suggests a disorganized world view.

Praises the stylistic appropriateness of Astr to its youthful audience, showing how Chaucer adapts the lexicon, syntax, and rhetoric of Massahalla to be more suitable to his ten-year-old son, Lewis. Chaucer relies on native rather than Latinate…

Analyzes the border illustrations and other codicological features of twelve manuscripts of the hooked-g group of manuscripts (including three CT manuscripts), using them to construct a "tentative chronology" of the dates of production and the…

Argues for an ironic reading of "The Kingis Quair," interpreting Minerva as an ally of Venus. TC influenced the author's view of Minerva, and the protagonist's decision to follow his will rather than reason places him in sinful subjection to…

Examines Chaucer's efforts, in BD, HF, LGW, and PF, to meld two strands of dream poetry: the philosophical and amorous subspecies of the form.

Although many of Chaucer's works are bawdy, modern readers can find contemporary ethical and moral issues resolved or discussed according to Christian values. "Christlike" faithfulness, steadfastness, and truth underlie TC, WBT, ClT, MerT, and…