Explores how Chaucer capitalized on extrinsic and intrinsic connotations in his ape metaphors. Kelly provides backgrounds to the metaphors from other medieval texts and, following Michael Riffaterre, theorizes about how such metaphors can operate in…
Erzgräber, Willi.
Bernd Engler and Kurt Muller, eds. Exempla: Studien zur Bedeutung und Funktion exemplarischen Erzahlens (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1995), pp. 55-77.
Examines structural and thematic roles of the Ceyx and Alcyone episode in BD, the Dido episode in HF, and the Dream of Scipio in PF.
Haug, Walter.
Dorothee Lindemann, Berndt Volkmann, and Klaus-Peter Wegera, eds. "Bickelwort" und "wildiu maere": Festschrift fur Eberhard Nellmann zum 65. Geburstag (Goppingen: Kummerle, 1995), pp. 354-65.
Compares RvT with its analogue in Boccaccio's "Decameron" and with the Middle High German "Studentenabenteuer," exploring their concerns with disorder and its effects.
Winstead, Karen A.
Chaucer Yearbook 2 (1995): 137-54.
Addresses medieval writers' uses of saints' lives in Middle English romances of persecuted laywomen. "Le Bone Florence of Rome," "The King of Tars," "Emare," and MLT exemplify the influence of, and variations from, early pious romances. The…
Edwards, Robert R.
Piero Boitani and Anna Torti, eds. Mediaevalitas: Reading the Middle Ages (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1996), pp. 15-41.
ClT maintains a tension between the interpretive multiplicity of Boccaccio's version of the tale and the hermeneutic closure of Petrarch's translation. The integration of Griselda and her heirs into hereditary hierarchy may help explain the…
A "palimpsestic" reading of MerT reveals the irony with which the Merchant treats January and with which Chaucer treats the Merchant, enriching and complicating the "Tale's" identification between the Merchant and January.
Snell, William.
Studies in Medieval English Language and Literature 10 (1995): 1-16.
Assesses PardT in light of contemporary literature about pestilence, arguing that Chaucer both distances PardT from his audience and critiques Flemings.
Vickery, Gwen M.
Essays in Literature (Malcomb, IL) 22 (1995): 161-69.
Argues that BD was composed after John of Gaunt made plans to remarry--or even after his second marriage--and that the poem constitutes both an elegy on the death of Blanche and a "carefully argued justification of Gaunt's second marriage." …
Delany, Sheila.
Piero Boitani and Anna Torti, eds. Mediaevalitas: Reading the Middle Ages (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1996), pp. 63-79.
In his "Legend of Holy Women," Osbern Bokenham "offers something formally similar but ideologically opposite" to LGW. Bokenham parodies Chaucer's work, thus reasserting the hagiographical genre that Chaucer undercut, and indirectly critiques…
Describes the rich Bohemian culture that Anne brought with her to England in 1381 and suggests various ways Chaucer may have been influenced by the connection with Bohemia. In the original version of LGWP, references to Anne indicate the extent to…
Kiser, Lisa J.
Piero Boitani and Anna Torti, eds. Mediaevalitas: Reading the Middle Ages (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1996), pp. 1-14.
Assesses the depiction of female-gendered Nature in Brunetto Latini's "Il Tesoretto," Alain de Lille's "De planctu naturae," Jean de Meun's "Roman de la Rose," and Chaucer's PF. A modern ecofeminst approach to these depictions helps disclose the…
Clogan, Paul M.
Gerald Gillespie, Margaret R. Higonnet, and Sumie Jones, eds. Visions of History, Visions of the Other. Vol. 2 of Earl Miner, gen. ed. ICLA '91 Tokyo: The Force of Vision. 6 vols. Proceedings of the XIIIth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association (Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1995), pp. 144-51.
Depictions of Thebes indicate various medieval views of history. "Roman de Thebes" blurs contrasts between pagan and Christian, classical and historical. Boccaccio's "Teseida" resists the modernization and secularization of romance tradition. TC…
Beadle, Richard,and A. J. Piper,eds.
Hants: Scolar Press, 1995
Fifteen essays by various authors on topics in book production from the twelfth to the seventeenth centuries, including discussion of Gower manuscripts (M. B. Parkes), a Wyclif manuscript (Anne Hudson), Wynkyn de Worde (Lotte Hellinga), codicological…
Gray, Douglas.
Proceedings of the British Academy 87 (1995): 67-99.
Surveys the art and rhetoric of scenes of sorrow or pity in Chaucer, Gower, Langland, Henryson, Malory, and others, arguing that Chaucer is "undoubtedly the master of the various modes of pathetic writing" in the period. Comments on scenes in KnT,…
Smith, Susan L.
Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1995.
Examines visual and verbal representations of the sexual power of women as "a topos of exemplification within the theory and practice of ancient and medieval rhetoric," especially as it developed in the twelfth through fourteenth centuries. Focuses…
Olivares Merino, Eugenio M.
Juan Paredes, ed. Medioevo y literatura, III: Actas del V Congreso de la Asociacion Hispanica de Literatura Medieval (Granada, 27 septiembre-1 octubre 1993), 4 vols. (Granada, Nicaragua: University of Granada Press, 1995), pp. 491-97.
Comments on Chaucer's description of Pedro I of Spain in MkT, and on similarities between CT and de Ayala's "Rimado."
Shoaf, R[ichard] A[llen].
Theodore J. Cachey, Jr., ed. Dante Now: Current Trends in Dante Studies (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1995), pp. 189-203.
Arguing that Chaucer was more deeply influenced by Dante than is generally accepted, Shoaf demonstrates Chaucer's dependence on Dante in MLT.
Pelling, Margaret.
Social History of Medicine 8 (1995): 383-401.
Comments on the appropriateness of PhyT to its teller, both in its classical learning and in its "gender-related ambivalences," also found among historical physicians.
Cooper, Helen.
Patrick Mileham, ed. Harry Mileham, 1873-1957: A Catalogue. His Life and Works, with a Selection of Paintings, Designs, and Sketches (Paisley: University of Paisley, 1995), pp. 45-47.
Comments on Harry Mileham's painting of the Canterbury pilgrims, depicted in a tavern during the telling of PardPT. Mileham is sensitive to literary and historical detail, derived especially from GP and the Ellesmere illustrations. The painting…
Grace, Dominick M.
Florilegium 14 (1995-96): 157-70.
Interpretations of "tretys" in MelP have assumed a single referent for both occurrences of the term. But here and elsewhere Chaucer challenges assumptions of consistency between word and meaning. In making the first use of "tretys" refer to Mel and…
NPT is a "mock-summa" that skeptically examines how authority is conveyed and parodies "didactic mechanisms." Mocking various kinds of rhetoric and discourse, the Nun's Priest also evokes a laughter of merriment that "laughs without laughing at…
Serrano Reyes, Jesus L.
SELIM: Journal of the Spanish Society for Mediaeval English Language and Literature 5 (1995): 29-45.
Argues that Chaucer's Ret was influenced by the prologue to Don Juan Manuel's "El Conde Lucanor," citing parallels not only in attitude and sentiment but also in structure, syntax, and grammar. Uses discourse analysis to compare linguistic features.
Boenig, Robert.
Ann Hurley and Kate Greenspan, eds. So Rich a Tapestry: The Sister Arts and Cultural Studies (Lewisburg, Pa.: Bucknell University Press; London: Associated University Presses, 1995), pp. 181-99.
Like the "Cloisters Apocalypse," HF depicts the Day of Judgment. Both works "select, rearrange, and fragment" the biblical account of the apocalypse, reminding us that interpretation is necessary for sinners.
Fichte, Joerg O.
Walter Haug and Burghart Wachinger, eds. Fortuna (Tubingen: Max Niemeyer, 1995), pp. 192-215.
Surveys the theme of Fortune's influence in treatments of the story of Troilus and Criseyde from Boccaccio to Dryden, including TC and the versions of Henryson and Shakespeare.
