Solopova, Elizabeth.
W. Speed Hill, ed. New Ways of Looking at Old Texts, II: Papers of the Renaissance English Text Society, 1992-1996. Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, no. 188 (Tempe, Ariz.: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, with the Renaissance English Text Society, 1998), pp. 121-32.
A description of questions raised in the process of producing the first installment of the computer-assisted "Canterbury Tales" Project (SAC 20 [1998], no. 11), and a justification of the project. The first installment made possible Solopova's…
Reviews Furnivall-Halliwell correspondence, which is concerned mainly wiht the affairs of the New Shakespeare Society, but also includes accounts of Furnivall's work on Chaucer manuscripts.
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1998.
Argues that the Bible is a far more pervasive influence on Chaucer than has been previously recognized. Chaucer uses the Bible or its glosses in most of his writings, responding--through quotation, paraphrase, or allusion--to traditional notions of…
Calin, William.
Deborah M. Sinnreich-Levi, ed. Eustache Deschamps, French Courtier-Poet: His Work and His World (New York: AMS Press, 1998), pp.73-83.
Contrary to earlier critical opinion, the "Ballade to Chaucer" demonstrates very little about Chaucer's renown outside court circles in southern England; it cannot necessarily be read as a sincere expression of Deschamp's opinion of Chaucer the poet.
Davenport, W. A.
New York: St. Martin's Press, 1998.
Chaucer was influenced by his English contemporaries, particularly John Gower, William Langland, Thomas Chester, and the Gawain poet; yet he chose to seek new literary directions. Chaucer was on a pilgrimage of self-discovery and a quest for…
Moore, Marilyn L. Reppa.
Dissertation Abstracts International 58 (1998): 2644A.
Rejects psychological characterizations of Troilus and Criseyde, arguing that they are better seen in light of rhetorical and devotional traditions. Associates Troilus with the ethos of petition and devotion and Criseyde with the pathos.
Chaucer refuses to allow closure in TC, either for Troilus or for the poem itself. For Chaucer, transgression is inevitable, closure is impossible, and the poet seems to "celebrate" this fact.
Paxson, James J.
James J. Paxson and Cynthia A. Gravlee, eds. Desiring Discourse: The Literature of Love, Ovid Through Chaucer (Selinsgrove, Penn.: Susquehanna University Press; London: Associated University Presses, 1998), pp. 206-26.
Reads TC as "an autocritique of the sophisticated rhetorical devices used by medieval poets to create the literature of desire." Examines several instances of apostrophe, pragmapoeia, ethopoeia, and sermocinatio in the poem, exploring relations…
Reale, Nancy M.
James J. Paxson and Cynthia A. Gravlee, eds. Desiring Discourse: The Literature of Love, Ovid Through Chaucer (Selinsgrove, Penn.: Susquehanna University Press; London: Associated University Presses, 1998), pp. 165-76.
In TC, Chaucer poses a tension between "Boccaccio's interest in the persuasive powers of linguistic skills to create private realities" and Dante's depiction of poetry as a means to transcendent enlightenment. This tension makes TC a poem "that…
Sanok, Catherine.
Studies in the Age of Chaucer 20 (1998): 41-71.
Explores the allusions to Statius's "Thebaid" in TC and identifies several structural similarities between the poems. Criseyde's reading of the epic and Cassandre's summary of it depict female consciousness of history and awareness of the…
Brewer, Derek.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the 'Canterbury Tales' and 'Troilus and Criseyde' (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 237-52.
According to Chaucer's conception of "manhood," as distinct from the somewhat anachronistic term "masculinity," Troilus is to be seen as "manly" and virtuous in his behavior, as well as worthy of the reader's sympathy. He is an "idealized and…
Assesses Pandarus's house and its literary functions in light of architectural details of fourteenth-century houses such as the "privy," "stewe," and "trappe" and in relation to conventions of medieval dramatic staging. Pandarus, leading Troilus…
Mooney, Linne R., ed. and trans.
Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1998.
Referred to by Chaucer in Astr, Somer's "Kalendarium" may have been a source for a number of the poet's astrological references. This facing-page edition and English translation of the Latin "Kalendarium" includes descriptions of the manuscripts;…
Sinnreich-Levi, Deborah M.
Deborah M. Sinnreich-Levi, ed. Eustache Deschamps, French Courtier-Poet: His Work and His World. (New York: AMS Press, 1998), pp. 123-30.
The misogynist female voices in a number of Deschamps's poems seem to share common sources with WBPT and MerT.
Taylor, Paul Beekman.
Lanham, Md., New York, and Oxford: University Press of America, 1998.
Twelve essays that pertain to Chaucer's "translative" use of source material, exploring less the influence of others on him than the "'affluence' his imagination sets flowing in the process of reshaping material." Recurrent issues include the ways…
Taylor, Paul Beekman.
Paul Beekman Taylor. Chaucer Translator (Lanham, Md., New York, and Oxford: University Press of America, 1998), pp. 155-69.
Compares Antigone's song in TC to Machaut's "Paradis d'Amour," ABC, to Guillaume de Deguileville's "Le pelerinage de la vie humaine." Explores the ironies of Antigone's song, especially those extending from the possibility that the "goodlieste mayde"…
Anderson, Judith H.
Theresa M. Krier, ed. Refiguring Chaucer in the Renaissance (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998), pp. 87-105.
Chaucer, especially GP, inspired Spenser's poetic identiy in "The Faerie Queene." Through allegory, Spenser manifests Chaucer's ironic doubleness, and he de-centers his dominant narration through various forms of "impersonations," emulating…
Berry, Craig A.
Theresa M. Krier, ed. Refiguring Chaucer in the Renaissance (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998), pp. 106-27.
Assesses Spenser's appeal to Chaucer and his continuation of SqT as an aspect of the Renaissance poet's doubt about his place in English poetry. Chaucer "revels in the multiplication of doubt," but Spenser sought to work out his doubts about his…
Bowers, John M.
Chaucer Yearbook 5 (1998): 91-115.
Treats "Thebes" and the Prologue to "Beryn" (here called "The Canterbury Interlude") as "efforts to write what Chaucer had left unwritten" and to confront contemporary controversies. Lydgate's work rebukes those who would critique monasticism and…
Cooper, Helen.
Theresa M. Krier, ed. Refiguring Chaucer in the Renaissance (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998), pp. 189-209.
Renaissance dramatic adaptations of Chaucer's works often resolve tensions left reverberating in his narratives (e.g.,John Fletcher's "Women Pleased" and WBT; Fletcher's "Four Plays" and FranT). But Fletcher and Shakespeare's "Two Noble Kinsmen"…
Delany, Sheila.
New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Reads Bokenham's "Legends of Holy Women" as a parody of Chaucer's LGW, itself a parody of hagiography. By inverting Chaucer's parody, Bokenham critiques Chaucer's emphasis on the classics and reasserts an Augustinian emphasis on Christian aesthetics…
Evans, William Dansby.
Dissertation Abstracts International 59 (1998): 1175A.
Examines Eliot's senior-year courses at Harvard for their medieval focus (in art, literature, and philosophy) in the light of primary materials (including Eliot's annotated Chaucer textbook).
Fyler, John M.
Donald Maddox and Sara Sturm-Maddox, eds. Froissart Across the Genres (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998), pp. 195-218.
Despite Chaucer's early borrowings from Froissart, the two poets diverged as their careers developed. Contrasts the "Voyage en Bearn" section of Froissart's "Chroniques" with SqT and FranT, arguing that Froissart is "in some respects even more…
