Browse Items (16470 total)

Compares Charles's "Fortunes Stabilnes" with James I's "Kingis Quair," focusing on their dream visions and the narrators' responses to dreams. James's poem is more distinctly Chaucerian in its political and philosophical implications, while Charles's…

Adaptations of its sources shape ClT in ways that encourage male, bourgeois readers to imagine themselves as Griselda's protectors. Infused with a sense of moral and patriarchal responsibility and driven by religious devotion, such readers also…

In KnT, neither the narrator nor the characters comprehend the ideal of courtly love. In BD, Chaucer depicts it fully; in TC, he reveal its weakness when confronted with reality. FranT reflects a bourgeois distortion of courtly love.

Identifies and tabulates "new" impersonal verbs used by Chaucer, Gower, Langland, and the Gawain-poet, describing factors that affected their usage, especially imitation of Old French forms.

Surveys the structure, frequency, and functions of interjections in the English language, tracing discussion of this word class in linguistic commentary and in Beowulf, MilT, and modern comic books.

Discusses the "sudden emergence" of and rapid growth in use of the "adverbial subordinator" because in Middle English writing, including the works of Chaucer.

Examines changes in the word "loci" in KnT, exploring the topography of "to and fro" and "up and doun."

Unlike "Teseida," KnT lacks the formal invocations of the epic, perhaps as a result of Chaucer's fitting the story into the CT frame.

The Black Plague resulted in economic advantages for townsmen and peasant women, enabling them to be active and powerful.

Demonstrates that Chaucer's "discourse of words and deeds" in GP and his apology for language in MilP are "heavily indebted" to Jean de Meun's comments on language in "Roman de la Rose," tracing lines of influence and emphasis from Jean's sources…

Discusses the fusion of the root and epistemic senses of modal auxiliaries such as "mot" / "moste," "may" / "myghte," "shal" / "sholde," and "wol" / "wolde" in TC.

Assesses the place of PrT in fragment VII, exploring the social and historical background of the "Tale."

Examines the play on "reyn" (as rain, reign, and rein) in Chaucer, especially in MkT, comparing such play with that in Somerset Maugham's "Rain."

Whereas Boccaccio uses the straightforward word "tradimento" of Criseyde, Chaucer uses the roundabout phrase "hire hertes variaunce." In TC, "in gret penaunce" means both that "Criseyde was in great misery" and "Criseyde was in hell for her sins."

Explores ambiguity arising from the polysemy of love in TC, with a comparative note on charite and amor/ous.

Some examples of metathesis in CT and TC (e.g., ax/ask, thurgh/thrugh, open/opne) may result from modern editorial selection; others (e.g., lisped/lipsed in GP 1.264-65) may indicate Chaucer's creative indication of individual speech patterns.

Blake examines the spelling variants of terminal -n and -m in a variety of words in WBP to show that fro/from was relatively erratic. Similar analysis indicates that final -e was obsolescent as a plural marker and in weak adjectives. Blake suggests…

Explores the "ambiguity of causality as a measure of the moral status" of the narrator and characters of TC, particularly Criseyde. Nakao tabulates and examines causal phrases beginning with "because," "since," and "for" in light of their contexts…

Kanno examines instances of "mesure" and its synonyms in Chaucer's works, comparing those meanings with the virtue of moderation in Confucianism. The meanings range from "calculation" to "moderation." Generally, Chaucer's distinction between good and…

Discusses Chaucer's uses of moot / moste, focusing on the fusion of social objective factors and the speaker's subjective implications.

Kumamoto examines eleven syntactical patterns used in conjunction with poetic enjambment. Chaucer's poetry contains more enjambment than do three anonymous romances included for comparison--and Chaucer uses enjambment more in his early poetry (BD,…

Sees astronomical ideas as literary devices in CT, analyzing Chaucer's use of astrological lore in satirizing the pilgrims.

Contrasts the climactic love scenes in Boccaccio's "Il Filostrato" and in TC, considering details, omissions, emphases, and narrative perspectives to argue that Chaucer makes the scene "emotionally, and indeed sexually, more intense" without being…

The poetic purpose of Mel is critical rather than aesthetic. Chaucer's use of prose is itself a trope for the Christian humility espoused in the tale.

Explicating WBP 418, Rex rejects Skeats's interpretation ("the common food of rustics") and Hoffman's ("harmony in marriage") and decides, on the basis of Old and Middle French slang meanings attested to in riddles and fabliaux, that the obscene…