Browse Items (16364 total)

For two essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Translation Theory and Practice in the Middle Ages under Alternative Title.

Examines the "author/reader dynamic" in Dante's "Commedia" and HF.

Uncouples Chaucer's fifteenth-century reception from "monolingual nationalist ideas of Englishness," focusing on rhetorical and codicological features of two trilingual love lyrics in Cambridge University Library, MS Gg.4.27 (Gg): "De amico ad…

Behrens investigates the problems of authorship surrounding the dedicatory poem "Go litel boke, go litel tregedie" addressed to the four wardens of the mercer guild: John Olney, Geoffrey Feldyng, Geoffrey Boleyn, and John Burton. Alluding to TC, the…

CT--in part a reaction to Gower's conservative conception of vernacular literature in "Confessio Amantis"--is a text encouraging interpretive autonomy.

Far from viewing herself as a "passive pawn," Criseyde sees herself as actively fleeing from an unhealthy relationship with Troilus to a healthy one with Diomedes. At the end of TC, she is no longer the cynical widow of Book 2, but instead a more…

Argues that Chaucer (like Michel Foucault) understands power to be, at times, in the control of the "traditionally powerless" (e.g., servants and women), largely because they have subversive knowledge of their subjugators' private behavior. In ClT,…

Identifies and assesses allusions to medieval literature in Ian McEwan's novel "Atonement" (2001), emphasizing Chaucer's works (TC and ClT) and Arthurian literature.

Describes teaching Chaucer at Morehouse College, an HBCU institution (historically black college or university), considering topics such as canon expansion, dress codes, linguistic standards, and student identity. Includes student reactions to the…

Argues that the "key fact" in Chaucer's satiric GP description of the Monk is that he is an "outrider," allowing leeway for suggestive details about diet, hunting, and other worldly concerns. Fabricates a fictional dialogue between the Monk and the…

Contrasts medieval and modern charitable giving, indulgence granting, and false relics, and assesses the Pardoner as a "professional collector," and "high-pressure fund raiser," reading PardPT as "an exposition" of the Pardoner's "fund-raising…

Describes how the quarrel between the Friar and Summoner in WBP sets up the vituperative exchange of FrT and SumT, commenting on audience expectations and the motives and techniques of the two narrators, but focusing particularly on the cleverness of…

Assesses previous explanations of the "greyn" placed on the clergeon's tongue in PrT (7.662ff.), including comments on analogues, and suggests that it is best understood as a "grain of paradise," i.e., the seed capsule of Aframomum melegueta…

Praises the "high organic unity" of MilT, attributing it to effective characterization of the major actors: "by making him 'hende' in one sense or another, Chaucer has motivated each incident of the plot involving Nicholas; and similarly, he has…

Includes examination of the verbal play on praying and belching in SumT 3.1934, arguing that the pun is effective satire even when manuscripts (including the Ellesmere) substitute "but" for the onomatopoetic "buf." Considers other puns…

Through line-by-line comparison shows that in the trial scene of SNT Chaucer improves upon the Latin original by compression and emphasis which increase dramatic impact, Cecilia's contentiousness, and Almachius's stupidity.

Focuses on Gower's Tale of Florent as a poem with its own logic and beauty, using Chaucer's WBT to clarify Gower's purpose.

Chaucer likely knew "Een bispel van .ij. clerken," a fourteenth-century Flemish analogue that provides more similarities to RvT than either "Le meunier et des II clers" or "De Gombert et des deux clers." Beidler includes a translation of the Flemish…

Analyzes "the state of Chaucer studies in China" by reviewing "Fang Zhong's translation into Chinese" of MilT. Beginning in the 1930s, Fang Zhong translated TC and most of CT in prose, modifying the Middle English version in two ways: changes to…

Translations of Chaucer are inadequate and have no place in serious literary scholarship. Reviews of translations are also misleading since they may suggest that modern English versions lift a veil from the opacity of Chaucer's poetry.

Only Chaucer places the story of the rioters' search for gold in plague time. The article examines the implications of the plague setting and the plague in literature to explain Chaucer's choice of plague setting.

Although thought immortal and evil, the Old Man in PardT is mortal in his longing for death, and, furthermore, good, patient, and kind. Chaucer's audience might have seen a parallel with Noah, the incredibly old survivor of a worse "plague," the…

Chaucer's unprecedented use of the woman baring her buttocks to the lover's kiss significantly emphasizes both the active potential of the woman, the rejection of courtly traditions,and the association of food with sex. The addition of her fart…

Chaucer's RvT contains sufficient close parallels with Boccaccio's story of Pinuccio and Niccolosa to suggest that the latter might have been a source for the former. Two German versions of the cradle-trick story, although more similar in general…

The "Rip Van Winkle" epigraph on keeping one's word until one dies (meaning that one will "not" keep one's word) is taken from a passage spoken by an old man to a widow in search of a husband in Cartwright's comedy, "The Ordinary."