Browse Items (16470 total)

In TC 2.78ff., Chaucer distinguishes between Statius's "Thebiad" and the "Roman de Thebes" to characterize Pandarus and Criseyde, to emphasize the uncle-niece relationship, and to affect tone and atmosphere. In 5.145ff., he uses Statius to develop…

Treats the "relevant historical events, some basic attitudes (of the era), literary stragtagems," and TC itself, which is a "vivid example of the degrading and disastrous consequences" when a noble, valorous man places his seduced private will above…

Discusses the legal status of homogenous groups of medieval women--the landed class under common law, free townswomen, peasants under manorial custom, townswomen of lowly estate, and the religious--under headings birth, childhood, girlhood, majority,…

Chaucer's concept of "fyn," or end, is illuminated by the "Nicomachean Ethics" of Aristotle, which is more important as a source for Chaucer than has been recognized.

Medical and scientific authors discussed sexual matters with clinical frankness. Chaucer's Merchant sees Constantinus Africanus as "a pander, a peddler of love potions."

Review article of Gellrich (poststructuralist) vs. Minnis (militant historicist).

In the contexts of medieval misogyny and penitential manuals, Braswell examines Chaucer's treatment of the sins of women in ParsT. The Parson denounces excess in dress among lords more severely than among ladies.

Considers romance as a vehicle for the resolution of philosophical and theological problems, the relation of history to romance, and the rhetorical systems of each genre. KnT, TC, and "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" illustrate how Chaucer and the…

Treats the previously ignored commentary of Trevet on "The Consolation of Philosophy," which served Chaucer as the primary or sole commentary in his translation of Bo and which he drew for TC 3.

No single answer to the concluding question of FranT is satisfactory because the tale's real concern is the interpretive process itself. FranT emphasizes different kinds of "trouthe" and poses ambiguous promises and statements.

Documents Douglas's theory of literal translation, "with its stress on the integrity and inviolability of the text," and gauges his success in achieving his goal. Douglas's theory is evident in his critiques of Caxton's translation of the "Aeneid"…

KnT participates in the Roman Antique tradition by expressing a political ideology found in other medieval retellings of classical stories. The Tale argues for harmonizing passion and wisdom through marriage and rewrites Theban history to conceal…

Reviews Priscilla Martin's "Chaucer's Women: Nuns, Wives, and Amazons" and Helen Cooper's "The Canterbury Tales," arguing that they "provide a good indication of some of the newest orthodoxies in Chaucer studies."

Surveys and evaluates scholarly work on Chaucer and nominalist--especially Ockhamist--philosophy, using four categories: epistemology, universals versus particulars, poetic structure, and relation of human to divine. Chaucer's awareness of and…

Surveys criticism of SNPT, describes the genre of hagiography, and summarizes the popularity of the St. Cecilia legend. Then argues that SNP heralds SNT in "theme, pattern, and imagery," effectively functioning "to focus and epitomize" its "figural…

Gauges the value of historicist approaches to medieval literary study, compared with other approaches, suggesting that a phenomenological approach aligned with humanistic awareness of individual consciousness is desirable. Recurrent references to…

Dorigen in FranT has more than the two options of shame or death: she can also choose to break a bad law, even though the decision to let bad law stand "seems somehow, tragically, to have been taken long before the characters became conscious of…

The friendship between Troilus and Pandarus synthesizes Cicero's "pure friendship" with "potential for mutual gain," emblematized in Troilus's offer to procure any woman Pandarus wants. Portraying friendship in economic terms, TC reveals more…

Observes that Chaucer's treatment of Alexander in MkT is largely consistent with how Alexander is depicted in fourteenth-century romances and monastic allusions. Suggests that Chaucer declines to condemn Alexander as an unworthy pagan, despite being…

Clarifies "two distinct modes of ekphrasis, the literal and the literary," exploring how and where they are deployed in HF (storm at sea and wall paintings of Dido and Aeneas) and in "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" (castle description and Gawain's…

The exensive emendations in the text of "Lady" are unjustified. The poem is a series of unfinished metrical innovations, showing Chaucer experimenting and practicing his art. The search for metrical regularity has in this lyric deprived the poem of…

Godwin's literary criticism of Chaucer's poetry contributed to the Romantic conception of Chaucer the man. His "Life" gives insight into the idea of the Middle Ages in early-nineteenth-century England.

Of the six additional new manuscripts of Boccaccio's "Filostrato," three contain verse commentaries on the ending of Boccaccio's poem. The two texts of the verse commentaries, edited here for the first time, may shed new light on the ending of…

Confessional literature illumines the Pardoner's performance by explaining the motives which lie behind it. Parallels with the "false confession" and an analysis of the pitfalls of despair and presumption suggest that the Pardoner is suffering from…

The narrative of MLT depends less on organic structure to develop the story than on exemplary episodic narrative sequence. Lack of descriptive detail is an effect of the narrator's interest in action, and the mode of presentation and the style of…