Browse Items (16472 total)

Analyzes the "comic unity" of the Pluto-Proserpine episode of MerT with the four biblical accounts women to: Rebecca, Judith, Abigail, and Esther (4.1362-74), all figures of deliverance rather than deception. By association, Proserpine should be read…

A novel in poetry that opens with direct reference to CT, and proceeds as a series of tales by various kinds of people: historical tales, migrants' tales, artists' tales, etc. The volume includes a Preface by John Kinsella in which he reports that…

Item not seen. Production trailer from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, 2012, available at YouTube.

Explores how in BD, HF, and PF "Chaucer concretizes abstractions, turning ideas into poetic form." The poems are "artistic recreations of medieval literary and philosophical commonplaces about life."

Many sources and analogues for Chaucer's poem, including the "Roman de la Rose," "Panthere d'amours," "La dance aux aveugles," and "Trionfo d'amore," as well as a reference in his own LGW (G, 403-05), suggest that the "man of great authority" is the…

Explores the female protagonists of the legends in LGW and Chaucer's adaptations of his sources in these legends to sketch Chaucer's "psychograph of the Good Woman," emphasizing rejection of authority and active pursuit of love and sex, "a human…

Written for "Lyte Lowys" (Chaucer's son), Astr is a concise, brilliant translation of Masha'allah's "De compositione et utilitate astrolabii." Chaucer best displays his comprehension in his definitions of the equinoctial. Although written for a…

The problems Chaucer faced in describing the construction and use of the astrolabe were similar to today's problems in technical communication.

The autobiographical character of Chaucer-the-pilgrim's reportage and of the individual "Tales" in CT intensifies the nuanced contradictions of the Manciple's portrait in GP,of the competing voices in the lengthy ManP, and of the Manciple's…

Offers surmises and suggestions about the number of GP pilgrims, professional groupings of them, and a two-stage "development" of GP--an early set of fourteen descriptions written ca. 1387-88 and a later revision, ca. 1396, that reflects plans for…

Compares and contrasts BD with French sources and analogues and emphasizes the degree to which BD "foreshadows" elements in Chaucer's later works, especially in its reliance on implicit meanings and narrative distance.

Surveys critical approaches to Mel and discusses its themes of "the good woman" and forgiveness; also assesses Mel as a complex, multi-leveled allegory.

An anthology of criticism, with a brief introduction (pp. vii-ix) that characterizes CT as "unique" because "no other work so fragmentary creates such an illusion of completeness." The volume reprints essays and excerpts by twenty-one writers,…

Unlike its two closest analogues--Mars and Anel--the falcon's lament exceeds its own generic and linguistic constraints and functions as both narrative and complaint.

The various fictional levels in CT result in a dialectic relationship between voice and genre, especially pronounced in Fragment D.

Hypothesizes that Mel, told by the Man of Law, was once the first tale in the Canterbury sequence, later replaced by MLT; KnT was placed first only in a third stage of revision. ParsP indicates Chaucer's initial plan: one tale per teller. He…

Variations in the ink color of MSS. Ellesmere and Hengwrt have yet to be accurately described and may provide information concerning the order in which the parts of the mss were written.

Although most critics agree that Chaucer intended ParsT and Ret to conclude CT, early manuscript history indicates that ParsT may have been an independent work, a "Treatise on Patience," for which Ret would serve as a fitting conclusion.

Close reading of rhythm, rhyme, and syntax discloses the wry control of the opening of GP.

Accepts that variants in manuscripts of TC provide evidence of Chaucer's revisions and studies a number of small changes that affect meter, style, and emphasis; cancellations or moving of stanzas have broader implications for Chaucer's…

Contrasts the consummation scene of TC with its source in Boccaccio's "Filostrato," arguing that the changes produce a "far greater emotional intensity," largely because the narrative puts the reader through the process of partial fulfillment…

Explores free will in Mars, KnT, TC, and CT, focusing on the relative balance of astrological determinism and character complexity. The "compulsions of astrology" in Mars are lessened in KnT, replaced by the "searching" for examples of providence in…

Surveys Chaucer's "use of rhyme as it contributes to poetic effect," examining rhymes in his complaints and balades, in Anel, and in Tho, and demonstrating his unobtrusive dexterity with rhyme royal in TC and with decasyllabic couplets in CT.…

Explores the events of a single day in the first half of Book 2 of TC, particularly changes Chaucer made to Boccaccio "Filostrato," showing how this section helps to characterize Pandarus and Criseyde. Argues that the "muted contrast" between the…

Corroborates and extends Carleton Brown's effort to show (in 1937) that the MLH was intended to introduce the first story in the CT, exploring evidence and counter-evidence for positing an "original opening sequence" as follows: GP, MLH, Mel, MLE,…