Bertolet, Craig E.
Brian Gastle and Erick Kelemen, eds. Later Middle English Literature, Materiality, and Culture: Essays in Honor of James M. Dean (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2018.), pp. 167-88.
Compares ShT and FranT as works that assign different values to "the transaction for a woman's body . . . couched in the tale-teller's understanding of his own economic system." ShT reflects the coin-based economy of the "Atlantic maritime commercial…
Bertolet, Craig E.
Anna Riehl Bertolet and Carole Levin, eds. Creating the Premodern in the Postmodern Classroom: Creativity in Early English Literature and History Courses (Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2018), pp. 83-93.
Describes how to use Pierre Bourdieu's notion of "habitus" and the modern idea of public relations to help students explore how and to what extent the punishments in MilT are or are not "fair"; students are grouped as PR advocates for each of the…
Bertolet, Craig E.
Yearbook of English Studies 53 (2024, for 2023): 7-20.
Uses Giorgio Agamben's discussion of "homo sacer" to argue that the "bare life" of imprisonment for Emelye, Palamon, and Arcite in KnT serves Theseus's sovereignty. Justifying exceptions to previous rulings, Theseus maintains his power through…
Bertolet, Craig E., and Robert Epstein, eds.
Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018.
Ten essays by various authors and an introduction by the editors. "Introduction: 'Greet prees at Market'-- Money Matters in Medieval English Literature" comments on recent critical interest in the social and political aspects of late medieval…
Bertolotti, Georgene Mary.
DAI 33.09 (1973): 4330A.
Considers Chaucer's diminishing use of classical stories in various stages of his "development as a creative artist," focusing on the rise of realism in his works.
Bertonèche, Caroline. Trans. Jonathan Fruoco.
Jonathan Fruoco, ed. Polyphony and the Modern (New York Routledge, 2021), pp. 206-16.
Argues that the polyphonies of John Keats's poetry (as identified by Helen Vendler) are attributable to his engagements with Chaucer's works and Chaucerian apocrypha, reflecting a particular kind of "Englishness," underpinned by travel and encounters…
In the Middle Dutch "Wrake van Ragisel" (adapted from the Old French "Vengeance Raguisel"), "Walewein, who is transformed into a dwarf, learns what women are exclusively led by their sexual desire," a different answer to the life question than is…
Besamusca, Bart.
Amsterdamer Beiträge zur älteren Germanistik 76 (2016): 89-122.
Offers six case studies of multi-text manuscripts to investigate "medieval concepts of authorship and . . . constructions of authority." Shows that Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Arch. Selden B.24 (including TC, PF, Truth, Mars, Venus, LGW, and…
Bessent, Benjamin R.
Studia Neophilologica 41 (1969): 99-111.
Considers Chaucer's "references to time" in TC in light of parallel passages in Boccaccio's "Filostrato," considering variants in TC manuscripts and arguing that Chaucer's concern with time in the poem results from his "desire to portray Criseyde as…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
New Literary History 22 (1991): 177-97.
Chaucer intended to entertain and edify Bukton by means of a network of biblical allusions that also provide an oblique comment on late-fourteenth-century biblical interpretation.
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Hugh T. Keenan, ed. Typology and English Medieval Literature (New York: AMS, 1992), pp. 183-205.
Chaucer uses biblical exegesis and typology for thematic purposes. In ClT, Griselda is portrayed as "pharmakos," a "figura Christi," through Chaucer's addition of biblical colorings and the typological juxtaposition of her character and actions with…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Chaucer Review 24 (1990): 306-308.
Not only does Troilus's address to the "paleys desolat" of Criseyde echo the lament over the deserted Jerusalem in the first two chapters of Lamentations, but also Troilus's fixation upon that house is designed to evoke the self-punishing behavior…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
New York and London: Garland, 1988.
The main text consists of "Index I: Chaucer's Biblical Allusions--An Annotated List," arranged by Chaucer's works, and "Index II: Scriptural References," a reverse index. The apparatus includes an introduction; an essay, "Research on Chaucer and…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Papers on Language and Literature 22 (1986): 322-25.
Several of Chaucer's worldly pilgrims (the Yeoman, the Man of Law, the Franklin, and the guildsmen) wear girdles, belts, or cords as symbols of wealth and opulence. None of the religious figures, however, is portrayed with a girdle. Since…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
David H. Hirsch and Nehama Aschkenasy, eds. Biblical Patterns in Modern Literature (Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1984), pp. 43-50.
Examines Chaucer's skeptical pose concerning theological and biblical controversies of the fourteenth century: "glosynge," parody, biblical allusion in PardP, PardT, GP, CT, and TC.
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
David Lyle Jeffrey, ed. Chaucer and Scriptural Tradition (Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1984), pp. 65-73.
Chaucer used the "Glossa ordinaria" in WBT and MerT; his use of the term "glosing" shows his awareness of fraudulent exegetes. ParsT is more literal than exegetical. Chaucer's attitude toward exegesis was shaped by the antifraternalism of the…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Chaucer Newsletter 1.1 (1979): 15-16.
Argues that GP 259-62, 642-43, and TC II, 36-37 are allusions to the Great Schism: the Friar like a pope in his "'double' worstede"; the pope like a popinjay (of two voices?), and the proverb that more than one way leads to Rome.
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Sanford Budick and Wolgang Iser, eds. The Translatability of Cultures: Figurations of the Space Between. (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1996), pp. 68-84.
Augustine's emphasis on charity and cupidity in "De doctrina Christiana" and his discussion of the relations among gospel narratives in "De consensu evangelistarum" suggest that he equates secular and biblical poetics. Similarly, Chaucer justifies…
Thirteen essays originally presented as lectures at the Center for Literary Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem between September 1991 and January 1993. Each essay re-examines the relation of a major author, genre, or theme to traditional…
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…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
North-Western European Language Evolution 34 (1998): 99-153.
Historical assessment of Chaucer's multi-word (or phrasal) verbs, assessing the syntax and semantics of such verbs, the drift to post-positioning of the particles in these verbs (e.g., "wente forth" rather than "forth wente"), and the effects of…
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Studies in the Age of Chaucer 23: 181-224, 2001.
Various "titles, epithets, and images" in TC reflect Chaucer's "covert engagement" with political and religious contention. Pandarus and the narrator adopt priestly roles, Troilus is like an anti-Lollard zealot, and forms of address such as "madame"…
