Prior, Sandra Pierson.
Journal of English and Germanic Philology 85 (1986): 1-19.
The hunt passages in BD involve technical terms that have not been fully understood, e.g., "embosed," "forloyn," and "strake." The literal hunt dissolves to a metaphorical one in which the dreamer seeks the hurt heart. In terms of the narrator's,…
Prior, Sandra Pierson.
Cindy L. Carlson and Angela Jane Weisl, eds. Constructions of Widowhood and Virginity in the Middle Ages (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999), pp. 165-80.
PhyT combines several conflicting ideas of virginity: its role in confronting the "ritualized violence of sacrifice," its emphasis on "bodily wholeness," and its "figuration of innocence and purity." In comparison with its sources, PhyT emphasizes…
Prose, Francine.
New York: New York Public Library; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.
Surveys understandings of and attitudes toward gluttony (especially drunkenness and overeating) from Church fathers to M. F. K. Fisher in theology, literature, art, and popular culture, including a summary of PardT (pp. 15-19).
Diachronic study of how the linguistic stress matches metrical strong positions in spoken poetry and songs of the Middle and early modern English periods, including discussion of Chaucer's works. Prominent mismatches are more frequent in earlier…
Suggests that the "Loathly Lady" is an anthropomorphic representation of the land, linking human vagaries with the uncertain product of working any given land and underscoring the impossibility of human attempts to control and regulate the natural…
Provost, Jeanne.
Studies in the Age of Chaucer 38 (2016): 39-74.
Uses several medieval court cases and posthumanist perspective to examine medieval notions of "corporeal property," arguing that, by comparing property relations to a "spousal and familial one," the Wife of Bath persistently destabilizes the…
Identifies the "structural units" of TC---"the books, the time units, and the narrative units"--and explores their relationships. Also considers various "structural devices": the proems, the lyrics, the rhetorically elaborate temporal descriptions,…
Provost, William.
Robert G. Benson and Susan J. Ridyard, eds. New Readings of Chaucer's Poetry (Rochester, N.Y., and Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2003), pp. 91-106.
The end of PF shows a flagging of spirits; the end of TC is complex and self-reflexive. Although several early poems indicate that Chaucer could not think of an ending or that he lost interest, ABC is notable as a return to the beginnings.
Provost, William.
Susan J. Ridyard and Robert G. Benson, eds. Man and Nature in the Middle Ages (Sewanee, Tenn.: University of the South Press, 1995), pp. 185-98.
Describes Chaucer's various uses of the terms "kynde" and "nature" (and their derivatives), focusing particularly on their semantic range and potential as personifications
Provost, William.
Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1974.
Presents a "structural description" of TC which anatomizes its five-book construction, its "time units" and their chronology, and its "narrative units" (signaled by shifts in narrative "modes") and their patterning. The description of these various…
Pugh, Tison, and Angela J. Weisl.
London: Routledge, 2012.
Analysis of the influence of medieval literature and culture on contemporary film, literature, and various academic disciplines. Includes discussion of Chaucer's CT, KnT, PF, and TC.
Pugh, Tison, and Angela Jane Weisl, eds.
New York: Modern Language Association, 2007.
Thirty brief essays on teaching TC, BD, HF, PF, LGW, and the lyrics, divided into four groups and an appendix: (1) materials (survey of editions and teaching aids by the editors); (2) backgrounds (lyrics, William A. Quinn; French tradition, Karla…
Pugh, Tison, and Marcia Smith Marzec, eds.
Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2008.
Twelve essays by various authors on gender construction in TC, with an introduction (pp. 1-8). For individual essays, search for Men and Masculinities under Alternative Title.
Although not lovers, Troilus and Pandarus express deep affection for each other, and Pandarus gains Troilus's dependence. In addition, Pandarus's speeches, silences, and gaze (staging sexual scenes for his pleasure), as well as more fluid medieval…
Pugh, Tison.
Journal of Narrative Technique 33: 115-42, 2003.
Reading the Wife of Bath's romance through her fabliau spirit reveals Chaucer's distaste for the Arthurian romance tradition (elsewhere seen in SqT, NPT) and (as seen in SqT, Th, and FranT) his ironic attitude toward male narrative authority, his…
Consideration of authorial agency enables professors and students to explore relationships between personal ethos and literary texts. Ethical criticism frames discussions of whether Chaucer raped Cecily Chaumpaigne or whether Flannery O'Connor was a…
Pugh assesses the "nonnormative" features of several genres in medieval literature--lyric, fabliau, tragedy, and romance--exploring not only representations and suggestions of homosexual behaviors but also how these behaviors disrupt readers'…
Pugh explores the "performative cruelties" of TC--the ways the three major characters are willing to "resort to tactics of cruelty to advance their individual agendas" and the way the narrative itself displays the "pleasures of salvation" that are…
In his initial governance of the carnivalesque "play" of tale-telling, Harry Bailly augments his masculinity by "queering" his fellow pilgrims; by the end of CT, his own masculinity is "undermined" by his inability to control the carnival he set in…
Pugh, Tison.
Medievalia et Humanistica, n.s., 32 (2007): 83-101.
Alison constructs Jankyn as a liminal figure combining both courtly and clerical ideals so that she can celebrate "her triumph over a representative figure of both arenas" (95).
