Parallels between Mary and Constance exist not only in details but also in narrative strategy, since both women are subject to the complexities and contradictions of the exemplary mode. In addition, Constance is presented through metaphors of death,…
Reed, Teresa P.
Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2003.
Examines allusions to the Virgin Mary in connection to five literary characters: Chaucer's Constance and Wife of Bath, the medical woman of the English "Trotula," Saint Margaret of Antioch, and the "Pearl" maiden. Chapter 1 focuses on parallels…
Argues that spoken recordings of Chaucer's works (and other Middle English writings) are useful in the classroom. Surveys critical attitudes toward such recordings and comments on the products produced by the Chaucer Studio.
Reed, Thomas L. [Jr.]
Revue de l'Universite d'Ottawa 50 (1980): 215-22.
The bird parliament accords with scholastic and literary forms of the debate, including the terminology which characterizes the tradition. Typical of the literary debate, PF ends without any clear decision on either side. The initial "demande…
Reed, Thomas L.,Jr.
Thomas L. Reed, Jr. Middle English Debate Poetry and the Aesthetics of Irresolution (Columbia and London: University of Missouri Press, 1990), pp. 294-362.
Discusses irresolution, style, persona, the "experiential labyrinth," Chaucer's sources, and the relationship of PF to the contemporary political world. The term "Parlement" evokes the university and law. The chapter is divided into five parts: …
Reed, Thomas L.,Jr.
Columbia and London: University of Missouri Press, 1990.
A prominent feature of Middle English debate poetry from 1200 to 1450 is irresolution, a quality appreciated in the context of carnival laughter (Bakhtin). Reed rejects univocal interpretation through allegory or symbolism in favor of "experiential…
Reed, Thomas L.,Jr.
Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 89 (1988): 44-56.
The fall of Nebuchadnezzar is the only history in MkT that ends favorably for its protagonist; in its tragicomic structure and its transformation of the hero to a birdlike beast, this episode anticipates some main features of NPT.
Reedy, Elizabeth Katherine.
Dissertation Abstracts International 28.03 (19167): 1057A.
Focuses on the tension in TC between the "two dimensions of human experience: the temporal and the eternal," examining the "paradoxical position" of humans as they seek to "discover and affirm" a stable and permanent world while existing as creatures…
Reeves traces the evolution of old wives' tales (including WBT) and assesses how such tales represent fancy and superstition in early scientific theories of the Copernican system. However, the tales also promote the theory of extraterrestrial life,…
Regan, Charles Lionel.
American Notes and Queries 22 (1984): 97-99.
Chaucer's reference in RvT 4096 to "make a clerkes berd" (i.e., "cheat") may be echoed a few lines later in the oath "by seint Cutberd" (line 4127), suggesting terms for shaving and castration.
The owls and apes of Medieval-Renaissance tradition appear in the Chester "Deluge" and in Burton's "Anatomy of Melancholy." The latter may echo Chaucer.
Traces Chaucer's uses of two rhetorical devices of compression throughout his poetic career, "praeterito" and "reticentia," arguing that he developed sophisticated uses of the devices for creating dramatic and emotional effects. The devices entail,…
Regan, Charles Lionel.
Notes and Queries 209 (1964): 210.
Offers the "Pseudo-Augustinian treatise on penance 'De Vera et Falsa Poenitentia, Liber Una'," as the source of ParsT 10.1025 where Augustine is cited.
Regenos, Graydon W.
Charles Henderson, Jr., ed. Classical, Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Honor of Berthold Louis Ullman. 2 vols. (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratre, 1964), 2: 41-46.
Argues that it "seems altogether likely" that when creating his GP description of the Physician Chaucer "at least had in mind" the doctor of the Brunellus the ass episode in Nigellus Wireker's "Speculum Stultorum"; both doctors are avaricious.
ManT is central to understanding the CT. Its primary theme is a warning against the danger of intentional blindness to sin or vice. Through comparison with Machaut's "Voir dit," we see that the bird in ManT illustrates the folly of self-deception.
Rehyansky, Katherine Heinrichs.
Dissertation Abstracts International 48 (1987): 123A-124A.
Rehyansky studies classical allusions Chaucer introduced into TC: they underscore its themes. Oenone, Daphne, Europa, and Venus represent the folly and tragedy of love; Niobe, Tantalus, Ixion, and Tityus show the folly of pride, greed, and…
Reichert, Folker.
Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 104 (2022): 331-43.
Examines geographical and literary backgrounds to Chaucer's use of "Carrenare" in BD, 1029, identifying it with "Caramoran" (especially as found in Marco Polo and Mandeville), and suggesting it helps to separate Blanche from the vanities of the…
Reichl, Karl.
Andre Crepin, ed. L'imagination medievale: Chaucer et ses contemporains (Paris: Publications de l'Association des Medievistes Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Superieur, 1991), pp. 157-76.
Surveys meanings of "ymaginacioun" and "fantasye" in Chaucer's time and discusses his exploitation of their ambivalence.
Reichl, Karl.
Theo Stemmler, ed. Liebe als Krankheit: 3. Kolloquium der Forschungsstelle fur europaische Lyrik des Mittelalters an der Universitat Mannheim (Tubingen: Narr, 1990), pp. 187-215.
Surveys the forms and conventions of Middle English lyrics that treat love-sickness, including MercB, and those in TC and KnT.
Reichl, Karl.
Piero Boitani, ed. The European Tragedy of Troilus (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), pp. 133-52.
In TC, philosophical terminology "provides a continual gloss on the text." A philosophical reading of the poem--free will versus determinism, fantasy versus reason--does not, however, detract from the poem's narrative, "an intensely moving story of…
Reichl, Karl.
Peter Glasner, ed. Ästhetiken der Fülle (Berlin: Schwabe, 2021), pp. 319-25.
Comments on the history and nuances of "syklatoun" as a kind of sartorial cloth used parodically in Th, a prelude to discussing the implications of clothing in "Emaré" as a popular romance.
Associates the Wife of Bath with the antic "rogue figure of wife" from conventional "low comedy" or "pantomime," more lively and vivid than realistic. Derived from the "topsy-turvy" world of conventional comedy, the Wife gains readers' sympathy…
Reid, Lindsay Ann, and Rachel Stenner.
Comparative Drama 55 (2021): 127-37.
Assesses and combines various attempts to define Chaucerian "resonance" as a term of intertextuality and the reception of Chaucer; also summarizes each of the twelve essays included in this special number of Comparative Drama. For summaries of the…
