Leicester, H. Marshall, Jr.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Geoffrey Chaucer: "The Wife of Bath." (Boston and New York: Bedford-St. Martin's, 1996), pp. 234-54.
Treats the Wife of Bath as a subject in the process of self-definition who simultaneously seeks to deconstruct the society that constitutes that process. Leicester focuses on the dream of blood in WBP (577-82) to show the difficulty of determining…
Hansen, Elaine Tuttle.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Geoffrey Chaucer: "The Wife of Bath." (Boston and New York: Bedford-St. Martin's, 1996), pp. 273-89.
The Wife of Bath's reference to being beaten by Jankyn and the rape in WBT indicate the violent nature of sex, yet the text glosses over this violence, making it seem normal. Although Chaucer's position as poet may have inclined him to identify with…
Patterson, Lee.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Geoffrey Chaucer: "The Wife of Bath." (Boston and New York: Bedford-St. Martin's, 1996), pp. 133-54.
A new-historicist reading that focuses on the conditions of marriage depicted in WBPT to show how the Wife uses the late-medieval marital system for her own private, emotional advantage. She capitalizes on the social and economic opportunities of…
Finke, Laurie.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Geoffrey Chaucer: "The Wife of Bath." (Boston and New York: Bedford-St. Martin's, 1996), pp. 171-88.
A Marxist reading of WBPT that regards the "link between sexuality and monetary gain" as the "key to the sexual economy of the Wife's performance." WBP reflects the violence potential in "primitive accumulation," an early stage of capitalism defined…
McInerney, Maud Burnett.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the 'Canterbury Tales' and 'Troilus and Criseyde' (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 221-35.
Chaucer plays with Ovid's "Metamorphoses" in his characterization of Troilus in bk. 3, examining the nature of masculinity by depicting Troilus as a "man trapped between two literary modes of loving."
Brewer, Derek.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the 'Canterbury Tales' and 'Troilus and Criseyde' (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 237-52.
According to Chaucer's conception of "manhood," as distinct from the somewhat anachronistic term "masculinity," Troilus is to be seen as "manly" and virtuous in his behavior, as well as worthy of the reader's sympathy. He is an "idealized and…
Dietrich, Stephanie.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the "Canterbury Tales" and "Troilus and Criseyde" (Toronto, Buffalo, and New York: University of Toronto Press, 1998), pp. 205-20.
The characterization of the male hero in the four portraits of Troilus exhibits "gender slippage" through "linguistic slippage." The second and third portraits show Chaucer subverting gender assumptions, while the other two are more "essentialized"…
Cohen, Jeffrey Jerome.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 143-55.
One of the dominant themes of fragment 7 of CT is the "gendering of male bodies." The theme plays out through the shrinking masculinity ofThopas and the absence of menacing sexuality in his encounter with Olifaunt. It parallels the diminution of…
Rossi-Reder, Andrea.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde ( Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 105-16.
Like Boccaccio in Il Filocolo, Chaucer in FranT contrasts men and women by emphasizing men's mobility and women's fixity. Men are depicted as publicly and physically active, while women are privately and intellectually active.
Everest, Carol A.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998) pp. 91-103.
From the perspective of medieval psychology, January's pretensions to youth and sexual vigor are ridiculous and potentially fatal, since his sexual overactivity diminishes vital spirits and causes, among other effects, blindness and eventually death.
Burger, Glenn.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 117-30.
The actions of the Host and the Pardoner in fragment 6 connect PhyT and PardT and their respective tellers, bringing "the male body into view to an extent not seen elsewhere" in CT.
Beidler, Peter G.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 131-42.
Compares ShT with "Decameron" 8.1 to assess the negative and positive characteristics of masculinity portrayed in the monk and merchant of the Tale. The wife is given traits identified with men in the Middle Ages, perhaps because of the Tale's…
Rubey, Daniel.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 157-71.
Places Mel in the context of Richard II and his detractors in the 1380s and 1390s and examines the competing kinds of masculinity in the Tale as argued by Prudence and allegorized in the character of Sophie.
Sharp, Michael D.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 173-85.
MkT critiques secular masculinity, represented by the Host and the Knight; their comments about the Tale disclose more about themselves than about the Tale or its teller. Against these two figures, the "Monk remains a figure of resistance."
Thomas, Paul R.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 187-202.
Differences between NPT and Roman de Renart indicate how Chaucer's 'Tale' depicts a mock-heroic masculinity through its scenes with the cock and the hen and the cock and the fox, as well as in the chase scene.
Ingham, Patricia Clare.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 23-35.
Examines masculine suffering and Theseus's stoic masculinity, particularly how it demands the suffering of the ruler's soldiers and the sorrowing of women. Concludes that the Tale depicts Theseus's creative power as specifically masculine.
Blum, Martin.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 37-52.
John, Nicholas, and Absolon are, each in his own way, feminized in MilT, while Alison is masculinized and thereby escapes punishment.
Pigg, Daniel F.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 53-61.
Connects the violence implicit in the performance of the Tale with physical violence and argues that RvT portrays the perversion of masculine power.
Biebel, Elizabeth M.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 63-75.
WBT reveals the Wife's idealized vision of society. The Tale answers her society's gender inequities, which victimize both men and women, by depicting a world wherein ultimately women and men are recognized as individuals.
Jost, Jean E.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 77-90.
Analyzes the fraternal and potentially sexual attraction between the Friar and the Summoner by focusing on Chaucer's conception of brotherhood and the male relationships in FrPT and SumPT.
Allen, Mark.
Peter G. Beidler, ed. Masculinities in Chaucer: Approaches to Maleness in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde (Cambridge; and Rochester, N.Y.: D.S. Brewer, 1998), pp. 9-21.
In the transformation from Deduit in the "Roman de la Rose" to the Host of CT, and in the actions of the Host during the pilgrimage, we can see intersections of gender and class as Chaucer constructs the Host's distinctively "bourgeois masculinity."
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.
Hühn, Peter.
Peter Hühn, and others, ed. Eventfulness in British Fiction. Narratologia: Contributions to Narrative Theory, no. 18 (New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2010), pp. 17-30.
Examines the tripartite plot structure of MilT and its "two oppositional" contexts, i.e., the ethical demands of its religious allusions and the subversiveness of its fabliau genre. The combination produces a "complex event structure full of…
Travis, Peter W.
Peter L. Allen and Jeff Rider, ed. Reflections in the Frame: New Perspectives on the Study of Medieval Literature. Special issue of Exemplaria 3 (1991): 135-58.
Ret is an example of a Derridean "parergon," simultaneously marginal to and an important element of CT. It allows for both humanistic and exegetical readings, producing a "hermeneutic double-bind," separated by an aporetic gap that generates new…
Faulkner, Peter
Peter Lewis, ed. William Morris: Aspects of The Man and His Work (Loughborough, Leicestershire: Loughborough University of Technology, 1978), pp. 28-49.
Gauges the originality and success of William Morris's poetry, commenting in passing that "The Lovers of Gudrun" is written "in the rather casual couplet form which Morris derived from Chaucer" (37), even though he fails to exploit the "variety" of…
