Browse Items (16472 total)

Despite the difficulties of comparing literature cross-culturally, CT and the "Heike Monogatari" are similar in their "middle" styles, their adaptability to parody, and their capacious allusions to "native and foreign literary studies."

Advocates a multicutural approach to literature by comparing FranT to a thirteenth-century Japanese narrative of the Emperor Gosaga.

Pynson's (1526?) edition of PF was the first printed version of the poem to establish the text from multiple sources.

Describes three recent schools of Chaucer criticism: "identity formation," New Historicism, and (three phases of) feminism.

Suggests several revisions to traditional classifications of the typefaces of William Caxton, drawing evidence, in part, from the digital reproductions of British Museum copies of Caxton's two editions of CT.

Explores Sir Walter Scott's knowledge of Chaucer and the novelist's use of themes and techniques reminiscent of those in BD and the apocryphal "Flower and the Leaf." Alluding to these works in "The Antiquary," Scott emphasizes their concerns with…

Putter compares Chaucer's techniques to the "close control" of syllable counting by alliterative poets. Although the metrical goals of these poets differ from those of Chaucer, the means whereby alliterative poets achieve control are similar to…

The "structural features" of GP reflect "the medieval philosophical debate over universals" and the epistemology of the "via moderna." Chaucer's number and arrangement of pilgrims suggest the "inadequacy of categories," whereas the balanced…

Examines manuscript evidence and compares the verse of TC with that of Boccaccio's "Filostrato," arguing that Chaucer's decasyllabic lines, adapted to rhyme-royal stanzas, are characterized by greater flexibility of caesura than in English…

Seeks to define "romance" in Western literary tradition, commenting on its development from classical roots up to modern fantasy literature. Common formal features help to define the term, along with recurrent narrative patterns and themes. The…

Encourages study of the classical-medieval theory and practice of artificial memory, i.e., memory training that depends on associating ideas with familiar places, whether real or imagined. Comments on the important work of Frances Yates and…

Examines the two lyrics embedded in BD for what they reflect about the relation between the narrator and the Black Knight. Through this relation and its "delicate act of self-effacement," Chaucer credits John of Gaunt for commemorating his dead…

Considers textual issues that pertain to the "Host stanza" at the end of ClT (4.1212a-g) and several passages in MkT and NPT: the "Adam stanza" (7.2007-14), the "Modern Instances" (7.2375-2462), and the short versus long versions of NPP. Discusses…

Argues for new attention to the complexities of textual issues in critical discussions of CT, suggesting that many recent studies ignore or only gesture toward such complexities.

Chaucer merges earthly love into charity in TC. Criseyde's love of Troilus could be the cause of her love affair with Diomede.

Focuses on the occupatio that addresses Emelye's ritual ablutions in the temple of Diana. Discusses the way Chaucer identifies different modes of seeing--all-inclusive panoramic vision vs. the privileged view of the voyeur--with the Knight's staging…

Comments on differences and similarities among these characters: the Wife of Bath as depicted in WBP, La Vieille of "Roman de la Rose," and old women who take young lovers in two medieval Japanese narratives.

Compares Chaucer's PardT with contemporary sermons by Honorius de Augustoduno and Giles of Rome using the theme of "radix malorum est cupiditas." Despite similarities among the three, only Chaucer's exemplum contains highly sophisticated linguistic…

The two references to kneeling in SumT help create irony. The friar's kneeling in the first half of the tale "forecasts" his "spiritual downfall" in the last scene.

Chaucer and Murasaki Shikibu, author of "Genji Monogatari," share a number of literary features: a commitment to vernacular expression, grammatically and stylistically open texts, celebration of generic variety, and preoccupation with the female…

Discusses the sociomoral and aesthetic qualities that constitute courtly speech, including social attitude, voice quality, brevity, plainness of speech, and sensitivity and understanding. Based on passages spoken "curteisly" in Chaucer, Burnley's…

Surveys commentary on Chaucer in Victorian critical journals, deriving three aspects of the Victorian view of Chaucer: he was a Child-Poet whose simplicity anticipated that of the nineteenth-century lower classes; he was the poet of the "green…

Analyzes ambiguity in the setting of FranT, suggesting that a distinction between the information given and what is revealed by it depends on the response of the audience. Textual clues open an ironic gap between the poet and his narrator.

Investigates the ways CT problematizes the medium of speech and, through its self-conscious narrators, comments on the changing value of spoken language. Though Chaucer preserves and allows resistance to the tyrannies of high literary form, his…

Examines the iconography of nineteenth-century engravings of select Canterbury pilgrims published by Knight. The postures, details, and styles in the engravings reflect assumptions about social order, as well as Knight's program of educating his…