Browse Items (16472 total)

Haas examines Th as the "unstable center" of Fragment 7, especially in its parodies of the "problems of mercantile culture" initiated in ShT: money and sexuality.

Identifies the legal features of the lovers' pacts in CT. Legal diction (e.g., "accord"), careful preparation, and various kinds of delay connect the illicit relations in MilT, WBPT, ShT, MerT, RvT, and others with the legal contract of marriage.

Characterizes the Prioress of GP and PrT as "psychologically androgynous," a combination of "feminine on the outside" and "masculine on the inside." This combination is evident in the Prioress's fusion of sentimentality and cruelty and her other…

Assesses the process of consolation in BD in light of modern theories of grief and reminiscence therapy, arguing that the numerology of the poem provides closure.

Reads MLT as an "allegory of will," a Christian response to the "Boethian stoicism" of KnT that transcends mundane mercantilism by dramatizing an "investment of self." As "God's merchant," Custance transforms herself and converts others through a…

Describes a pedagogy for teaching ClT in comparison to the Griselda story in Christine de Pizan's The Book of the City of Ladies--as part of a course that treats "Chaucer in context" as a means to encourage students to engage actively in their…

Chaucer's ability to draw female characters--in particular, Criseyde and the Wife of Bath--sets him apart from contemporaries in a male-dominated society. The subjectively described Criseyde, with her "slydynge" heart, and the objectively described…

Ovid is an important source for Gower's "Confessio" and for LGW. However, there is evidence that both authors also made first-hand use of Livy.

PF can be used as a vehicle for notional instead of Newtonian criticism. It is better interpreted as a complicated art form rather than as social criticism.

Fifty-seven essays on a variety of topics. For essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Image of Nature in Literature, the Media, and Society under Alternative Title.

Deals with erotic love, marriage, and the theme of cupidity in PardT and MerT.

Assesses the Physician as a skillful practitioner and comments on PhyT, audience response to the tale, sources, arrangement of materials, and Chaucer's message.

Compares the roles and functions of Criseyde and the Wife of Bath as two of the most outstanding female characters in Middle English literature.

Explores different aspects of the love felt by Criseyde in light of the emotions expressed in BD. As a pragmatist, Criseyde thinks she will not suffer love's pains. Her feelings lack heroic grandeur.

Margery Kempe and Alison of Bath represent a basic conflict: as representatives of the nascent bourgeoisie, they seek to inscribe themselves in a tradition that, since they are women, silences them.

Shows that the diction, style, and substance of the Eagle's disquisition on sound in HF (606-863) illustrate the "techniques of Ciceronian persuasive rhetoric on a relevant science, the physics of sound," part of the poem's unifying concern with the…

Includes four chapters, each devoted to a single poem as addressed on a particular occasion and/or to a particular audience, considered in light of rhetorical traditions, genre expectations, oral concerns, and sources: 1) SNT on the occasion of a…

Review article.

Explores Chaucer's uses of "fama," perhaps reflecting his ambiguous relationship with the concept. At times, he seems to switch from desire of acknowledgment to a more bitter view.

Explicates Virginia's death by reference to patristic definitions of virginity as the desired ideal veiled in substance, a state inevitably transgressed by the gaze. By extension, the ideal that virginity implies is destroyed by its articulation. …

Explores "the ways in which the Medusa figure informs" TC and how "petrification" through astonishment is a recurrent concern in FranT. Neither poem refers directly to Medusa or a gorgon, although each capitalizes on the connotations of "astoned" and…

Viewed in light of Jean Baudrillard's "Simulacra and Simulation," the Pardoner's relics are simulacra, which allows Chaucer to question their "realness." The textuality of PardT (and CT as a whole) is to be read as a hyperreality.

Th is told between PrT and Mel, two stories that feature violence. While Th is often read as an innocent parody of romance, there are suggestions of potential violence. In his encounter with the elf queen. Sir Thopas represents the threat against the…

Compares how Dante's Paolo and Francesca fall in love with the process of Criseyde's falling in love. Each poet self-consciously depicts love, but whereas Dante maintains a conventional view of his feminine character, Chaucer discloses the…

In Filostrato, Troilo's accurate decoding of Criseyde's language enables him to discover her reciprocal desire, leading to fulfillment. In TC, fulfillment is more complex as Troilus, Pandarus, and the narrator each construct their own meaning of…