Blamires, Alcuin.
Elaine Treharne and Greg Walker, with the assistance of William Green, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Literature in English (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 478-95.
Discusses representations of individuality in medieval literature, exploring concepts of "singularity" and the Chaucerian notion of "condicioun." Comments on BD, ClT, and the descriptions of the pilgrims in GP, along with a range of medieval works.
Comments on the concern with propagating robust and pure lineages in numerous areas of medieval culture--including Chaucer's ClT, KnT, and MerT in particular. The denouement of the latter may be read as May's inserting herself into January's family…
Blamires, Alcuin.
Corinne Saunders, ed. A Companion to Medieval Poetry (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2010), pp. 335-51.
Blamires introduces TC as Chaucer's "longest finished poem," commenting on sources, fusion of genres, suppleness of verse form and diction, the characters' sympathies, and the poem's "emotional trajectory."
Blamires, Alcuin.
Helen Phillips, ed. Chaucer and Religion (Cambridge: Brewer, 2010), pp. 3-23.
Discusses how Chaucer deals with "regulations and expectations of fourteenth-century Christianity," especially in relation to Chaucer's views on sex, virginity, gender, and marriage. Focuses on BD, PF, TC, ClT, MerT, WBP, NPT, MilT, and PardT.
Blamires, Alcuin.
Isabel Davis and Catherine Nall, eds. Chaucer and Fame: Reputation and Reception (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2015), pp. 344-51.
Surveys classical and medieval skeptical views of the significance of fame and contrasts the attitudes toward reputation expressed by Criseida in Boccaccio's "Filostrato" and Criseyde in TC, focusing on the heroines' views about infamy before leaving…
Blanch, Robert J.
Studia Neophilologica 57 (1985): 41-51.
The Wife's portrayal of the rape, the judgment, and punishment of the knight reflect wish fulfillment, legal anachronism, and the inversion of the natural order of legitimate authority, though the tale ends in "true freedom and order."
Blanch, Robert J.
Lock Haven Review 8 (1966): 8-15.
Demonstrates the presence of three kinds of irony in MerT: verbal irony in the Merchant's double entendres and introductory comments on marriage, rhetorical irony in the deflation of courtly ideals by means of distorted or exaggerated figures and…
Blanch, Robert J., and Julian N. Wasserman.
Julian N. Wasserman and Robert J. Blanch, eds. Chaucer in the Eighties (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1986), pp. 175-91.
The iconographic meaning of the colors red and white had been lost in folk traditions by the time Chaucer wrote KnT. Meaning comes from the joining of the two colors--a symbol of unity. Palamon's and Arcite's choices of colors for their banners…
Blanch, Robert J., ed.
Columbus, Ohio: Charles E. Merrill, 1970.
Textbook edition of MerT, with brief introduction and notes, accompanied by ten selections from previously published criticism of the Tale by various authors, all from the twentieth century. Includes suggestions for student essay topics and "General…
Blanchot, Jean-Jacques.
Andre Crepin, ed. L'imagination medievale: Chaucer et ses contemporains (Paris: Publications de l'Association des Medievistes Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Superieur, 1991), pp. 71-80.
In TC, Chaucer is both a translator and a creator. He combines the model of ancient authors with a mythological world and a symbolic construction.
Blanco, Karen Keiner.
Dissertation Abstracts International 56 (1995): 920A.
Writing for an audience that knew animals and animal lore well (from physical interaction, folklore, and religious tradition), Chaucer appealed to, influenced, and manipulated this lore in HF, PF, PT, and TC.
Bland, Cynthia Renee.
Charlotte Cook Morse, Penelope Reed Doob, and Marjorie Curry Woods, eds. The Uses of Manuscripts in Literary Studies: Essays in Memory of Judson Boyce Allen (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 1992), pp. 213-35.
John of Cornwall's "Speculum grammaticale" uses English as well as Latin sentences for examples, and such vernacular pedagogy seems to have been widely established by late fourteenth century. The unidiomatic phrase "conservatyf the soun" (HF 847)…
Bland, D. S.
[London] Times Literary Supplement April 26, 1957, p. 264.
Suggests that Chaucer was in 1345-46, with several rejoinders in ensuing correspondence: Margaret Galway, May 10, p. 289 and July 12, p. 427; C. E. Welch, May 17, p 305; and G. C. G. Hall, June 28, p. 397.
Blandeau, Agnès.
Leo Carruthers and Adrian Papahagi, eds. Prologues et épilogues dans la littérature anglaise du Moyen Âge (Paris: Association des Mdivistes Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Suprieur, 2001), pp. 171-82, 2001.
Pasolini's Racconti di Canterbury uses ellipsis and expansion to produce cinematographic transformations of CT. Adjustments of narrative structure and original visual effects produce "tales told only for the pleasure of telling them."
Blandeau, Agnès.
Wendy Harding, ed. Drama, Narrative and Poetry in The Canterbury Tales (Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail, 2003), pp. 35-50.
Though Pasolini's visualization of CT chooses to emphasize "solaas" rather than "sentence," both the filmmaker and the poet offer metafictional reflections on their art and the "discourse of the narrative."
Blandeau, Agnès.
Adrian Papahagi, ed. Métamorphoses (Paris: Association des Médiévistes Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Supérieur, 2003), pp. 229-43.
There is more to Pier Paolo Pasolini's film version of CT than mere adaptation, for the shift from one semiotic system to another implies some puzzling metamorphoses. Yet, paradoxically, the spirit of the original is cleverly restored on the screen.
Blandeau studies Pasolini's cinematic trilogy of medieval tales: The Decameron, CT, and One Thousand and One Nights, focusing on the first two. Argues that Pasolini "puts two semiotic systems in translation with each other, not so much to transmit…
Blandeau, Agnès.
Sandra Gorgievski and Xavier Leroux, eds. Le Moyen Âge mis en scène: Perspectives contemporaines. Babel, no. 15. [Toulon]: Université du Sud Toulon-Var, Faculté des Lettres et Sciences Humaines, 2007, pp. 17-31.
Blandeau explores how three films capture the spirit if not the letter of CT.
Blandeau, Agnès.
Martine Yvernault and Sophie Cassagnes-Brouquet, eds. Frères et sœurs: Les liens adelphiques dans l'Occident antique et médiéval. Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2007, pp. 229-36.
Blandeau examines meanings and connotations of the terms "brother," "brotherly," and "brotherhood" in CT and other medieval texts, from "Beowulf" to Malory's "Le Morte Darthur." Brotherhood ranges widely and can extend to a universal fraternity in a…
Late fourteenth-century traders' time of profit-making synchronizes with narrative time in Chaucer's tales, enabling the poet to articulate the relationship between time as physically experienced and Christian time, both linear and cyclical.
