Glosses to the early manuscripts of CT may be read as important commentaries on the text. In particular glosses to WBT point out the wife's misquotations and, ultimately, her spiritual deafness to the New Law and the deeper meaning of marriage.
Luengo, Anthony E.
Chaucer Review 11 (1976): 1-10.
The form and style of the Pardoner's sermon are affected by its two audiences. The moral tale is related for the benefit of the Pilgrims; the "ensamples" (the brief Biblical stories against various sins) are for the "lewed people" in his rustic…
Chaucer self-consciously makes the reader aware of the achievement of the writer, of the reader as reader, and of the intelligent response he is asking the reader to make. All three point to Chaucer's fascination with the power of language as a key…
The French narrative poems of Machaut and Froissart reveal the source of the voice in Chaucer's early poems. Even though BD imitates the conventions of its French models, it shows how Chaucer adapted the conventions to his own use.
The germ of Chaucer's phrase "and by the reyne hire hente" is found in Benoit's "Roman de Troie." Benoit uses a similar phrase four times. This is further evidence that Chaucer was conflating Boccaccio and Benoit.
Clark, Roy Peter.
Chaucer Review 11 (1976): 164-78.
In SumT Friar John and Thomas parody significant features in the life of St. Thomas the Apostle. The probing of Thomas's body by the friar parodies the "doubting Thomas" legend. The references to St. Thomas provide a foil by which the audience may…
No criticism has dealt satisfactorily with Chaucer's versification. This is because prosody cannot be studied in isolation. It must consider the literary and linguistic effects as well as the specific form and the mode of performance.
Chaucer abuses authority throughout CT. He refers to so many authorities that they cannot be reduced to anything like unity. Such abuse reflects the farcical potential of the academic procedure of disputation as well as the dilemma of the…
Pichaske, David R.,and Laura Sweetland.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 179-200.
There is a parallel between Harry's rule in CT and medieval political theory. Harry progresses from the role of egocentric tyrant ruling amidst chaos to that of a more or less generous public servant ruling amidst social harmony.
Schneider, Paul Stephen.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 201-09.
In ShT money corrupts marriage and brotherhood, but it effects a relationship between the merchant and his wife. Hence money is both good and evil, but its effects are unpredictable.
Scattergood, V. J.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 210-31.
ShT contradicts the usual view of merchants in the fabliaux. By setting the merchant against the monk and the wife, Chaucer defies tradition and presents the merchant in a generally favorable light.
The psychological condition of ClT must be understood in terms of fourteenth-century, not twentieth-century, psychology. The relationship between Griselda and Walter can be compared to a man-to-God, child-to-parent, or colonial-to-colonizer…
Zimbardo, Rose A.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 283-98.
The epilogue to TC emphasizes the poem's double perspective of man as an active character in life's drama and of man deliberately separating himself from reality to perceive it objectively. This problem reflects the dilemma of the artist, who is at…
Garbaty, Thomas J.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 299-305.
In the epilogue Chaucer addresses his book as "litel myn tragedye," adding that God might prompt him still to make it into "som comedye." This objective is achieved when Troilus (recalling "Paradiso," XXII) transcends tragedy and attains celestial…
Levy, Bernard S.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 306-18.
The Clerk responds to WBT by showing that "gentilesse" is found in humble virtue and obedience, as well as in noble birth. MerT, however, seeks to deny the underlying premise of these earlier tales by showing that "gentilesse" and happiness can…
Abraham, David H.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 319-27.
The recognition of the sexual puns on the words "cosyn" and "cosynage" determines the structure of ShT, as the narrative shifts its balance from relationship to deception.
Friedman, Albert B.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 328-33.
The grain which the Virgin places on the clergeon's tongue and which is removed after his death to stop his singing is simply a prop necessary to the structure of the tale; elaborate allegorizations are unnecessary.
David E. Lampe's thesis that the word "Vache" in "Truth," 22, is an iconographic pun is falsely reasoned on several accounts, the most glaring of which is that "vacca" has several evil connotations in addition to the favorable "worldly renunciation"…
McGregor, James H.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 338-50.
The Chaucer portraits in Hoccleve and TC are iconographic, not realistic, stressing Chaucer's role as artist-philosopher and teacher of poets and princes alike.
McCobb, Lillian M.
Chaucer Review 11 (1977): 369-72.
Analysis of the conclusion of the English "Partonope" and its French source's conclusion suggests the English as a later work done under the influence of Chaucer's tale. The author may have followed a copy of Chaucer's work.
NPT parodies the high, middle, and low styles of medieval rhetoric by allowing the animals to speak in all these styles. The animals speak in four styles of usage--intimate, conversational, didactic, and literary.
