Exemplifies Chaucer's "control of proportion" of details in GP, observing a "middle-class tendency to conformity" in the generalized description of the Guildsmen.
Comments on the comic and aural effects of the allusions to Hasdrubales's wife and to Nero in NPT (7.3362-73), focusing on Pertelote and the other female chickens.
Crampton, Georgia R[onan].
Medium Aevum 43 (1974): 22-36.
Argues that TC "gains psychological interest and what may be called a novelistic effect" through adaptation of the "to do and to suffer" topos. Troilus is "a man of passion who suffers," Pandarus is "a man of action who contrives," and Criseyde…
Gellrich, Jesse M.
Journal of English and Germanic Philology 73 (1974): 176-88.
Describes the "pervasive tone" of MilT as "comic irony" and explores how musical imagery contributes to this tone, especially through incongruous juxtapositions of profundity and profanity. Includes discussion of Nicholas's Annunciation song…
Reads HF as an example of science fiction, focusing on its presentation of acoustics and commenting on its recurrent use of "scientific or pseudo-scientific explanations."
Tallies John Keats's early references and allusions to TC in his letters to Fanny Brawne and assesses how his lyric "What can I do to drive away" follows Chaucer's poem in representing the "rhythmic experience of pain passing into sweetness and…
Baron, F. Xavier.
Papers on Language and Literature 10 (1974): 5-14.
Considers Troilus's "altruistic love" of Criseyde to be one of the "outstanding examples in late medieval romance" of "self-abnegating love," i.e., "placing another's good before one's own." Troilus's hesitancy to act is a manifestation of this…
Herzman, Ronald B.
Papers on Language and Literature 10 (1974): 339-52
Several features of KnT indicate that the rules and forms of chivalry can dignify conduct but at the same time threaten to overwhelm or undercut what they are intended to achieve. Similar threats of form overwhelming content are evident in the tale's…
Olson, Glending
Modern Language Quarterly 35 (1974): 219-30.
Argues that in its concern with social pretension and its atmosphere of "game and contest," RvT is better regarded as a comic fabliau than as a tale of vengeance that reflects its teller. Compares and contrasts RvT with several fabliaux, including…
Stroud, Theodore A.
Modern Philology 72 (1974): 60-70.
Reviews two books about Chaucer: "Language of Chaucer's Poetry: An Appraisal of Verse, Style and Structure" by Norman E. Eliason; and "Disembodied Laughter: 'Troilus' and the Apotheosis Tradition" by John M. Steadman.
Explores the ways in which Chaucer anticipates features of Renaissance literature, focusing on realism and ideas of humanity in TC and CT, but also commenting on satire in PF and parody in Thop. In Lithuanian, with summaries in Russian and English.
Ebin, Lois A.
Philological Quarterly 53 (1974): 321-41.
Reads "The Kingis Quair" as a "direct response" to Boethius's "Consolation of Philosophy" and to TC and KnT, taking up their concerns with Fortune. "Quair" shares the concern with worldly love found in Chaucer's two poems, although it presents love…
Argues that in translating Renaud de Louens's "Le Livre de Mellibee" in his own Mel, Chaucer created an "overtly rhetorical style for purposes of parody." Probably an expansion of an earlier, abridged translation by Chaucer, Mel is characterized by…
Articulates various "levels of perception" manipulated by Chaucer to create comic irony through his personae in BD, HF, PF, LGW, and CT. The "Chaucerian pose" is relatively constant in the early poems where the narrator is a "reasonable man" (but "no…
Lasater, Alice E.
Southern Quarterly12.3 (1974): 189-201.
Argues that Chaucer's influence on Edmund Spenser's "Shepheardes Calendar" is "deeper and far more extensive" than previously recognized. In particular, manipulations of the "hidden narrator" in Spenser are similar to similar techniques in CT and…
Manning, Stephen.
South Atlantic Bulletin 39.1 (1974): 17-26.
Psychoanalyzes the oral imagery in PardPT (food, drink, swearing, the Eucharist, "taking in," aggressive speech, phallic tongues, kissing), arguing that it indicates the Pardoner's unconscious search for pardon.
Jordan, Robert M.
Yale French Studies 51 (1974): 223-34.
Assesses structural and stylistic features (rather than the subject matter) of medieval narratives classed as romance, analyzing the "compositional structure" of WBT, particularly its "inorganic" and "additive" incorporation of digressive materials.…
Szittya, Penn R.
Studies in Philology 71 (1974): 19-46.
Identifies allusions in SumT to biblical passages that were used by fraternal orders and criticized in antifraternal commentary. The allusions, which engage a "theological controversy well known in Chaucer's time," satirize friars' hypocritical…
Utley, Francis Lee.
Western Folklore 33 (1974): 181-201.
Comments on the roles and methods of folklore study in literary criticism, arguing that international folktales are as important as elite narratives for understanding and appreciating medieval literature. Discusses plots shared by Boccaccio and…
Brunskill, Ann, illus.
London: World's End Press, 1974.
Item not seen; reported in WorldCat with the following note: "Contains Fragment A of the Middle English Romaunt of the Rose, sometimes (as here) attributed to Chaucer, with the parallel section (verses 1-1670) of its Old French ancestor . . . . 'A…
