The unresolved contradicitons, sudden shifts, and visible seams in MLT indicate the Man of Law's limitations not just as storyteller but also "as a man of law." The limits of the common law of his patriarchial society give him his identity and…
Jonassen, Frederick B.
John Marshall Law Review 43 (2009-10): 51-108.
Describes aspects of Chaucer's life that indicate that he had training in law or familiarity with it, and explores the legal language and details of GP, arguing that the Host's "responsibility for the pilgrims reflects the law of innkeeper's…
Medcalf, Stephen, ed.
New York: Holmes and Meier, 1981.
Essays include "On Reading Books from a Half-Alien Culture," "The Ideal, the Real, and the Quest for Perfection," "Inner and Outer," "Art and Architecture in the Late Middle Ages," "The Age of the Household: Politics, Society, and the Arts c.…
Collette, Carolyn P., and Harold Garrett-Goodyear, eds.
New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
Anthology of documents pertaining to English literature from 1350-1500. Introduction details historical, social, and political movements of late Middle Ages. Includes annotations, timeline, and chronological listing of major medieval literary works.
Identifies thematic concerns in Mel that it shares with other narratives in CT (WBPT, ShT, Clerk's Envoy, MerT, and NPT), exploring how pedantry, suspect counsel, the struggle for "maisterie," and antifeminism convey humor in Mel, especially in…
Mey, Jacob.
Eva Hajicová, Miroslav Cervenka, Oldrich Leska, and Petr Sgall, eds. Travaux du Cercle Linguistique de Prague/Prague Linguistic Circle Papers, I (Amsterdam: Benjamins, 1995), pp. 261-94.
Considers the question of how language may (or may not) preserve technological knowledge over time by commenting on the linguistic features of "Inland English," invented by Russell Hoban in his futuristic novel "Riddley Walker" (1980). Uses…
A social and political history of the "aristocracy of the fourteenth century through the life and times of John of Gaunt." Chapter ten, "Chaucer" (pp. 203-15), summarizes the poet's career, Gaunt's role in his life, and Gaunt's possible reactions to…
Bawcutt, Priscilla.
Yearbook of English Studies 2 (1972): 5-12.
Discusses various topoi of the lark (including its etymology in Latin) to explore and explain details in a variety of medieval and Renaissance poems, including KnT where the lark is "bisy" and a welcomer of dawn (1.1491-92).
Rubin, Miri.
Tjitske Akkerman and Siep Stuurman, eds. Perspectives on Feminist Political Thought in European History: From the Middle Ages to the Present (London and New York: Routledge, 1998), pp. 34-49.
Mentions NPT and Rom in a survey of late-medieval "pervasive understandings" of women and femininity. Finds places within this survey for instances of "feminist moments" and the "dialects within which they were set."
Mosser, Daniel W.
Norman Blake and Peter Robinson, eds. The Canterbury Tales Project Occasional Papers, Volume II (London: King's College, Office for Humanities Communications, 1997): pp. 41-53.
Examines characteristic features of the two similar scribal hands of CT manuscript En1, correcting errors and emphases in Manly and Rickert's analysis (1940). The scribes appear initially to have divided their labors before Scribe 2 completed and…
Horobin, Simon.
Estelle Stubbs, ed. The Hengwrt Chaucer Digital Facsimile (Leicester: Scholarly Digital Editions, 2000)
Focuses on spelling in the Hengwrt manuscript (Hg) in light of the development of London English (from Type II to III), especially in comparison with spelling in the Ellesmere manuscript (El). Though the two manuscripts are closely related, Hg shows…
Horobin, Simon C. P.
Anglia: Zeitschrift für Englische Philologie 119: 249-58, 2001.
Analyzes spelling in the four printed editions of CT issued before 1500. Caxton (1476 and 1482) and Wynken de Worde (1498) responded individually to the perceived authority of the work, while Richard Pynson (1492) attempted to replace the nonstandard…
Smith, Jeremy J.
Martin Stevens and Daniel Woodward, eds. The Ellesmere Chaucer: Essays in Interpretation (San Marino, Calif.: Huntington Library; Tokyo: Yushodo, 1995), pp. 69-86.
Argues for the superiority of Hengwrt over Ellesmere on metrical and dialectical grounds.
Horobin explores how linguistic issues affect questions of attribution, reception, and manuscript authority, focusing not only on lexicon but also on orthography, phonology, and grammar. The language of the Hengwrt manuscript of CT (perhaps produced…
Nakao, Yoshiyuki.
Michio Kawai, ed. Language and Style in English Literature: Essays in Honour of Michio Masui. The English Association of Hiroshima (Tokyo: Eihosha, 1991), pp. 343-60.
Discusses the language of romance in Th, focusing on seven types of "deviation."
Seeks to "ascertain why the diction of poetry from Chaucer to Milton has a distinct character, and one unlikely to be revived." Chapter 2, "Chaucer and His Successors" (pp. 28-38), assesses Chaucer as "the first English poet with a style recognizably…
Tarvers, Josephine Koster.
Ph.D. Dissertation. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1985. Dissertation Abstracts International A46.11. Fully accessible via ProQuest Dissertations & Theses; accessed August 18, 2025.
Identifies "nine components commonly found in prayers," exploring their presence in various devotional poems in Middle English and interpolated in narrative works by the "Gawain"-poet, Langland, Gower, and Chaucer, observing superior style in the…
Shimonomoto, Keiko.
Tokyo : Waseda University Enterprise, 2001.
Examines the indicators of politeness and social categories (class, degree of intimacy, etc.) in the speech of romance characters in CT and TC, with attention to forms of address and second-person pronouns (ye/thou). Also considers politeness…
Burnley, David,and Matsuji Tajima.
Woodbridge, Suffolk; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1994.
An annotated bibliography of 1,335 studies, arranged chronologically (1865-1900) within three broad categories: Early Middle English, Later Middle English, and dissertations. Includes studies in which "linguistic description has been used to cast…
Stillwell, Gardiner.
Journal of English and Germanic Philology 54 (1955): 693-99. Rpt. in Studies by Members of the English Department, University of Illinois, in Memory of John Jay Parry. Essay Index Reprint Series. [Urbana]: University of Illinois Press, 1968, pp. 212-18.
Identifies predecessors in Old French fabliaux for courtly details, diction, locutions, and situations in MilT and RvT, helping to create comic irony by contrast between "elegance and 'harlotrye.'"
Masui, Michio.
Studies in English Literature, English Number (1960): 1-36.
Describes and assesses Chaucer's depictions of the expressions and psychology of love in TC, attending to diction, tone, style, and various uses and developments of the conventions of French and Italian love poetry. Focuses on the poet's successful…
Chaucer developed a poetic idiom of ubiquitous equivocal effects and prevarication both in the comments of his persona and in the voices of his speakers. Poems touched on include TC, PardT, NPT, MerT, and LGW.
