Browse Items (15542 total)

Compares Chaucer's use of history in BD with that of Langland in "Piers Plowman," suggesting that focus on contemporary events is common to the poets and perhaps indicative of their common audience. Such commonalities and the habits of mind they…

Chaucer and Langland are both "great religious writers," although Langland is more deeply engaged in "who and what God is." Both writers are poets of religious experience: Chaucer explores pathos, and Langland confronts the "central beliefs of…

Occasional essays previously published on Chaucer and Langland.

Chaucer's preeminence over Langland is an effect of historical and social forces and must be revised, because tradition is a conflicted notion that helps construct understanding of past, present, and future. Chaucer was a medium of this process, "the…

Ten essays that pertain to Chaucer, plus a commemorative preface (by M. I. Cameron), an introduction (by David Williams) that summarizes the essays, a bibliography of Wurtele's publications, and a subject index. For individual essays that pertain to…

"Reviews work on Chaucer's language and its importance for the development of English literary language." Also suggests directions for future language studies.

Counters "Robertsonian" or exegetical criticism of Chaucer's works, particularly its neglect of "later scholastic philosophy," focusing on views of individuality and experience found in writers such as Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, and William of Ockham.…

Like most of the early nineteenth-century critics, Leigh Hunt strove to bring about a popular revival of Chaucer. But more important, he was among the first to attempt a technical analysis of Chaucer's poetry and to link his poetry with the idea of…

A detailed, tabulated comparison of tree-lists in Chaucer (Rom 1379-86, PF 176-82, KnT 2063-65) with those in his sources shows Chaucer becoming more familiar with a technical vocabulary, and more willing to adapt and augment his immediate sources…

Reviews Ian Robinson's book, "Chaucer and the English Tradition" (1972), with commentary on various critical works published between 1950 and 1972.

Chaucer does not attempt to work within the framework of such established literary forms as romance and fabliau. The flaws in the genre approach become evident when the tales are judged from the broader perspective of medieval rhetoric and poetic.

Points out that Chaucer develops the idea of interpretation through his works (especially CT), and demonstrates how Lydgate's "The Siege of Thebes," drawing on Chaucer, revolves around the ideas of truth and interpretation.

Argues that for most Chaucerian scholars historical criticism,which necessarily recognizes generic and cultural differences between our own time and the Middle Ages, is outweighed by aesthetic criticism, which is viewer-centered and oriented toward…

Explores Chaucer's "employment of Lollard ideas and motifs" in the CT, particularly in ParsPT and WBP, and in the G version of the LGWP. Argues that Chaucer's rhetoric and portrayal of Lollardy reflects how he wants readers to understand the…

Chaucer gave Lydgate his language, his verse forms, and his poetic style--with the urge to refine and elaborate them into a high medieval art. Lydgate's career is arguably a determined effort to emulate and surpass Chaucer in each of the major…

Examines citations of Chaucer and Lydgate in John Palsgrave's "Lesclarcissement de la langue francoyse" (1530) as indications of the dictionary-maker's efforts to record "special language use," i.e., dialectical use and varying registers.

Explores Chaucer's and Lydgate's assumptions about their audience's knowledge of history, and discusses how and to what extent it may indicate irony in KnT, MkT, TC, and several works by Lydgate.

Explores CYT and sections of Malory's "Morte d'Arthur" as works that foreshadow the Renaissance, attempting "to contain and understand the irrational and the numinous."

Surveys the medical knowledge evident in CT, commenting on Chaucer's breadth of learning. Includes a glossary of medical terms found in CT.

Reviews D. W. Robertson's "A Preface to Chaucer: Studies in Medieval Perspectives" (1962), providing a brief survey of the "prevailing criticism" that challenges the exegetical, patristic, or historicist criticism that Robertson champions, and…

Establishes that GP is an example of the medieval literary genre of estates satire, i.e., a "satiric representation of all classes of society," based on occupation. Surveys the tradition of the genre, including works that only draw on "estates…

The inherent irony of CT stems from a Neoplatonic or Augustinian world view in which poetic tale-telling is an inadequate reflection of reality. This particularly medieval irony necessitates the inclusion of Ret, whereby art leads beyond time and…

Examines the imagery, formulas, structure, and audience appeal of a number of Middle English sermons and sermon cycles, exploring their influence on Chaucer in Mel, ParsT, PardT, and NPT. The aural element of sermons is reflected in Chaucer's poems;…

The scatalogical language and happenings in MilT and SumT can be interpreted as a serious commentary. The farting, kissing, and symbolic sodomy recall the anal character of demonic ritual. The friar's misuse of the gift of tongues may reflect the…

Brown describes a "recent crisis" that threatened the survival of the Canterbury Centre for Medieval and Tudor Studies at the University of Kent at Canterbury.