Browse Items (16035 total)

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.

Behind FranT is the "Inferno," cantos 9-10--the cantos of the heretics, especially the Epicureans, and of Medusa. The teller's epicureanism prevents him from probing beneath the letter to the spirit. Likewise, his Dorigen is "astoned" (astonished,…

A difficult form requiring of the reader a complex consciousness and thus hitherto largely neglected by critics, Menippean satire provides a meaningful context for Chaucer. The works of the third century B.C. satirist, themselves being lost, come to…

Thirty-six essays by various authors on late-medieval literature and manuscripts, accompanied by an appreciation of Robbins's career and list of his publications. For seventeen essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Chaucer and Middle English…

Modernism, properly defined, allows the critic to evaluate Chaucer's art more meaningfully. Modernism has much in common with the medieval aesthetic.

Compares MerT, MilT, and ShT with works by Moliére, arguing that Chaucer's "dramatic impulse" is clear in light of "Comedy Proper," a dramatic form in which intellectual error leads to folly and just, comic punishment. Both writers succeed through…

The authors maintain that Chaucer's visit to Monserrat inspired aspects of HF and suggest that Chaucer's man of great authority (HF 2158) was Pedro IV.

Suggests that Chaucer identifies the virtuous women in MLT, ClT, PhyT, and Mel with one of the four cardinal virtues to enhance the characteristics found in his sources.

An overview of research in progress on the mythographic tradition in the Middle Ages (primarily commentary on the works of Virgil, Lucan, Statius, Martianus Capella, Boethius, and Ovid) and examples of its applicability to Chaucer.