Browse Items (16318 total)

Hanna encourages more refined analysis of Chaucer's lexical practice, especially examination of patterns of choices between English and French synonyms.

Explores interrelations among world literature studies, comparative literature studies, textbook marketing, translations of Chaucer's works into various languages, Ngugı wa Thiong'o's concept of "globalectics," and the essays accompanying Warren's…

Explores gift-giving in Part 5 of CT, from the magical gifts given to Ghengis Khan in SqT to the concern with generosity that ends FranT. Uses Derridean notions of gifts and exchange to argue that the sequence is Chaucer's means to "erase…

Although elite cultural views, such as those of theologians, set the polarities of moral judgment as good and evil, vernacular writings in Middle English--including Lollard sermons, Piers Plowman, and CT--set up instead a dialectic of sin and evil. …

Summarizes traditions antecedent to Chaucer's uses of classical deities, and asserts that Chaucer's own uses rejuvenate the tradition, arguing that he is less conventional than usually assumed. Treats sources and analogues, BD, HF, PF, TC, LGWP, KnT,…

The solemn tone of an unusually learned vocabulary, the skillful syntax, and the architectural strength of the ababbcbc eight-line unit combine to give Chaucer's "image of regret" in "Form Age" what Joseph Campbell calls the "force of living myth"

Documents the influence on WBPT, SumT, PardT, and, to a lesser degree, other parts of CT of the "Communiloquium" of John of Wales (or another fraternal compendium much like it), showing that a number of biblical, classical, and medieval quotations or…

While Chaucer undoubtedly mined John of Wales's Communiloquium for details in PardT, he also consulted Jerome's Letter 22, to Eustochium, for details not found in John's florilegium. Comparison of PardT with Jerome's letter elucidates Chaucer's…

Bowen considers the treatment of stringed instruments in Chaucer's Latin sources, their treatment as symbols of "celebration and peace" for characters in CT, and connections between the instruments and concepts of bodies. Stringed instruments…

Critiques traditional treatment of Chaucer's English as the main antecedent of modern English and the assertion that it is representative. Chaucer's English is more conservative than that of many of his contemporaries and of general spoken discourse.…

Surveys medieval understandings of Rome and its history as background to understanding Chaucer's allusions to Rome and Romans, especially his treatments of them in PhyT, SNT, the Caesar and Nero accounts in MkT, and the Lucrece legend of LGW.…

Clarifies the appropriateness of Symkin's wife swearing by the "croys of Bromeholm" (RvT 1. 4286), adducing Roger of Wendover's "Flores Historiarum" and, possibly, the clerical status of the wife's father.

Investigates the "equestrian vocabulary" used by Chaucer, with particular attention to GP, but including his other references to horses, their tackle, colors, names, conditions, movements, etc., clarifying the denotations of the terminology. Includes…

Historical detective novel, with Chaucer as the investigator of a string of murders while on a diplomatic mission to France in 1370.

Postulates a crucial division in Chaucer's poetic career, separated by a "courteous but thoughtful and decisive rejection of 'fine amour'," reflected in PF, TC, and LGWP. Acknowledges the impact of French and Italian models on Chaucer's changing idea…

Examines theatricality in Chaucer's work evidenced in spatial representations, the specialized behavior of performers, and the presence of an audience in PrT, SNT, and MilT. Some attention to TC, HF, MkT, SqT, and FranT.

Despite David Wallace's assertion that London is "absent" in Chaucer, and D. W. Robertson's contention that medieval Londoners were content within "an hierarchical classless society," CT depicts London as an "underworld," where unscrupulous…

Juxtaposes "visual materials and their literary analogues" to illuminate larger images created by narrative action. Seven chapters treat medieval hypotheses of audience and image; Chaucerian aesthetics of the image in the poem; KnT, the…

Presented differently than in Trevet, Chaucer's scenes of the blind Briton and the blindfolded Maurice in MLT emphasize the helplessness of humankind and the help of God. The emphasis is consistent with Innocent III's "De miseria condicionis humane"…

HF, a turning point in Chaucer's career and in English literary culture, reflects attitudes toward fame and glory from Homer to the Scholastics to writers of the Italian "trecento." The poem deals with issues of fame, poetry, and linguistic theory…

Examines through the eyes of modern poets the ability of medieval imagination "to bridge gaps gracefully between the poets and the world around them"--addressing "all varieties of experience, aspiration, and frustration," often through fresh and…

Surveys criticism of ClT in order to show the "inadequacy" of this criticism and reads the Tale as a "typological allegory" even though it goes steps beyond its sources in depicting the plot realistically.

Sociohistorical commentary on the rise of prestige markers in English writing and speech, focusing on accent as a marker in Chaucer's time and soon after, in particular the pronunciation of final -e, the Great Vowel Shift, and northern dialect…

Essays on Anglo-Italian relationships and Chaucer's borrowings. For individual essays, of this volume.

On Chaucer's Italian sources.