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Chaucer's Art of Portraiture: Subject, Author and Reader
Saunders, Claire.
Linda Cookson and Bryan Loughrey, ed. Critical Essays on The General Prologue to The Canterbury Tales (Harlow: Longman, 1989), pp. 72-80.
Gauges how subject, author, and reader "interact with varying degrees of subtlety in the GP descriptions of the pilgrims: the "snapshot" (Yeoman), idealization (Parson), caricature (Summoner), balance between ideal and caricature (Wife of Bath), and…
Chaucer's Art of Verbal Allusion: Two Notes
Burnley, J. D.
Neophilologus 56 (1972): 93-99.
Demonstrates Chaucer's "skills as a miniaturist," discussing antecedents in rhetorical tradition to the phrase "places delitables" (i.e., "locus amoenus") in FranT (5.899) and the interdependence of "moral and physical gifts" in the description of…
Chaucer's Arthurian Romance
Quinn, Esther C.
Chaucer Review 18 (1984): 211-20.
WBT is an ironic Arthurian romance, particularly when viewed alongside Marie de France's "Lanval" and "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," which parallel it in several ways.
Chaucer's Arthuriana
Bovaird-Abbo, Kristin Lee.
DAI A69.06 (2008): n.p.
Considers Chaucer's use of Arthurian legend, from his use in TC of the traditional French conception of Lancelot for Troilus to his examination of the subtext the legend provides for the fabric of fourteenth-century English society. In particular,…
Chaucer's Articulation of the Narrative in 'Troilus': The Manuscript Evidence
Hardman, Phillipa.
Chaucer Review 30 (1995): 111-33.
A comparison of the manuscripts of TC with those of Boccaccio's "Filostrato" indicates that Chaucer's narrative divisions correspond to the summary rubrics in the earlier work, even if he did not retain Boccaccio's internal subdivisions.
Chaucer's Artistic Accomplishment in Molding the "Wife of Bath's Tale."
Albertini, Virgil R.
Northwest Missouri State College Studies 28.4 (1964): 3-16.
Identifies "traces of the primitive folk tale" that underlie the Cupid and Psyche myth and WBT, and maintains Chaucer's familiarity with some version of the myth. Compares and contrasts aspects of the Tale with its English analogues, and argues that…
Chaucer's Artistic Use of Pope Innocent III's "De Miseria Humane Conditionis" in the Man of Law's Prologue and Tale.
Lewis, Robert Enzer.
PMLA 81 (1966): 485-92.
Argues that Chaucer uses portions of Pope Innocent's "De Miseria" in MLPT to "further characterize" the Man of Law, deepening the "concern with wealth" found in the GP description of the Sergeant. Furthermore, the portions from "De Miseria" unify the…
Chaucer's Artistry in the "Manciple's Tale."
Eberle, Gerald J.
Loyola University Studies in the Humanities 1 (1962): 75-90.
Surveys prior criticism of ManT and observes recurrent irony in the tale, particularly in Chaucer's assigning unnecessary expansions and repetitions to the verbose narrator.
Chaucer's Arts and Our Arts
Kelly, Henry Ansgar.
Donald M. Rose, ed. New Perspectives in Chaucer Criticism (Norman Okla.: Pilgrim Books, 1981), pp. 107-20.
In the Middle Ages the term "art" meant the liberal arts or almost any serious endeavor (other than the visual arts), also involving Gregory the Great's dictum that "the art of arts is the rule of souls." Chaucer was less influenced by the visual…
Chaucer's Ascetical Images
Fleming, John V.
Christianity & Literature 28.4 (1979): 19-26.
Chaucer is the rule for vernacular poets rather than the exception. His appropriation of monastic patterns of thought and ascetic ideas and imagery were a tradition already becoming a classic in his time. In CT, the Summoner's portrait, the…
Chaucer's Assonance
Adams, Percy G.
Journal of English and Germanic Philology 71 (1972): 527-39.
Exemplifies the varieties and density of assonance in Chaucer's poetry, commenting on assonance in French, Italian, and English predecessors, and on Chaucer's uses of assonance in combination with other devices of sound and emphasis.
Chaucer's Attitudes to Music
Brewer, D[erek] S.
Poetica (Tokyo) 15-16 (1983): 128-35.
Brewer surveys the presence (and absence) of music in Chaucer's work, suggesting that Chaucer knew its celestial, theoretical underpinnings and enjoyed its zesty, earthy pleasures.
Chaucer's Audience
Strohm, Paul.
Literature and History 5 (1977): 26-41.
Special individuals of the lesser gentry--knights, squires, and women of equivalent rank closely connected with the court, in such professional positions as the Chancery, secretaryships, and legal work--found their complicated life-experiences…
Chaucer's Audience
Mehl, Dieter.
Leeds Studies in English 10 (1978): 58-74.
Chaucer obviosly expects his audience to be familiar with his person, his previous writings, and his reputation as an author. He also expects his audience to reflect about the moral function of poetry. He draws his audience into his poetry by using…
Chaucer's Audience and the Henpecked Husband
Boyd, Beverly.
Florilegium 12 (1993): 177-80.
Chaucer's frequent references to nagging wives and henpecked husbands have less to do with his personal views than with his awareness of audience; women as well as men could share the misogynistic joke because in Pauline theory the shrew was "some…
Chaucer's Audience: Discussion
Chaucer Review 18 (1983): 175-81.
Symposium by thirteen Chaucerians.
Chaucer's Audience(s): Fictional, Implied, Intended, Actual
Strohm, Paul.
Chaucer Review 18 (1983): 137-45.
The problem of ascertaining Chaucer's audience(s) is complex, running from the fictional one of GP to the real audiences of the poet's day to the audiences of the present.
Chaucer's Bad Tales: The Aesthetic Forms of Late Medieval Pathos and the Tradition of 'Sermo Humilis'
Weissman, Hope Phyllis.
DAI 34.06 (1973): 3362A.
Traces the development of the "sermo humilis" tradition in literature and the visual arts as a context for Chaucer's uses of "pathetic style" in the Ugolino episode of MkT, PrT, PhyT, and MLT, arguing that these accounts reflect the evolution of…
Chaucer's Ballade 'To Rosemounde'--a Parody?
Stemmler, Theo.
Richard G. Newhauser and John A. Alford, eds. Literature and Religion in the Later Middle Ages: Philological Studies in Honor of Siegfried Wenzel (Binghamton, N.Y.: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1995), pp. 11-23.
Disagreeing throughout with Joerg Fichte and Edmund Reiss, Stemmler uses literature contemporary with Chaucer to show that Ros is a "seriously meant love-lyric." It is not a parody.
Chaucer's Bawdy
Ross, Thomas.
New York: Dutton, 1972.
An alphabetical glossary of obscene, sexual, and scatological references, puns, and allusions in Chaucer's works. Individual entries define and analyze the terms and phrases, providing bibliographical citations to previous critical discussions; the…
Chaucer's Bawdy Tongue.
Braddy, Haldeen.
Southern Folklore Quarterly 30 (1966): 214-22.
Assesses Chaucer's "vulgarisms" for the ways that they "reveal" his "expert insight into the uninhibited lives of the folk." Comments on Chaucer's depictions of incest, claims that Chaucer's uses 119 "bawdy terms," and focuses on his robust…
Chaucer's Beard-Making
Tkacz, Catherine Brown.
Chaucer Review 18 (1983): 127-36.
Clerk John's oath by "seint Cutberd" (line 4127) is to the appropriate saint Cuthbert, but Chaucer puns on "cut-beard," suggesting sexual deceit.
Chaucer's Beards
Jennings, Margaret,C. S. J.
Archiv 215 (1978): 362-68.
Chaucer's characters' beards, medievally understood, are iconographic and physiognomic, and neatly fit the personalities of their wearers.
Chaucer's Bibles: Late Medieval Biblicism and Compilational Form.
Kraebel, A. B.
Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 47.3 (2017): 437-60.
Focuses on how manuscript compilations, especially biblical materials, are evoked in CT. Argues that a strictly historical arpproach to this material is inadequate and examines how an author can use the material form of books for specific literary…
Chaucer's Biblical Poetics
Besserman, Lawrence [L.]
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1998.
Argues that the Bible is a far more pervasive influence on Chaucer than has been previously recognized. Chaucer uses the Bible or its glosses in most of his writings, responding--through quotation, paraphrase, or allusion--to traditional notions of…