Browse Items (16012 total)

Frames Rom "in a lineage of narrative fiction going back to the twelfth-century predecessors of the two authors [Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun] and attempts to describe their respective innovations." Includes and interprets various texts…

Traces "the afterlife of the 'Romance of the Rose' in fourteenth-century England, arguing that the RR "exercised its influence on fourteenth-century English literature in two principal ways": 1) "the development of a self-reflexive focus on how…

Characterizes Oswald the Reeve as a guiler beguiled and a "judge who unwittingly judges himself by his own principles," examining aspects of GP (Miller and Reeve), MilPY, and RvPT for the ways that Oswald's retributive assault on Robin lacks…

Explores the relations between emotion and identity in PrPT, observing that the presence of Jews "amps up its emotional charge," particularly how it "provokes--and coopts--a huge range of emotions in the service of Christian piety." Considers the…

Assesses parallels between the "greyn" of PrT 7.662 and the three grains of legend that Seth laid upon the tongue of Adam when the latter was buried; suggests that the ambiguities of Chaucer's presentation indicate his artistic purpose.

Argues that the use of Dante's "Paradiso" 53 in the initial presentation of faith in PrT reflects Chaucer's sophisticated engagement with the ways humans try to articulate transcendent truth.

Assesses the five uses of "place" as a locational noun in the description of the tournament in KnT, arguing that it has a "precise technical meaning," i.e., the "grassy ground of the arena within the lists." This meaning is also found in Middle…

Provides "definitive texts and exhaustive variorum commentary" with facing-page translations, introduction, and appendices.

A new verse translation of "Pearl" with original Middle English text and modern English version on facing pages. Contains a brief preface and longer introduction, which discusses current scholarship and criticism.

Investigates the extent to which ParsT as a manual of confession can be seen to encourage the process of "individualization" theorized by Michel Foucault and to subvert the "immense control that the Church had over medieval lives" and aligning with…

Introduces Japanese analogues of PardT dating from the seventeenth or eighteenth century, and compares them with their Chinese and Indian ancestors, in order both to hypothesize the genealogies and to trace the change of motifs through transmission.…

Explores parallels of plot and detail found in "Pamphilus de Amore" (or "Pamphilus and Galatee"), "aspects" of the "Roman de la Rose," "parts" of Juan Ruiz's "Libro de Buen Amor," and the first three books of TC, demonstrating that the "'Pamphilus'…

Explores the tension between "solaas" and "sentence" in three features of NPT (its representations of humans and non-humans, its reference to the Uprising of 1381, and its gender politics), investigating the importance of the rhetoric of the Tale in…

Describes how GP reflects "Chaucer's fascination" with social diversity and "bodily variety," and reads MkT as a "verse anthology of disability narratives," using various approaches drawn from disability studies to examine several of the Monk's…

Explores MkT as a revelation of its narrator, positing a structural arrangement among the individual tragedies and their various depictions of Fortune and interpreting this arrangement as a reflection of the Monk's character and psychology: he…

Argues that the "organization and success" of MilT depends upon the "dramatic irony" of tensions between its courtly and common, sacred and profane, and realistic and fantastic elements, exploring such tensions in the signifying names of the…

Asks why Chaucer uses a "Latin masculine name of the month to refer to his very feminine heroine" in MerT, answering that it contributes to the theme of healing in the Tale, much as does Damyan's association with St. Damian, patron saint of healing.

Assesses ManT in light of its sources and analogues to reveal a "tissue of comic devices—of controlled incongruities, of hyperbole, of antiphrasis, of equivocations, allusions, and purposeful distortions" that "produce a parodic version of the…

Considers Chaucer's modifications in Troilus's letter (TC 5.1317-1421) of Boccaccio's original in "Filostrato" and of Beauvau's French translation in "Roman de Troyle et de Criseida," arguing that the changes reflect late-medieval English…

Defines and illustrates the meanings of "limitour" and "limitacioun" as applied to friars in the late Middle Ages, clarifying licensing, territorial jurisdiction, and the authority to beg, preach, and hear confessions. Focuses on documents of the…

Describes the "basic historical method" of KnT as consistent with the "contemporary aristocratic chronicle," showing how Chaucer uses Statius's "Thebaid" to archaize the plot drawn from Boccaccio's "Teseida" and create a world "believable" for his…

Argues that the KnT is "especially suitable for the beginning of the pilgrimage" in CT because it "presents the continual subversion of noble efforts to bring order out of disorder" and because, in comparison with its sources," it poses a "pagan…

Explores the epic elements of KnT and its sources, arguing that in placing love at the thematic center of his poem (replacing traditional political concerns), Chaucer was "attempting to make something entirely new" out of his material. By emphasizing…

Suggests that the "greyn" placed on the clergeon's tongue in PrT 7.662 is, ironically, a "breath sweetener," one of several satiric details observed in the Tale.

Explores the "conflict and friction" of GP as a stand-alone tale, also reading it forward to the following tales and backward from them. Designed for pedagogical use, includes several questions for discussion.