Both Boccaccio and Chaucer use the figure of the "woman reader" to represent changing interpretive strategies that, in turn, reflect changes in social complexity. Lartigue focuses on the Teseida, the Decameron, LGW, and CT.
Kiessling, Nicolas K.
Chaucer Review 7.2 (1972): 113-17.
Argues that the Wife of Bath's reference to an incubus (3.880) is not an aggressive critique of the Friar's "deficient virility" as editors assume but instead a gentle and teasing jibe.
Wentersdorf, Karl P.
Chaucer Review 44 (2009): 110-13.
The clear erotic context of the blacksmith's response to Absolon's late-night visit supports a gloss of "viritoot" as a derivation of "the Latin ablative cum virtute," meaning 'with manly ardor.'
Matsuda, Takami.
Studies in English Literature, English number, 59 (1983): 101-25.
Traces the "growing versatility" of the "ubi sunt" motif in Middle English literature--its emotional impact, its relations with the theme of mutability, and its potential for expressing nostalgia--concluding with a comparison of Chaucer's uses of the…
Lydgate's "Troy Book" describes the classical theater as a semicircle with a raised pulpit in the midst. This is what is portrayed in the Corpus Christi College (Cambridge) manuscript: finely dressed figures mime the roles of the principals while…
Pearsall, Derek.
Yearbook of English Studies 7 (1977): 68-74.
The famous "Troilus" Frontispiece has created an image of Chaucer's audience as the royal court with Richard and Ann. But such identification in an unrealistic picture, clearly a presentation-picture variant, is impossible. Chaucer's actual audience…
Reis, Huriye.
Edebiyat Fakültesi Dergisi (Hacettepe University) 20.1 (2003): 140-49.
Reads LGWP as an indication of Chaucer's theory that writing is based largely on the reading of others. Chaucer's narrator is confronted with the implications of this theory.
Desmond, Marilynn R.
Studies in the Age of Chaucer 35 (2013): 179-207.
Explores the influence of Italian and French vernacular versions of Ovid's "Heroides" on the legends of LGW, where Chaucer engages and undermines the historical emphasis of these vernacular versions and reasserts the literary, rhetorical authority of…
The rhetorical trope 'translatio' subsumes metaphor, allegory,and irony, providing a basis for understanding how the Pardoner translates himself into his characters and the Old Man into the rioters. The Pardoner represents his own Otherness while…
The relationship between Troy's story and Criseyde's demonstrates Chaucer's vision of how common Destiny frames but ultimately releases individual free will. The "de casibus" frame comments on the human condition; like Troy and Criseyde, we are…
Daileader, Celia R.
Chaucer Review 29 (1994): 26-39.
WBT and Mel contain comparable female characters who use discourse to challenge the antifeminist patristic tradition. The plot in both tales--the transformation of a misguided male by a knowledgeable woman--points to a more "peaceful" world where…
Wentersdorf, Karl P.
Studia Neophilologica 53 (1981): 269-74.
After discussing various readings for the phrase, "In termes hadde he cas and doomes alle..." (GP 323), Wentersdorf argues that "term" is equivalent to a court session: thus, when courts were in session, this man of law had at his disposal all the…
Owen, Charles A. Jr.
Chaucer Review 7.4 (1973): 267-80.
Surveys critical approaches to Mel and discusses its themes of "the good woman" and forgiveness; also assesses Mel as a complex, multi-leveled allegory.
Dane, Joseph A.
English Language Notes 31:4 (1994): 10-19.
Chaucer's phrase is traditionally interpreted, "Yet for all the oxen in my plough, I would not take upon me more than enough (i.e., be overly suspicious)." A more accurate reading, however, is "I would not take upon me more than the oxen in my…
Crowther, J. D. W.
Chaucer Newsletter 2.1 (1980): 12-13.
The Friar, who does not want Thomas to divide his money among several confessors, argues that likewise an ill man should not divide his among several physicians. He thus materializes the penitential injuction not to divide one's confession among…
Gallacher, Patrick J.
Chaucer Review 21 (1986): 200-12.
From Greek medicine, the concept of the six "non-naturals" intensifies and clarifies the relationship between the friar and Thomas and throws light on the summoner in FrT. The "non-naturals" are circumstances that affect health: air, sleep and…
SqT dramatizes the relationship between two types of narrative: the fantastic and the metafictional. The former is seen in the mirror, ring, steed, and sword brought to Cambyuskan's court; the latter, in the response to these gifts by the courtiers…
In its narrative strategy and its theme of the comic irrelevance of the abstractions on which men try to base their lives, Nigel of Longchamps' medieval Latin beast fable, "Speculum Stultorum," provided a suggestive model for Chaucer's NPT.
Dickson, Donald R.
South Central Review 2 (1985): 10-22.
Establishes relationships between CYP and parts of CYT. The Yeoman shows himself as unstable as alchemy, caught between desire for success and fear of losing his soul.
Quinn, William A.
R. F. Yeager and Toshiyuki Takamiya, eds. The Medieval Python: The Purposive and Provocative Work of Terry Jones (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), pp. 167-79.
Corroborates Terry Jones's view that Chaucer was a pacifist, and argues that Jones and Chaucer both use humor and indirection against war. Chaucer was very earnest in his critiques of war in Mel and ParsT, but less direct in KnT and his description…
Guerin, Richard
English Studies 52 (1971): 412-19.
Reconsiders relations among ShT, Sercambi's "Novelle" no. 31, and Boccaccio's "Decameron" nos. 8.1 and 8.2, suggesting that it is "not unreasonable" to think that Chaucer "might have known all three of the analogues."
Jennings, Margaret (C.S.J.)
Florilegium 43 (1994): 121-40
Thematic sermon structure, as delineated in English "artes praedicandi," influenced romances as well as other genres. This influence can be seen in "Sir Amadace," "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," KnT (Theseus's speech on order), WBT (the…
