Browse Items (16012 total)

Examines the contradictory religious and secular aspects of the complex Prioress, an important personality in CT.

Argues that the rational absurdity of the plot of NPT and the inapplicability of the various morals applied to the Tale expose the ridiculousness of the fable genre; the Tale is an "anti-fable," as Th is an "anti-romance."

The Wife of Bath first weakens the conventional notion of men as reasonable and women as sensual by showing how sensual and unworthy of sovereignty were her five husbands. Then she overthrows this notion when her own feminine-sensual image dissolves…

Certain characteristics of Chaucer's poetry resulted from the influence of the court of Richard II, but paradoxically "in reaction against Richard." Brewer refutes Gervase Mathews's claim for a high state of culture and its influence in the reign of…

The opposition of knowledge in HF suggests the fourteenth-century reaction to the scholastic efforts of the thirteenth century to forge a synthesis between reason and faith. However, this dissertation does not argue that Chaucer was a reformer. The…

SqT illustrates how "a poet may come to poetic and prosodic mastery." Chaucer's conscious creation of an inept teller who overuses or misuses rhyme, enjambment, and caesura illustrates the difficult process of maturing as a poet.

Discusses apostrophe as speech (or writing) that is "'overheard' rather than merely heard," assessing it as a "powerful esthetic instrument for plumbing the emotional and emotive depths" of literary characters through "overheardedness." Comments on…

CT resists the dominant medieval gender discourses that it inscribes.

Chaucer's knowledge of medieval mathematical imagery is evident in several ways, beginning with his reference to "Argus, the noble countour," who is Algus, the great Arab mathematician Al-Khwarizmi. By refiguring the beginnings and endings of…

Since the noun "armee" or a variant appears in the "best" and earliest Chaucer manuscripts and was used in Old French and Middle English, "armee" (rather than "aryve") is probably the word Chaucer intended in GP 60.

Chaucer's art of characterization is an act of poetic creation rather than the mere use of rhetorical convention. By employing rhetorical devices which vivify emotion and intensify dramatic action, or which infuse suggestion of movement, Chaucer…

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…

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…

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.

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,…

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.

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…

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…

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.

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 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…

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.

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.

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 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…