Describes Chaucer's uses of physiognomic details in GP, PardPT, KnT, RvT, WBP, Th, and NPT, arguing that while he used such details for imagery he "only rarely relies on physiognomy alone to delineate character."
Cushing, Ian.
Language and Literature 27.4 (2018): 271-85
Argues that training in stylistics has benefits for teachers, putting forward a pattern for what a training course might look like. Chaucer is invoked as a subject of study by a student respondent.
Mazzon, Gabriella.
Jacek Fisiak, ed. Studies in English Historical Linguistics and Philology: A Festschrift for Akio Oizumi Studies in English Language and Literature, no. 2 (Frankfurt am Main : Peter Lang, 2002), pp. 255-66.
Classifies Chaucer's verbs of "verbal activity" (gestural, onomatopoetic, and performative), treating verbs of saying as a subset of performative verbs.
Burnley, David.
Indian Journal of Applied Linguistics 10 (1984): 77-90.
Reconstructs some features of the stylistic "architecture" of Chaucer's language and illustrates its exploitation in the GP description of the Prioress. The portrait may be more critical, less ambiguous, and less sympathetic than is usually assumed.
Utley, Francis Lee.
University Review 37 (1971): 174-98.
Close reading of the opening of Lucretius's "De Rerum Natura," TC 5.1765-1889, and W. B. Yeats's "Sailing to Byzantium," emphasizing that, despite differences, all three manipulate rhythm and tone to convey the "warring intensities" of human emotion.
NPT parodies the high, middle, and low styles of medieval rhetoric by allowing the animals to speak in all these styles. The animals speak in four styles of usage--intimate, conversational, didactic, and literary.
Boitani, Piero.
Piero Boitani, ed. Chaucer and the Italian Trecento (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 185-99.
Examines Chaucer's style, iconography, and adaptations from the "Teseida" in HF, Anel, TC, KnT, LGW, and FranT. Chaucer's method is metonymic; Boccaccio's is metaphorical.
Gardner, John.
Language and Style 2 (1969): 143-71.
Explores how and in what ways the "psychological realism" of BD is established and reinforced by the verbal and structural repetitions of the poem. Considers the nature of the dream, the view of love, and the interaction of the narrator and the…
Davis, Norman.
Leeds Studies in English 1 (1967): 7-17.
Demonstrates the "conventional and unspontaneous elements in the language" of early English letter-writing, citing examples from the Paston letters, Cely letters, Stonor letters, etc., and discussing how phrasing reflects earlier literary usage,…
Ganim, John M.
Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1983.
Explores stylistic and structural discontinuities and the resulting narrator-audience relationship in TC, "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," Lydgate's "Siege of Thebes," and Henryson's "Testament of Cresseid."
Nolan, Maura.
Brian Cummings and James Simpson, eds. Cultural Reformations: Medieval and Renaissance in Literary History (New York: Oxford University Press), pp. 396-419.
Nolan exemplifies the continuity of English versification through close metrical analyses of samples from Chaucer (Truth), Lydgate, and Wyatt. Each text "displays inherited forms at the very limits of their capacities."
Study guide to CT, arranged topically, with sections that introduce the Host, the narrator, and other "voices"; genre and the relations of teller and tale; and several thematic concerns: ideal womanhood and its subversion, writing and authority, and…
Watson, Pat, and Johanna Wrinkle.
Joel E. McIntosh, ed. 20 More Ideas for Teaching Gifted Kids in the Middle School and High School (New York: Routledge, 2021), pp. 85-88.
Lesson plan for teaching GP in high school classes (senior level), introducing the four humors and using a personality test for students.
Watson, Pat, and Johanna Wrinkle.
Joel McIntosh, ed. 20 More Ideas for Teaching Gifted Kids in the Middle School & High School (Waco, Tex.: Prufrock Press, 1994), pp. 91-94.
Describes classroom activities for studying Chaucer and the "clues" he provides in CT to the personalities of his pilgrims, particularly those clues of physical appearances.
Brewer, Elisabeth.
Harlow: Longman; Beirut: York Press, 1984.
Summary description of Chaucer's life and social contexts, accompanying by appreciative analyses of each of his major works, especially the CT (each tale summarized and described). Also includes discussion of Chaucer's genres, his uses of rhetoric,…
Glencoe Literature Library.
New York: Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, 2001.
Item not seen; cited in WorldCat, with the following abstract: "Provides teaching strategies, background, and suggested resources; reproducible student pages to use before, during, and after reading." Also available at…
Giffin, Mary.
Quebec: Les Éditions "L'Éclair," 1956.
Includes four chapters, each devoted to a single poem as addressed on a particular occasion and/or to a particular audience, considered in light of rhetorical traditions, genre expectations, oral concerns, and sources: 1) SNT on the occasion of a…
Buckmaster, Dale, and Elizabeth Buckmaster.
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal 12.1: 113-28. , 1999.
Reviews criticism of ShT as it relates to the history of accounting, arguing that Chaucer scholars would benefit from deeper familiarity with the subject. In Chaucer scholarship, descriptions of historical accounting practices are less precise and…
Thirteen essays by diverse hands discuss what Pearsall describes as the largest manuscript "the student of vernacular literature will ever be likely to have to deal with"--"a comprehensive programme of religious reading and instruction" (x). Five of…
Examines several aspects of Middle English tail-rhyme romances, contrasting them with couplet romances, comparing them with Japanese "sekkyo," and exploring their relations with the "cult of the Virgin," the Holy Family, and contemporary visual art.…
Originally published in 1966, here revised, corrected, and expanded. Describes Chaucer's grammar and usage, anatomized according to parts of speech, with extensive examples. Topics include verbs (in their various tenses, aspects, and moods), nouns,…
Minkova, Donka, and Robert Stockwell, eds.
Berlin : Mouton de Gruyter, 2002.
Nineteen essays by various authors, divided into three sections--Millennial Perspectives; Phonology and Metrics; and Morphosyntax/Semantics-and an envoy. Includes author and subject indexes. For three essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for…
Fitzmaurice, Susan M., and Donka Minkova, eds.
New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2008.
Nineteen studies, including position papers, responses, and counter responses. A set of exchanges pertains to Chaucer: In "Metrical Evidence: Did Chaucer Translate The Romaunt of the Rose'?" (pp. 155-79), Xingzhong Li affirms on metrical grounds that…
