The GP description of the Knight engages late-medieval questions of war and pacifism, confronting the audience with an "ethical and political dilemma."
Characterizes the Knight as an "enlightened pragmatist" and interprets various details and stylistic devices of KnT (including "occupatio" and various kinds of opposition) as evidence that the teller is a man who seeks to affirm "ordering principles"…
Mroczkowski, Przemyslaw.
Piero Boitani and Anna Torti, eds. Genres, Themes, and Images in English Literature from the Fourteenth to the Fifteenth Century (Tubingen: Gunter Narr Verlag, 1988), pp. 40-58.
Elucidates the puzzling portrait of the GP Knight by "historical information on chivalry" and especially on knights who went to Prussia as "Crusaders"; modifies opposing views of the Knight (as chivalric ideal or murderous hypocrite).
Lester, G. A.
Notes and Queries 226 (1981): 200-202.
Similarities between Chaucer's description of the knight and the descriptions in "Warwick Pageant," a fifteenth-century complimentary biography of the Earl of Warwick, indicate that Chaucer's description contains not irony but praise.
Kempton, Daniel.
Journal of Narrative Technique 17 (1987): 237-58.
Having moved in his own life from warfare to pilgrimage, Chaucer's GP Knight depicts Theseus, a conqueror in war at the beginning of his tale, as effecting a solution at the end "by the arts of diplomacy and rhetoric in parliament." Theseus, with…
Luttrell, Anthony.
Library of Mediterranean History 1 (1994): 127-60.
The discrepancies in the Knight's military curriculum reflect Chaucer's attempt to represent a desire for peace at home and for the transfer of destructive military activity to distant frontiers in Prussia and the Mediterranean. Luttrell explores…
Kelly, Henry Ansgar.
Ruth Evans, Helen Fulton, and David Matthews, eds. Medieval Cultural Studies: Essays in Honour of Stephen Knight (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2006), pp. 152-65.
Kelly recounts military and political events in Lithuania around 1390-92 involving Roman Catholics, Greek Orthodox Christians, and recent converts. Focuses on the involvement of Henry Bolingbroke and on uses of the word "pagan," as backdrop to…
Reads KnT as an expression of the narrator's pessimistic yet stoic view of human "travails and uncertainties," evident in the prevailing "sense of the insignificance of the major actions" of the plot, and reinforced by grim humor and by the tension…
Raffel, Burton.
Notre Dame English Journal 10 (1976): 1-11.
Examines details and reads tonal shifts in the GP description of the Knight (in comparison with the Monk) and in KnT, considering them as evidence of Chaucer's gentle, humorous depiction of chivalry. Neither sharply satiric nor wholly idealistic, KnT…
Brewer, Derek.
Leo Carruthers, ed. Heroes and Heroines in Medieval English Literature: A Festschrift Presented to Andre Crepin on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday (Woodbridge, Suffolk; and Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1994), pp. 81-96.
Like Peter of Cyprus, celebrated in Machaut's "Prise," Chaucer's Knight is a hero, his lists of battles showing him to be a Crusader-knight virtuous in devotion to duty. Chaucer deemed the knightly ideal possible in his contemporary world.
Zilleruelo, Art.
Kathleen A. Bishop, ed. "The Canterbury Tales" Revisited--21st Century Interpretations (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2008), pp. 194-208.
Reads KnT as "historical narrative constructed upon a foundation of misleading anachronism . . . to lend strength to the potentially objectionable sociopolitical agenda of its narrator."
Keen, Maurice.
V. J. Scattergood and J. W. Sherborne, eds. English Court Culture (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1983), pp. 45-61.
Why is the Knight identified with crusades against the infidel at a time when crusading fervor had supposedly dissipated? Evidence from three contemporary disputes over armorial bearings (at one of which Chaucer testified) suggests that the…
Valentine, Virginia Walker.
Tampa, Fla.: Axelrod, 1994.
Six critical essays by the author on topics ranging from Old English to modern literature. For two essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Chaucer's Knight: A Man Ther Was under Alternative Title.
Valentine, Virginia Walker.
Virginia Walker Valentine. Chaucer's Knight: A Man Ther Was (Tampa, Fla.: Axelrod, 1994), pp. 1-23.
Argues from evidence in KnT and GP that Chaucer presents not an idealized figure but a complex, realistic character. Valentine treats the narrative and rhetorical features of KnT and its relations with Boccaccio's "Teseida" as evidence of the…
Jones, Terry.
Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1980. 2d rev. ed., 1985; with new introduction, 1994 (London: Methuen).
Ranging through the history of the Crusades, Jones attempts to prove that Chaucer's Knight is a venal mercenary and Chaucer's means to criticize his contemporary military politics.
Brown, Emerson, Jr.
Mediaevalia 15 (1993, for 1989): 183-205.
Chaucer initially uses "worthy" for the Knight in GP with clear denotative meaning, but by the word's final appearance its meaning becomes ambiguous. The Knight is not being criticized; rather, the semantic degeneration of "worthy" indicates a…
Schembri, A. M.
Journal of Anglo-Italian Studies 5: 15-37, 1997.
Chaucer's changes to Boccaccio's "Teseida" in KnT introduce a concern with Cathar heresy. Until Theseus's final speech, the plot reflects cosmic dualism (Saturn and Jupiter), determinism, and pervasive sterility and evil. The poem is also touched by…
Brewer, Derek.
George Hughes, ed. Corresponding Powers: Studies in Honour of Professor Hisaaki Yamanouchi (Woodbridge, Suffolk; Rochester, N.Y.: D. S. Brewer, 1997), pp. 103-12.
Reads KnT as an expression of Chaucer's own outlooks, i.e., his sympathetic views of chivalry and ritual.
Edwards, Elizabeth B.
Exemplaria 20 (2008): 361-84.
Edwards discusses the rites and purposes of mourning in KnT in relation to the psychological theories of Freud and Derrida. Contrasts the Freudian account with medieval practices of theology and Purgatory. Tthe pagan setting is necessary to…
McAlpine, Monica E.
Toronto; Buffalo, NY; London: University of Toronto Press, 1991.
Annotated entries are alphabetized in five chronological periods (1900-30, 1931-60, 1961-70, 1971-80, 1981-85) under two headings: Knight in the GP (and Links) and KnT.
Morgan, Gerald.
Gerald Morgan, ed. Chaucer in Context: A Golden Age of English Poetry (New York: Peter Lang, 2012), pp. 153-88.
Examines the characterization of Theseus in KnT, comparing it with that of Boccaccio's Teseo and arguing that Chaucer depicts an ideal of moral worth, aristocratic justice, knightly virtue, and nobility of conquest.
