Browse Items (16012 total)

Previous criticism often finds an unresolved tension between tale and teller in MLT and in the tale itself, leading a critic like Edward A. Block to declare the work "poor art." However, the admitted tensions within the tale between a feeling of…

The Man of Law's allusion to the story of the nine daughters of Pierus, as presented in Ovid's "Metamorphoses" 5, is viewed as literary criticism that emphasizes the fact that the Man of Law is reluctant to be compared to the daughters--who lost…

Skilled in the law and both learned and adept in poetry, the Man of Law crafts a tale of sin, free will, and providence. Though Custance is steadfast, her will is free and consequential, the foundation of true judgment. MLT proposes a concept of…

MLT reflects the occupation of its teller both in its concern for "legal particularities" and in its vision of the beauty and order of the law, in such terms as "prudence" and forms of "govern." Constance's own name suggests "justitia."

Reads the Man of Law's materials in CT as an unfolding characterization of the lawyer, commenting on the relationship of tale to teller, the narrator's use of law and legalistic rhetoric, and the relation of MLT to other rhyme royal tales in CT. The…

Explores the implications of illegality in Chaucer's GP description of the Sergeant at Law as a "purchasour."

Reads MLT as a satire on its narrator whose volatile comments on the action of the poem contrast sharply with Constance's own patient acceptance, and characterize him as "anti-Boethian, anti-humanistic, [and] anti-religious," a man interested in…

MLT extends the concerns with wooing and governance that are developed in Part 1 of CT, especially when considered in light of the extended version of CkT found in Bodley MS 686, which is edited and appended to this essay.

Resists impulses to denigrate the artistry of MLT and argues that the rhetorical passages--including several of the narrator's apostrophes--achieve "genuinely intense emotion" rather than mere sentimentality.

Use of sources and analogues in the classroom can provide baffled students a point of entry into the complexities of MLT and allow them to appreciate the importance of redaction in medieval literature. In particular, examining Chaucer's feminization…

The portrait of the Man in Black of BD reflects a traditional "imago pietatis," the Man of Sorrows. So, to a lesser degree, do the Falcon of SqT and Criseyde.

The characterization of Chaucer in Helgeland's film reinforces the film's concerns with authority and masculinity, ultimately revealing that "canonical authority" is "anachronistic."

The autobiographical character of Chaucer-the-pilgrim's reportage and of the individual "Tales" in CT intensifies the nuanced contradictions of the Manciple's portrait in GP,of the competing voices in the lengthy ManP, and of the Manciple's…

ManT examines the kind of language by which a poet can survive. Given the historical context of Richard II's reign and the contemporary chronicle literature that warned of the necessity of suppressing one's speech, the individual must resort to…

Because it contains the fewest emendations and corresponds most closely to Chaucer's MLT, the version of Les Cronicles in the MS Paris, Bibl. Nationale, Franc. 9687, fols. 1va-114va (ca. 1340-50), will serve as a base text for the Chaucer Library…

Restricts the "marriage group" to the four components originally proposed by George Lyman Kittredge (WBPT, ClT, MerT, FranT), disclosing the intricacies of their interconnections and considering in turn their various attitudes toward sex and mastery…

Discusses Chaucer's three references to May 3 as an ambivalent "destinal date," arging that the date is affiliated with tragic fortune in TC, with humanistic outlook in KnT, and with comic reversal in NPT. This sequence comprises a "kind of limited…

Argues that Chaucer's references to May third, assigned in Ovidian tradition to "the goddess Flora and her celebrations," is a day on which the "force of love is especially and powerfully felt," and therefore "a suitable day for Pandare [TC 2.56],…

Compares the narrative strategy of MerT with the techniques of standup comedy. The narrator of MerT holds up for ridicule the socially sanctioned convention of marriage between young women and old men, while at the same time affirming conventional…

Commentary on social, political, ecclesiastical, and religious aspects of CT, with attention to particular pilgrims. Limited availability at http://hdl.handle.net/10069/9502; http://hdl.handle.net/10069/9506; http://hdl/handle.net/10069/9570;…

Explores Chaucer's use of "the physics of measurement," an aspect of the science of optics (new in Chaucer's day), which measured "motion and relationships among objects inside a framed space." Chaucer's "verbal structures often move as the eye…

Defends Mel as a meaningful allegory, considering in turn Chaucer's use of the name "Sophia," his reference to wounded feet, and the "extended account" of Christ's passion which indicate framing attention to the Crucifixion. Then tabulates "three…

A "palimpsestic" reading of MerT reveals the irony with which the Merchant treats January and with which Chaucer treats the Merchant, enriching and complicating the "Tale's" identification between the Merchant and January.

Argues that in MerT "January's love of May reflects, in heightened colors," the Merchant's own "commercial love of the world's goods." Explores the possessive nature of January's love of May, focusing on the Merchant's metaphors and references to…

Considers evidence that January's knife-image ("Ne hurte hymselven with his owene knyf"; MerT 5.1840) when commenting on sexual relations with his wife may have indicated to some members of a medieval audience that he was "a sexual pervert of the…