Browse Items (15544 total)

Argues that it "seems altogether likely" that when creating his GP description of the Physician Chaucer "at least had in mind" the doctor of the Brunellus the ass episode in Nigellus Wireker's "Speculum Stultorum"; both doctors are avaricious.

In two parts: 1) Elliott admires the unity and aesthetic qualities of PardT and addresses PardP as Chaucer's successful means to insert commentary on Church corruption; 2) Thomas argues that the Pardoner's effrontery and the moral failings of the…

Describes the medieval tradition of representing the scorpion as a figure of female sexuality and explains how this underlies the depiction of Fortune as a harlot and a treacherous "woman-visaged scorpion" in MerT 4.2057-62.

Summarizes the transmission of the "Liber Scalae" (ultimately Arabic), and identifies similarities between its eschatological and cosmological details and those found in late-medieval English works, including "Pearl," "The Land of Cockayne," and HF,…

Suggests that the "greyn" placed on the clergeon's tongue by the Virgin in PrT 7.662 may represent that his "disembodied spirit [was] restored for a time," offering contextualizing background from biblical, classical, and medieval scientific sources…

Traces the legacy of Lollard and Wycliffite writings in early modern print, including works incorrectly attributed to Chaucer (such as "The Plowman's Tale," "Jack Upland," and "The Testament of Love") and led to him being regarded as a…

Adduces ParsT 10.445 and "Purity" 1407-8 to argue that the paper castle in "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" (800-02) has moral implications of luxury and excess.

Identifies four medieval instances (three from Mel) of collocation of forms of "passen" and "gon" that predate the OED's two quotations for "past and gone," from 1598 and 1897.

Comments on English and Continental versions of medieval fox-and-cock narratives, including the claim that the "real value" of NPT "lies in [Chauntecleer's] windy philosophical monologue"; "Russell's subsequent appearance and his making off with…

Demonstrates the plain prose style of John Wyclif's sermons by comparing and contrasting five sample sermons with passages of similar length from ParsT and the "Cloud of Unknowing," considering sentence length, complexity, and clausal construction;…

Explores differences between the narrator's depictions of the passing of time in TC. Books 1-4 record events consecutively, with little or no inference of simultaneity of action, and Book 5 shifts abruptly to an "outside-narrator time sequence"…

Looks at multiple examples of reference and allusion to Greek and Roman literature in works by Chaucer and Milton to contemplate ways in which these poets parallel modern classical scholars in their approach to the ancient world.

Examines the "shifts in point of view, authorial intrusion, changes in subject, and multiple closures" of the final seventeen stanzas of TC, reading their structure closely, and arguing that they produce an "artistic disorder, the purpose of which is…

Argues in Freudian terms that dreams in TC disclose psychological aspects of the characters. Criseyde's dream (II, 925-31), added by Chaucer to his source, Boccaccio's "Filostrato," indicates her desire for ravishment and marks her early submission…

Intellectual backgrounds to the European Middle Ages and Renaissance, with particular attention to literature, classical, and late-classical influences; the concept of the universe and the earth; human physiology and psychology; and cultural…

Surveys and comments on English poetic translations of Dante's "Commedia" from Chaucer to Laurence Binyon, opening with mention of the Ugolino episode from MkT (based on "Inferno" XXXIII 1-90), followed by quotation of SNP 8.36-56, calling it a…

Discursive bibliography of Chaucer studies (ca. 1930-1960), with five sub-sections: Bibliographies, Editions, and the Chaucer Canon; Chaucer's Life and Times; Chaucer's English; General Critical Works; The Canterbury Tales; and Troilus and Criseyde…

Using evidence from WBPT, challenges D. S. Silvia's argument (N&Q 1967: 8-10; same title) that the Wife of Bath has lost interest in Jankyn and is looking for husband number six.

Identifies John of Trevisa's "Polychronicon" as the likely source for the Monk's use of "pileer" distinct from "boundes" (7.2126-27) in his account of Hercules, a distinction also made by John Lydgate in his "Troy Book." Comments on the uses of…

Characterizes the Host as a "delightful traveling companion," summarizing details of his GP description and of his interactions with the other pilgrims in the links between the tales. He is "sometimes pompous, often impudent, and always forceful," a…

Concentrates on Old English poems and Middle English plays that are analogous to Milton's "Paradise Lost," but includes in an appendix "[s]some relationships with The Canterbury Tales and . . . description of seven Middle English poetic analogues."

Explores "important tensions" in the characterization of the Wife of Bath, interpreting the "larger subject" of WBT as the "grace of God," even though it concludes with the Wife's "irreligious" final curse. In WBP, her "masking is predictable…

Historical analysis of the changes in the English world view preceding and following the Black Death of 1349, with particular attention to the art and literature up to 1385 and its "pessimism and macabre realism." Includes recurrent references to…

Surveys and comments on English poetic translations of Dante's "Commedia" from Chaucer to Laurence Binyon, opening with mention of the Ugolino episode from MkT (based on "Inferno" XXXIII 1-90), followed by quotation of SNP 8.36-56, calling it a…

Offers background and context for various kinds of "unsettling" dreams in literature, mentioning that Pertelote treats Chanticleer's "anxiety dream" in NPT 7.2882ff. "as a cryptic diagnosis [of humoral disorder] which required immediate prescription…