Browse Items (16012 total)

Suggests that interpretations of the Pardoner are overwrought, arguing that he acts "perfectly in the character given him by his creator" and that his somewhat troubling offer of relics to the Host is best understood as a joke.

Criseyde's allusion to Prudence with "eyen thre" is derived from Dante's "Purgatorio," 29.132; but since the Italian reference is cryptic in style and symbology, Chaucer was probably also influenced by glosses and illuminations for the passage,…

Though "the rede" may be taken as referring to either Phaethon or his father Phoebus, Phaethon is in Ovid the red-haired boy burning in the sky, who falls to earth as a human torch;"rede Phaethon" shows fidelity to Chaucer's source and intensifies…

Examines the influence of Boethius on Dante, Boccaccio, and Chaucer. Focuses on how understanding "The Consolation of Philosophy" enhances the "philosophical reflection" and reception of TC for readers.

Chaucer's dream visions confront contemporary philosophical debates, which also shape his poetics. BD is concerned with the status of universals, the relationship of universals to singulars, and the certainty of human knowledge. HF mocks "the logical…

Examines the GP description of Chaucer's Physician, assessing the extent to which the Physician's astrological medicine is satiric when seen in relation to such works as Nicholas of Lynn's Kalendarium.

This guide for undergraduates treats astrology, the zodiac, humors, therapies, Chaucer's authorities, medieval attitudes toward medicine, and the GP Physician.

Compares PhyT with its sources in Livy and the "Roman de la Rose" to argue that Chaucer's retelling characterizes the Physician as amoral, consistent with the GP description.

In his "Physicall and approved Medicines..." (London, 1611) Edmund Gardiner cites Galfridus Chaucer as one of his authorities and quotes a version of GP, I (A), 443-44: "For Gold in Physicke is a cordiall: / Wherefore he loved Golde in speciall."

Describes fourteenth-century medical training and practice in England and documents physicians who were contemporary with Chaucer, suggesting that John de Middelton is the "perhaps most probable" candidate for a real-life model of Chaucer's…

Applies portrait of the Physician in GP to a close reading of PhyT; the imperfect Physician is Chaucer's criticism of medical doctors.

Chaucer quotes Juvenal's Tenth Satire in TC and WBT. The satire also provides suggestions for the three substantial additions he made to PhyT--on Virginia's beauty, her chastity, and the duty of governesses.

Analysis of PhyT and its connection with the storyteller through the notions of authority, sovereignty and power. In the post-plague context, when doctors had become broadly distrusted, a story that stresses these aspects would help to restore the…

Explores interconnection among medicine, religion, and gender, as well as Chaucer's engagement with Marian doctrine, in PrPT and PhyT.

Explores Chaucer's depictions of physicians, focusing on how they exemplify the tension between "medici corporals" (bodily medicine) and "spirituals" (spiritual medicine). None of Chaucer's physicians exhibit an ideal balance; Chaucer explores a…

Addresses "Chaucer's engagement with the concept of movement" in HF, exploring how three scenes of motion (the eagle's descent, the eagle's lecture on movement and sound, and the whirling House of Rumor) engage with William of Ockham's "Brevis summa…

Considers the techniques of characterization in CT, with particular attention to the range of social classes and the assigning of fabliaux to particular tellers. Comments on the gender of individual tellers and on the likelihood of class and gender…

Cullen's third volume on CT claims the work is an allegory reflecting Chaucer's preoccupation with astronomy/astrology. The Pilgrims, who congregate at sunset, correspond to the constellations and planets-celestial "pilgrims" traveling across the…

Argues that the characterizations in Willa Cather's "Death Comes for the Archbishop" were influenced by Chaucer's GP descriptions, particularly those of his ecclesiastical characters. The two authors also share a tendency to avoid rigid schemata of…

Gauges the performances of the Canterbury pilgrims by their relative balance between self-will and common will, basing the distinction on patristic notions of pilgrimage and successful progress toward God, as well as Horace's aesthetic criteria of…

Chaucer's pilgrims reappear in the prologues of "The Tale of Beryn" (ca. 1410) and Lydgate's "Seige of Thebes" (1422) as "metafictions," or comments on Chaucer's GP; "Beryn" criticizes implicitly the lack of realism in Chaucer, and Lydgate portrays…

Thirty-two essays by various authors who define and describe the professions, vocations, and avocations of Chaucer's pilgrims. Individual essays pertain to each of the pilgrims mentioned in GP--including the five guildsmen, the Host (innkeeper), and…

Assesses the aesthetic success of the techniques and devices used to characterize and arrange the pilgrims in GP, treating them in "five successive groups" and commenting on degrees of naturalism, pairings, significant details, and various "gamuts in…

Studies "historical background" to Chaucer's Monk, Clerk, and Physician, comparing their characterizations with historical personages. Argues that the Monk is "probably either Benedictine or Cistercian," and "primarily realistic" rather than satiric.…

Jean de Meun's view of love and nature in the "Roman de la Rose" had a deep influence on Chaucer when, under the pretense of writing pitiful stories of good women who sacrificed themselves to Love, he wrote about impudent women who were foresaken by…