Strohm, Paul.
Lee Patterson, ed. Literary Practice and Social Change in Britain, 1380-1530 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), pp. 83-112.
London politics in the 1380s were characterized by "shifting planes of alliance." Such shifting in the early years of the decade led to the eventual struggle of 1385-88 between Richard's court party and the duke of Gloucester's aristocratic…
Turner, Marion.
Corinne Saunders, ed. A Concise Companion to Chaucer (Malden, Mass.; Oxford; and Victoria: Blackwell, 2006), pp. 13-33.
Divided into three sections - "Politics and Discourse," "London Life and Chaucer's Poetry," and "Chaucer's Social Circle" - this essay surveys a variety of Chaucer's narratives and short poems, showing how they reflect urban and political elements in…
Knight, Stephen.
Stephen Knight and Michael Wilding, eds. The Radical Reader (Sydney: Wild and Wooley, 1977), pp. 169-92.
A Marxist approach to form, structure, and character shows broad dichotomies in Chaucer's art; e.g., between city and country, Gothic and modernist narratives, and worldy and otherworldly philosophies. From the last divergence derives the major…
Potter, Russell Alan.
Dissertation Abstracts International 52 (1992): 3276A.
Chaucer's works have been treated variously through the centuries: vernacular text teaching a diverse audience in debates over "Englishing" the Bible; both model and subject for translation to the Neoclassics; basis for study in the nineteenth…
Strakhov, Elizaveta.
Yearbook of Langland Studies 32 (2018): 289-313.
Identifies food-chain predation and ecosystemic competition as formal elements of animal fables; then examines these dynamics in NPT, the Rat Parliament of Langland's "Piers Plowman," and their respective allusions to the Uprising of 1381 and to the…
Astell, Ann W.
Ithaca, N.Y., and London : Cornell University Press, 1999.
A series of studies that explore how William Langland, John Gower, the Gawain poet, Chaucer, and Sir Thomas Malory all "practiced an allegorical art, partly as a result of their similar educational backgrounds and also because political pressures…
Jucker, Andreas H.
Richard Dury et al., eds. English Historical Linguistics 2006: Selected Papers from the Fourteenth International Conference on English Historical Linguistics (ICEHL 14), Bergamo, 21- 25 August 2006. Volume II: Lexical and Semantic Change. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2008, pp. 3-29.
Arguing that contemporary "negative" politeness may function in public only, Jucker surveys historical functions of politeness in English. Analyzes Chaucer's use of "thou" and "you" forms in ClT as "retractable," i.e., variable by situation, rapidly…
Sell, Roger D.
Studia Neophilologica 57 (1985): 175-85.
Stylistic or linguistic thickening is a key to meaning, as in selectional politeness. Abrupt shifts of topic, disruption of narrative frames, and lack of deference to the reader's expectations make MilT more "impolite."
Burrow, J. A.
Anne Marie D'Arcy and Alan J. Fletcher, eds. Studies in Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Texts in Honour of John Scattergood (Dublin: Four Courts, 2005), pp. 65-75.
Explores the concept of "civil inattention" ("a desire not to intrude on privacy") as it helps to explain the behavior of the dreamer toward the Black Knight in BD. The concept is described in modern sociology and occurs in several medieval romances…
Eun, Hyesoon Lim.
Dissertation Abstracts International 49 (1989): 493A-494A.
Nouns of address and the two second-person forms offer clues to perceptions of rank, ideals, and tone, as well as to characterization. Chaucer and the "Gawain"-poet exploit linguistic resources brilliantly.
Dor, Juliette.
A. J. Tops, Betty Devriendt, and Steven Geukens, eds. Thinking English Grammar: To Honour Xavier Dekeyser, Professor Emeritus (Leuven: Peeters, 1999), pp. 33-40.
Lexicographical information on sely is inconsistent and often based on the assumption that there was no historical overlap between "pious-good" and "foolish-simple." Chaucer's uses of the term capitalize on uncertainty of tone in LGW, making it…
Magnani, Roberta.
Medieval Feminist Forum 50 (2014): 90-126.
Discusses Emily's subjectivity and "empowered devotional femininity" in KnT. Contends that Chaucer's "queer hermeneutics" adjusts "traditional concepts of masculinity and femininity" within KnT.
Hallissy, Margaret.
Massachusetts Studies in English 9 (1983): 54-63.
In PardT details from poison lore add to the sophistication with which Chaucer develops the central paradox of the tale: the Pardoner as a channel of grace despite his evil character.
Hallissy, Margaret.
Essays in Arts and Sciences 10 (1981): 31-39.
Chaucer draws on the medical and literary traditions about poison current in his day. In KnT, Arcite's love for Emelye is pictured as a deadly infection.
Greenwood, M. K. Smolenska.
Guy Bourquin, ed. Hier et aujourd'hui: Points de vue sur le moyen age anglais (Nancy: Association des Medievistes Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Superieur, 1997),: pp. 45-55.
KnT creates puzzling effects. Chaucer's subversion of several issues (genre, nobility, love, wisdom) highlights their absurdity.
Greenwood, Maria Katarzyna.
Colette Stévanovitch and René Tixier, eds. Surface et profondeur: Mélanges offerts à Guy Bourquin à l'occasion de son 75e anniversaire (Nancy: Association des Médiévistes Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Supérieur, 2003), pp. 179-98.
Piety and pathos heighten the impact of PrT and promote the narrator's reputation for religious correctness, yet all aspects of her Tale are undermined by pointlessness. Greenwood argues that the Tale is dialogistic and Menippean; a satirical subtext…
Brown, Murray.
R. Barton Palmer, ed. Chaucer's French Contemporaries: The Poetry/Poetics of Self and Tradition (New York: AMS Press, 1999), pp. 187-215
Deschamps's "Ballade" dates from Sir Lewis Clifford's diplomatic mission to the French court in 1391, when France and England were closer to peace than they had been in almost a decade. Both Chaucer and Deschamps were associated with the Order of the…
Scanlon, Larry.
Fiona Somerset and Nicholas Watson, eds. The Vulgar Tongue: Medieval and Postmedieval Vernacularity (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), pp. 220-56.
Scanlon considers contemporary ideas of vernacular literature and its potential for "subversiveness" through incompleteness, focusing on the concept of "poet laureate" as introduced into English by Chaucer in ClT and on the interdependence of…
Ransom, Daniel J.
Norman, Okla.: Pilgrim Books, 1985.
Ransom demonstrates "the ironic tone of four Harley poems," reveals "the parodic intention (ambiguities, incongruities, exaggerations) that underlies that tone," and discovers irony in other Harley lyrics. Includes various references to and…
Kane, George.
Daniel Donoghue, James Simpson, and Nicholas Watson, eds. The Morton W. Bloomfield Lectures, 1989-2005 (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, Western Michigan University, 2010), pp. 1-19.
The first of the Bloomfield lectures. Traces the impact of "hamartiology" (the study of sin and crisis) in Langland's "Piers Plowman" and Chaucer's CT, especially in GP and the fabliaux. Estates satire, penitential handbooks, and other examples of…
Green, Richard Firth.
Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980.
Treats the modus vivendi of medieval poet in the context of the king's intimate circle, the literate court, the court of love, the writer as adviser or court apologist.
Meyer-Lee, Robert J.
Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
Many causes contributed to the change in climate, particularly Bolingbroke's seizure of the throne from Richard II in 1399 and the concomitant changes in relationships between princes and poets, between poets and audiences, and between audiences and…
