Browse Items (15542 total)

The word "hoom," appearing numerous times in FranT, changes according to the character with whom it is associated. This is especially true of Dorigen, whose "hoom" reflects her most moral self.

FranT, although a declared romance, has been judged almost universally by real-life standards of conduct in marriage. Two real-life women of Chaucer's period, Margaret Paston and Christine de Pizan, provide a standard of conduct in their own…

Dorigen's home is in "lower" Brittany around Carnac and the Locmariaquer peninsula, an area replete with menhirs and dolmens. These megalithic pagan structures are the "grisly rokkes blake," and Dorigen's fear of them is both physical and spiritual.

Far from being rambling, hasty, or incoherent, Dorigen's lament on faithful and faithless wives is a careful working out of the solution to her own dilemma. Starting with stories from Jerome's "Against Jovinian," she develops a favorable, Augustinian…

An abridgement and adaptation of FranT, presented in photographs with running text, designed as self-help for juvenile audience.

In light of linguistic, legal, and folkloric traditions, Dorigen's speech to Aurelius in the garden--a moment of dialogue within the larger dialogue of the pilgrims--does not constitute a promise. Rashly made promises were not considered legally…

Chaucer's characterization in CT reflects the clash between the dogmatic world view of medieval philosophy and the critical, rational outlook proposed by post-Occamist philosophy. Variations in the "allegorical and/or individual costume" used in…

Double-entry bookkeeping, which Chaucer could have learned in Italy, contains "a system of rhetoric as well as a technique." The plot of ShT can be seen as a series of parallel accounts, with the ending as the "closing of the books" on the final…

Comments in critics' "pun-hunting" in Chaucer's works and describes two kinds of bawdy puns in MilT (those that carry connotations of subtlety and secrecy and those that connote pleasure and entertainment), tracing their complex interrelations and…

Analyzes Chaucer's exploitation of the potentially contradictory meanings of "trouthe," especially (1) personal loyalty, fidelity; (2) linguistic truth; and (3) factuality.

Suggests that "esy of dispence" in the GP description of the Physician (1.431) means not only "slow to spend money," but also "moderate in prescribing remedies," or perhaps that he prescribes palatable medicines.

Analyzes the architectural constructions (especially walls) in KnT and TC. Claims that the "effect of a wall in Chaucerian narratives is the double-sidedness," because walls can invite and discourage connections between inside and outside spaces.

Examines plot and language repetition and "doublings" in CT. Focuses on irony and ambiguity in Th-MelL and claims that both tales have an "identical sentence" and are "the same story told twice. Also discusses MkT, NPT, and PrT.

John's Oaths to St. Thomas may refer to the apostle as well as to Becket.

In SumT Friar John and Thomas parody significant features in the life of St. Thomas the Apostle. The probing of Thomas's body by the friar parodies the "doubting Thomas" legend. The references to St. Thomas provide a foil by which the audience may…

Discusses problems of translating medieval texts, especially CT and "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," treating problems of cultural distance and reception as well as linguistic aspects.

Clark mentions Chaucer in the context of conceptions of "drinking-house culture."

Fifteen essays by various authors examine ways of reading tales in CT in terms of relationships to a particular literary mode, whether theater, narrative, or poetry. The collection includes an introduction by the editor. For the individual essays,…

CT accommodates apparently conflicting forms of address and confusions of narrative, dramatic, and expository genres. Chaucer manipulates a number of Northrup Frye's "radicals of presentation," allowing perpetual reinterpretation through the overlay…

Readers err in trying to define the time-scheme of TC too closely, since only a few days of the story's three years are narrated in detail. One must distinguish, therefore, between historical and dramatic chronology, noting Chaucer's emphasis more…

Describes the five-act "pyramidal" structure, rising and falling action, clear-cut scene divisions, dialogue, three unities, courtly love conventions, balance and parallelism, and other dramatic elements in TC, commenting on similarities to classical…

Moore studies the influence of varied forms of dramatic presentation on Chaucer, Langland, and the "Gawain"-poet; significant use of voice and gesture is implied in their work although the poets were aware of a new audience of readers.

Six brief essays from a graduate seminar explore how select medieval plays of the Flood, Nativity, Annunication and Slaughter of the Innocents and Jean Bodel's "Le jeu de Saint Nicholas" illuminate Chaucer's characters in MilT.

Dramatic irony in FranT and FranP results in incongruities between the characters' appearances and their absurdities, also demonstrating the Franklin's ill-claimed eloquence and acquaintance with rhetoric.

Explores the moral and intellectual "failings" of the priest in CYT, arguing that his greed, his gullibility, and his status as an "annueleer" make him a target of the Tale's satire by way of dramatic irony.