Browse Items (16334 total)

Suggests sources in Boccaccio's "Filostrato" for the "corounes tweyne" of TC 2.1735 (noting parallels with SNT 8.221) and for the Invocation to light in the Proem to TC 3, reinforced by several other echoes of "Filostrato."

Suggests that when referring to St. Peter's sister in MilT 1.3486 and to Thomas's combination of wrath and frigidity in SumT 3.1825-31 Chaucer was influenced by Robert Grosseteste.

In BD and HF, Chaucer uses the "symplegades" or "clashing rocks" motif, which is related to the "Cliff of Death" theme in Germanic literature, as identified by Donald K. Fry.

Suggests that the Monk's "celle" of GP 1.172 is a storeroom rather than a subordinate monastery, and hypothesizes that the storm that occasions Troilus's clandestine visit to Criseyde in TC is based upon the legend of St, Benedict and his sister…

Challenges previous arguments that the name "Malyne" is appropriate to the character in RvT because it means "dish cloth," arguing instead that "Malyne," "Aleyn," and their roles in RvT can better be understood in light of the denotations and…

Offers evidence that "embosed" in BD 352-53 means that the deer "had well concealed itself in a thicket and was not easy to find" and that the meaning of "double worstede" (Friar's cloak; GP 1.262) is worsted fabric of "considerable width."

Uses visualization software (the "network analysis software Gephi") to represent the interactions among the pilgrims in the links between tales in CT, focusing on the importance of the Host and his "twin anxieties"--concern with haste and with…

Tallies similarities in the works of Chaucer and of Juan Ruiz (themes, sources, allusions, details, etc.) that they share as "representatives of the fourteenth century."

Describes the emphasis on short stories in the Danish literary magazine "Cavalcade" and analyzes several of its Danish translations from CT published in the late 1940s, suggesting that the translators--Lis Thorbjørnsen and Jørgen Sonne--were…

Includes discussion of WBT as "inspiration" for Reginald Heber's fragmentary verse-drama "The Masque of Gwendolen" (1830).

Analyzes the placement of proper names in the verse lines of Chaucer's CT, tabulating and commenting upon the total number of incidences of names and the numbers of their initial and terminal placements in the verse lines of twelve of the tales. Then…

"Townes end" translates, literally, as "the town's end," a concept that has lost its meaning in our modern society of expanding cities. Chaucer's "estres" has a much broader meaning than merely "the ins and outs of a building." Virtually the entire…

Identifies allusions to Chaucer from the "Periamma Epidemion" of 1659: to the description of the Physician in GP 1.437-38 and to WBP 3.227-28

Examines Troilus's two speeches on the "problem of free will and determinism" in TC (4.958-1082 and 3.813-40), observing complex irony whereby readers are led to agree with a perspective, then disagree, and then agree again. Chaucer "affirms both…

Two references by Stephen Hawes to Chaucer (along with Gower and Lydgate) not noted by Spurgeon are contained in "The Comforte of Hope." The unique copy of this work, printed by Wynkyn de Worde about 1512, is in The British Library.

Heffernan discusses the nature, origins, and development of Italian "novelle"; Boccaccio's innovations with the form; and the likelihood that Chaucer had direct knowledge of The Decameron. Argues that the influence of Italian novelle generally, and…

Parodies more than eighty works, most from the western literary canon, in strings of 140-word "tweets," with an Introduction, Glossary, and Index. Includes CT (pp. 184-85) in seventeen tweets, with emphasis on GP, WBP, and MilT, and touches of faux…

Argues that "evolving discourses of gentility . . . served as models" for Chaucer, Sir Thomas Malory, and Henry Medwall, inspiring them "to write, variably, about socio-linguistic reform . . . and meta-literary reflection on the impact of newly…

Arguing that medieval thought links disability with the feminine, Pearman examines "medieval female disability" in works of Chaucer (WBPT, MerT), Marie de France, Henryson, and Margery Kempe, among others.

Cawsey examines the impact of assumptions about audience in the criticism of six twentieth-century Chaucer scholars (Kittredge, Lewis, Donaldson, Robertson, Dinshaw, and Patterson). These assumptions include whether the audience is diachronic or…

Six previously published essays by individual authors, an introduction, and a conclusion look at how Chaucer addresses audiences and how contemporary audiences interpret Chaucer's works. Describes the "audience function" and traces the "effect of…

An anthology of thirteen new and previously printed essays and excerpts pertaining to PardPT, with a critical introduction, a brief chronology, and a selected bibliography. The Introduction (pp. 1-14) focuses on characterization, the place of PardPT…

Cawsey examines features of medieval tales of Tutivillus and explores how representations of female "discursive communities" and gossip in WBPT and plays about Noah illuminate these features through similar concerns with marginalized speech.

Korean translation of TC, with an introduction.

Argues for the effectiveness of the Pardoner's speech in light of his use of fables and exempla rather than "officium." PardT affirms the power of literature over that of the Pardoner's own duplicitous nature.