Burrow, J. A.
Review of English Studies 66, no. 276 (2015): 624-33.
Considers how Nature brings forces to bear that "incline" Hart to feel and behave the way he does in "King Hart." Argues that Chaucer's Wife of Bath uses the same technical term when she says "I folwed at myn inclinacioun / By vertu of my…
Aristotelian natural philosophy, specifically the doctrines of natural place and natural motion, lie at the heart of the structure and meaning of TC. Troilus and Criseyde are bodies in motion toward their natural resting places; their natures--her…
Asakawa, Junko.
Koichi Kano, ed. Through the Eyes of Chaucer: Essays in Celebration of the 20th Anniversary of Society for Chaucer Studies (Kawasaki: Asao Press, 2014), pp. 81-99.
Examines the notions of nature and chance represented in TC in light of medieval philosophical and cosmological theories. In Japanese.
Discusses what naturalism is and how it links a set of normative intuitions about gender and desire to a broader theory of what it means for humans to be a law to themselves. Central to MilT is Alisoun, the "single most compelling instance of a…
The prologue of LGW is a kind of "ars poetica" that contrasts seasonal renewal with eternal regeneration in order to show that poetry can mediate between them and serve as a true guide to love.
Houwen, L. A. J. R.
Geoffrey Lester, ed. Chaucer in Perspective: Middle English Essays in Honour of Norman Blake (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), pp. 100-17.
Derived from Boethius's Consolation and from the Roman de la Rose, the exemplary image of the caged bird invoked for the audience of ManT and SqT the "natural law" of sexual drive and the requirement that human beings, unlike birds, curb this drive.…
Wilkinson, Anouska.
Seventeenth Century 29 (2014): 381-402.
Discloses John Dryden's "profound interest in the rich cultural history of natural law philosophy" through close comparisons of his translations/adaptations of KnT and WBT with their Chaucerian originals, as well as through similar examinations of…
Dunleavy, Gareth W.
Transactions of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters 52 (1963): 177-87.
Identifies references in Chaucer's works to "natural law," or "law of kynde," describing its status in medieval legal theory and philosophy, including Boethius, and exploring Chaucer's possible experiences with the practices of "law merchant" and…
Demonstrates that PF reflects a movement from natural law to a more subjective interpretation of individual rights and ties this transition to the crisis of "commonalty" in the late fourteenth century.
Ruud, Jay.
Journal of the Rocky Mountain Medieval and Renaissance Association 9 (1988): 29-45.
Behind the grotesque circumstances of PhyT, Chaucer presents an ironic view of natural law: Nature gloats as she forms Virginia to glorify God in purity; yet, the Physician mocks the sheltering of perfection since natural law will soon corrupt her.
Krug, Rebecca.
Jane Tolmie and M. J. Toswell, eds. Laments for the Lost in Medieval Literature (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2010), pp. 225-41.
Explores the depictions of grief over lost children in the Wakefield mystery play "Slaughter of the Innocents"; a Middle English life of Saint Bridget; and ClT. The depictions present grief as variously natural, unnatural, and a response to conflict;…
Fleming, John V.
Susan J. Ridyard and Robert G. Benson, eds. Man and Nature in the Middle Ages (Sewanee, Tenn.: University of the South Press, 1995), pp. 19-35.
Assesses various medieval depictions of personified Nature lamenting human error, and comments on Prioress's "ambiguous" motto (Amor Vincit Omnia) as a "reordering" of the phrase "omnia vincit Amor" from Virgil's tenth "Eclogue," modified by the…
Butterfield, Ardis.
Brian Cummings and James Simpson, eds. Cultural Reformations: Medieval and Renaissance in Literary History (New York: Oxford University Press), pp. 33-54.
Comments on Chaucer's address to his book at the end of TC as an example of the poet's awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity.
Cooney, Helen, ed.
Dublin and Portland, Ore. : Four Courts Press, 2001.
Ten essays by various authors on the role of language and literature in fifteenth-century England, Chaucer's influence at the time, and the relations of fifteenth-century literature to earlier and later tradition. Mention of Chaucer recurs…
Reads LGW as a "double palinode" in which Chaucer explores the "variety and complexity of the feminine psyche" as expressed in his sources, Ovid and Boccaccio, and his own TC. Compares LGWP-F and LGWP-G to show that Chaucer increases the comedy and…
Spearing, A. C.
Sylvie Patron, ed. Optional-Narrator Theory (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2021), pp. 166-83.
Challenges the applicability of modern narratology to medieval narratives, examining the narrating position in "King Horn" as popular romance and in BD as adaptation of a French "dit," and showing that novel-based notions of narrator-as-character do…
Wood, Charles Roger.
Dissertation Abstracts International 55 (1994): 1572A.
Froissart's "Chroniques" have shaped subsequent perceptions of the uprising of 1381. Although Chaucer refers to it only once, his placement of the simile in NPT is significant. Edmund Burke and Thomas Paine took opposing eighteenth-century views. …
Palmer, James Milton.
Dissertation Abstracts International 64 (2004): 2479A
Explores medieval attitudes toward the medical foundations of the emotions in MerT, TC, Gower's "Confessio Amantis," and Diego de San Pedro's "Cárcel de Amor."
Hanawalt, Barbara A.
Essays in Medieval Studies 12 (1995): 1-21.
Examines various fourteenth- and fifteenth-century historical and literary texts to demonstrate that law and tradition encouraged parental and communal responsibility for the proper raising of children. Mentions PrT and the hagiography of Hugh of…
Scanlon, Larry.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
Late-medieval English exempla and exemplum collections have political and ideological significance. Vernacular exempla are "narrative enactment(s) of cultural authority" that appropriate the authority of exemplary sermons and imitate the political…
