Browse Items (15542 total)

Challenges D. W. Robertson's moral condemnations of the major characters of TC, and justifies personal affection for the character of Criseyde; presented in the pose of a legal defense against prosecution.

Transcriptions of previously unpublished manuscript versions of three minor poems: "ABC" from Melbourne MS.; "Truth" from Nottinghame ME LM I; "Wom Unc" from Bodleian Fairfax 16.

Goldstein considers Custance of MLT and Alisoun of WBP in relation to the Augustinian theology of perfection, particularly in light of late fourteenth-century adaptations of Augustine, both orthodox and heterodox. MLT exemplifies the deterministic…

Examines structural and thematic functions of Chauntecleer's dream exempla in NPT. The exempla all suggest "an unresolved sense of guilt" that casts into tragic relief the events in the barnyard, transforming NPT from comedy to tragedy. The Tale…

This encyclopedia of world authors describes how the works of individual authors "fits with the context of the author's life, historical events, and the literary world"; it includes a comprehensive index, printed in each of the four volumes. The…

Chaucer at times uses French constructions in his English, as is shown by examples in RvT, KnT, TC, PardT, and GP (portrait of the Prioress).

Although the link between ManT and ParsT has been seen as tenuous, ManT leads symbolically and actually into ParsT, and it simultaneously extends the piety of ParsT back into CT as a whole.

Challenges Matthew Arnold's assertion that Chaucer's poetry lacks "high seriousness," considering the issue in light of game theory and Chaucer's attitude toward characterization. Because Chaucer's viewed character as performative role-playing…

Applying ANOVA/Tukey's Range Test on nine early CT manuscripts, the author finds that none of them is based on exemplars written in more than three hands. Attributes the final ordering in the first manuscripts of CT to "the poem's first two scribes,…

Collects interdisciplinary essays focusing on the breadth and depth of games in medieval literature and culture. For an essay that pertains to Chaucer, search for Games and Gaming in Medieval Literature under Alternative Title.

Chaucer's "detached role" in CT establishes his "characteristic attitude toward human behavior--the rhetorical attitude," which views social interaction as a series of roles played in accord with conditional games. Comments on the Host, the Wife of…

Contrasts ShT with its fabliau analogues, arguing that Chaucer creatively adapts the genre by adding complicated characterization to the stark comic plot and by developing a serious thematic concern with the commercialization of sex and marriage,…

McDonald describes the principles and operation of two late medieval ribald games of "amorous divination" - Ragman Roll and Chaunce of Dice - as a means to explore the female audience for such games and related literature, particularly LGW. "Demandes…

Bakhtinian analysis of references to garlands and garlanding in KnT and A Midsummer Night's Dream. Greenwood traces the classical traditions of garlands of love and glory, arguing that depictions of both "veer towards negative criticism" in these two…

As Greenwood has shown in a previous study, garlanding often implied criticism. In KnT and A Midsummer's Night's Dream, however, it is an acknowledgment of power.

Argues that George Gascoigne's reading of TC inspired aspects of his "Adventures of Master F. J." [or F. I.]. In particular, identifies parallels to the scene Troilus's fainting (TC 3.1092), the character of Criseyde, the "self-effacing pose" of…

Explores the complex workings of an allusion to the Wife of Bath in Joyce's "Ulysses " that resonates with Irish mythology, Yeats, and Irish political power.

Identifies a number of parallels between Chaucer's works and those of Gavin Douglas, focusing on "Eneados" and demonstrating that "Douglas owes far more to Chaucer than has been generally recognized." Not a "servile imitator," Douglas, "like…

Chaucer influenced Douglas in many ways: "as a model for diction and register, as a source of phrase and adapter of syntax, as an establisher of the Dream Poem...; Chaucer's "House of Fame" stands as the inspiration for Douglas's own first long…

Thirteen previously published articles study "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," medieval English Literature, the development of Arthurian literature, and Middle English romances. Contains a Japanese translation of the first two branches of…

Discusses various levels of difficulty in translating CT and "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" into Modern English.

Includes versions of the GP description of the Pardoner and lines 591-640 of PardT in normalized spelling, with a brief Introduction that identifies several indications that the Pardoner is gay.

Chaucer explores the limits of romance and extends them so that TC, KnT, SqT, Th, WBT, and FranT become "poems about narrative."

Describes the use of select Chaucerian works as part of a four- or five-week unit in an undergraduate introduction to literature.

Lampert decenters Christianity and releases the study of Jews and Judaism from a "restricted economy of particularism." She shows how representations of Jews go beyond representations of the "Other" in a range of English texts by revealing…