Looks at Lydgate's Parisian poems with a focus on "Pilgrimage of the Life of Man." Aims to define and construct "virtual coteries" and identify connections between Lydgate's coteries and the poetry of Gower and Chaucer. Refers to Mel, ABC, Purse, and…
Lydgate's introduction of new critical terms and definitions--"enlumyn," "adourne," "enbelissche," "aureate," "goldyn," "sugrid," "rhetorik," and "elloquence"--shift poetry's emphasis from the variety and pleasure found in Chaucer's writings, to…
Edwards, A. S. G.
Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses 10 (1985): 175-82.
Early in his career Lydgate borrowed from Chaucer for particular effects: echoes of GP appear in "The Siege of Thebes." In his later career Lydgate tried to create a Latin-derived poetic language linked to Chaucer.
Sweet, W. H. E.
Vincent Gillespie and Kantik Ghosh, eds. After Arundel: Religious Writing in Fifteenth-Century England (Turnhout: Brepols, 2011), pp. 343-59.
Assesses the use of secular and sacred topics in Lydgate's corpus, arguing that his expressions in his late poems of regret for writing secular verse in mid-career are sincere. Contrasts Lydgate's "retractions" of his poetry in "Testament" and…
Lydgate was not an incompetent Chaucerian imitator; he used a different verse design. Parametric comparison of Chaucer's and Lydgate's verse designs demonstrates Lydgate's use of a tradition older than Chaucer's iambic pentameter. Lydgate had only…
Nolan, Maura.
Studies in the Age of Chaucer 27 (2005): 59-92
Reads Lydgate's tale of Canacee (Fall of Princes, Book 1) as a subtle response to its source (Gower's "Confessio Amantis"), complicated by several allusions to Chaucerian narratives (ClT, MLT, PrT). Lydgate's confrontations with various kinds of…
Reads "The Churl and the Bird" as John Lydgate's self-conscious rumination on "the poetic and philosophical implications" of willfully refusing to accept confinement. Includes comments on SqT, ManT, and Chaucer's influence on Lydgate.
Denny-Brown, Andrea.
Lisa H. Cooper and Andrea Denny-Brown,eds. Lydgate Matters: Poetry and Material Culture in the Fifteenth Century (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), pp. 35-56.
Denny-Brown explores roots of the medieval legends of Bicorn and Chichevache, examining how Chaucer develops the "themes of beastly appetites" in ClT and how Lydgate expands the theme of appetite in his "Bycorne and Chychevache."
Bale, Anthony.
Suzanne Conklin Akbari and James Simpson, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Chaucer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), pp. 580-600.
Examines connections between Chaucer and Lydgate, tracing "some of the ways in which Lydgate received and (re)constructed Chaucer’s poetry." Concentrating on "The Mumming at Bishopswood," the "Siege of Thebes," and the patronage between Lydgate and…
Spearing, A. C.
Robert F. Yeager, ed. Fifteenth-Century Studies: Recent Essays (Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, 1984), pp. 333-64.
The truncated nature of CT challenged Chaucer's followers. Casting Chaucer in the role of Laius, Lydgate's "Siege of Thebes," in imitation of Chaucer, was designed as the first tale of the homeward journey as counterpart to KnT, in high style though…
Examines how Lydgate's "Legend of Dan Joos" recasts the opening of GP into a representation of eternal redemption in praise of Mary in his own aureate style.
Cooper, Lisa H., and Andrea Denny-Brown, eds.
New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.
Eight essays by various authors, an introduction by the editors, an afterword by D. Vance Smith, and an index. The essays consider Lydgate's poetry in relation to "the role of material goods and the material world in the formation of late-medieval…
Edwards, A. S. G.
Nottingham Medieval Studies 54 (2010): 185-94.
Examines the influence of Lydgate in Scotland in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, commenting on the manuscript circulation of his poems. Scottish writers' stylistic indebtedness to Lydgate is complicated by the influence of Chaucer's writings…
While the "Siege of Thebes" can be read in terms of Lydgate's anxiety about his relationship to KnT, its combination of narrative and moralizing is principally influenced by developments within the tradition of the "roman antique." Lydgate's work is…
Kertz, Lydia Yaitsky.
Dissertation Abstracts International A78.06 (2016): n.p.
In the course of a discussion of a medieval aesthetic associating romance's luxury with aristocracy, finds examples in HF and TC, among other period works.
Gillespie, Vincent.
Martin Procházka and Jan Čermák, eds. Shakespeare Between the Middle Ages and Modernism: From Translator's Art to Academic Discourse. A Tribute to Professor Martin Hilský, MBE (Prague: Charles University, Faculty of Arts, 2008), pp. 11-39.
Argues that Chaucer requires readers to actively engage with the text as "active participators in the generation of meaning." Gillespie claims that Chaucer's role is more of a commentator rather than an "auctore," because he is as much a "product of…
Wilsbacher, Greg.
College Literature 32 (2005): 1-28.
The linked anti-Semitism and poetic virtuosity of PrT confront medievalists with a paradox, in which accurately representing the past and combating bigotry in the present are pitted against each other. Resolving this paradox by ignoring aesthetics in…
A likely source of inspiration for ShT is the scriptural text from Luke, where interrelated sins parallel those of Chaucer's characters and where images and phrases are analogous to Chaucer's.
Aloni, Gila.
Rhetoric Society Quarterly 29.3: 31-43, 1999.
Argues that in the LGW account of Lucrece (a tale of enforced copulation), Chaucer uses the word "myght" as a noun, a verb, and a copula to suggest the ultimate triumph of the heroine's seductive rhetoric. The story is less about rape than about…
Hinton, Norman (D.)
Papers on Language and Literature 17 (1981): 339-46.
The disparity between Chaucer's allusion to Lucan in MLT 400-403 and the actual passage in Lucan may be explained by commentaries that Chaucer might have known. The "Pharsalia" shares thematic parallels with Chaucer's story, and may reflect his…
Blandeau, Agnés.
Claire Vial, ed. 'Gode is the lay, swete is the note': Résonances dans les lais bretons moyen-anglais / Echoes in the Middle English Breton Lays (2014): n.p. (web publication).
Assesses the theme of keeping one's word in Breton lays, including FranT, focusing on the theme's Middle Ages: pledging and keeping one's word, and its opposite, breaking one's promise or betraying one's pledge.
Guy-Bray, Stephen.
Buffalo, N.Y.; and Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006.
Argues that poetic influence can be regarded as an erotic or romantic relationship between male couples, focusing on literature of Dante, Spenser, and Hart Crane and questioning notions of literary influence promulgated by T. S. Eliot and Harold…
