Slaughter, Eugene Edward.
New York: Bookman, 1957.
Classifies various kinds of love in Chaucer's works--religio-philosophical, courtly, heroic, and syncretistic--with sub-categories of virtues, vices, and sins in each. Describes the sources, characteristics, and overlapping of the classifications,…
Stavrou, C. N.
South Atlantic Quarterly 55 (1957): 454-61.
Rejects Matthew Arnold's claim that Chaucer lacked "high seriousness," commenting on the "close interrelationship between the ironist and moralist" in the older poet's works, and suggesting that, though genial in his acceptance of human variety and…
Re-arranges the sequence of the descriptions in GP to align with the order in which the pilgrims tell their tales. Includes descriptions of pilgrims who tell no tales at the end, along with the colloquies or speeches of the pilgrims in the links…
Provides detailed background for Petrarch's ekphrastic descriptions of pagan gods in his "Africa" (iii.138-264), and argues that Chaucer's related descriptions in HF (131-39) and in KnT (1.1955-66) derive from the "Libellus de deorum imaginibus"…
Williams, George G.
Modern Language Notes 72.1 (1957): 6-9.
Proposes that the facade of the thirteenth-century "Maison des Musiciens" in Reims may have inspired Chaucer's description of the exterior of Fame's palace in HF 1189-1266, hypothesizing how and when Chaucer may have seen the historical building.
Williams, George G.
Rice Institute Pamphlet 44, no. 1 (1957): 126-46.
Argues that the "chief characters" of TC "were probably modeled from real people" and, exploring alterations from Boccaccio's "Filostrato," speculates that Troilus is based on John of Gaunt, Criseyde on Katherine Swynford, and Pandarus on Chaucer…
Wright, Herbert G.
London: University of London, Athlone, 1957.
Surveys the influence of Boccaccio's Italian and Latin works on English writers and literary tradition through the nineteenth century, with extensive analyses of Chaucer's uses of the "Teseida" in KnT, "Filostrato" in TC, and "Decameron" in ClT.…
Dyson, George, composer.
London: Oxford University Press, 1958. Original composition 1930. Reprinted several times.
Includes scoring for oratorio of fifteen cantatas: GP I, GP II, Knight, Squire, Nun, Monk, Clerk of Oxenford, Guildsmen and the Merchant, Sergeant at Law and Franklin, Shipman, Physician, Wife of Bath, Parson, and L'Envoi. Performed and recorded…
The first two in a series of essays Dédéyan published on Dante in England in Les Lettres Romanes, volumes 12-15 (1958-1961). The first surveys references, allusions, and uses of Dante in TC, PF, and HF. The second continues the discussion of HF, and…
Cooney, Barbara.
New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1958. Rpt. New York: HarperCollins, 1986. Reissued with new cover illustration New York: HarperTrophy, 1989.
NPT, adapted and illustrated for juvenile audience.
Baker, Donald C.
Studia Neophilologica 30 (1958): 17-26.
Demonstrates "the extremely close dove-tailing of the three major sections" of BD "and the way in which they complement and illuminate one another" through parallel incidents and atmosphere. Then examines "the imagery patterns in the poem" to show…
Baum, Paull F.
Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1958.
[xii], 229 pp.
Appreciative commentary on Chaucer’s life and works, considering what can and cannot be determined from his life-records and literature, why he may not have completed several works, why (though a civil servant) he did not comment on political events,…
Augments Baum's earlier dictionary of puns (PMLA 71 [1956]), with nearly 30 more examples noticed by Baum and by readers of his earlier listing, exemplifying and explaining each.
Bloomfield, Morton W.
Modern Language Review 53 (1958): 408-10.
Argues that the correct reading of TC 5.1809 is the eighth sphere (not seventh as in some manuscripts), and that Chaucer's "making use consciously or unconsciously of an old tradition, placed his hero for all eternity in the sphere of the fixed…
Bowers, R. H.
Modern Language Notes 73.5 (1958): 327-29.
Transcribes (with modern punctuation, capitalization, and commentary) a 26-line compilation of proverbial misogynistic sentiment from London, British Library MS Harley 7333, fol. 121v-122r, attributed there to "Impingham," identified by Manly and…
Bradbrook, M. C.
Shakespeare Quarterly 9.3 (1958): 311-19.
Argues that "[c]ompression and inversion direct Shakespeare's use of" TC in "Troilus and Cressida," particularly, "the clear inversion of every idealistic feeling save those of Troilus is so relentless that a 'mirror image' emerges." Shakespeare…
Brereton, Georgine E.
Medium Aevum 27 (1958): 173-74.
Proposes that an error of transmission in Chaucer's source (Frère Renaud de Louens' "Livre de Mellibee et Prudence") accounts for the inaccurate claim in Mel: that Ovid says a weasel can slay a bull. The proposed error confuses Ovid's "viper"…
Brewer, D. S.
Modern Language Review 53 (1958): 321-26.
Surveys the thirteenth- and fourteenth-century French tradition of short love-visions, observes similarities between PF and Oton de Grandson's "Le Songe Saint Valentin," and emphasizes that Chaucer's originality most evident in two ways: his…
Identifies a cut-down single-page portion of Book 1 of TC ("Cecil" manuscript), found attached to the cover of a rent book in Hatfield House. Provides a facsimile, transcription, table of variants, and commentary.
Cassidy, Frederic G.
Journal of English and Germanic Philology 57 (1958): 739-42.
Suggests that "don thyn hood" in TC 3.954 may have the literal meaning of "put on your nightcap" or, more likely, the figurative meaning of "restrain yourself," the latter drawn from the practice of hooding a hawk.
Cauthen, I. B., Jr.
Notes and Queries 203 (1958): 248-49.
Locates a previously unnoticed allusion to MilT 1.3638-39 in Samuel Harsnet's "A Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures" (1603), perhaps recalled from memory.
