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Includes a thirteen-line poem entitled "Chaucer" (p. 15).

Considers Harriet and Sophia Lee's "Canterbury Tales" as an eighteenth-century re-reading of CT. The moral and didactic character of the Lees' "Tales" made possible the inclusion of three of them in Spanish anthologies of 1800 and 1808, providing…

Walter and Griselda are an "Oedipal couple whose sadomasochistic rituals of dominance and submission enact gender roles prescribed by patriarchal social structures which Freud recognized and propogated through his Oedipal models for mental health."

Studies the "lordship economics" of late fourteenth-century England, especially as represented in the literature of John Gower, but providing historical and political backgrounds, and commenting on similar concerns in Chaucer and other writers.…

In SumT, exchanges between the friar and the lord of the manor illuminate the friar's bourgeois relationship with Thomas. When Thomas "pays" the friar with a fart, and the friar appeals to the social hierarchy represented by the feudal lord of the…

Argues that like "Guy of Warwick" and "Ywain and Gawain," KnT promotes "ideals of both prowess and lordship," with Chaucer emphasizing the ideals of "chivalric interdependence" and the bonds of "mutual loyalty."

Characterizes the language of Chaucer's day and emphasizes his range and synthesis of styles, exemplifying features of Middle English and Chaucer's dexterous uses of it in poetry and prose. Comments at length on the opening of GP, on Astr, on uses of…

Documents William Langland's use, in "Piers Plowman," of sudden, irruptive, colloquial, and polysemous language, distinguishing it from so-called "real" speech and assessing its thematic, narratological, and ethical values. Gower found this device of…

Since secular narratives treat behavior, twelfth-century scholars regarded them as practical philosophy. Thus, internal debate and decision-making in both French and English romance are often based on theology and philosophy.

Argues that Henryson's "Testament of Cresseid" is fundamentally Boethian in its castigation of "inconstant Venereal love," and suggests that Henryson links his poem to TC in order to "underscore the Boethian view of love."

Belief in the salvation of virtuous pagans (the "'facere quod in est' principle") has been associated with nominalist thought. Minnis examines Chaucer's praise of Cambuyskan in SqT to argue that there is no real evidence of nominalist influence on…

Kolve investigates the iconic importance of Criseyde's dream of the eagle and Troilus's dream of the boar and their embedded affiliations with the sun. In TC, these images illustrate the gap in the worth of two men and underscore the poor choice…

The narrator's eight-year sickness may refer to the last illness of Henry, Duke of Lancaster. The portrait of Lady White departs significantly from that of Machaut's lady in "Jugement dou Roy de Behaingne" to reconcile courtly with Christian love.

Examines the meaning of "let see" in HF 1623, "nothing lyk" in BD 1085, and the "God toforn" in TC 5.963.

Considers the date and provenance of the Longleat 257 manuscript, describes its contents, and offers a full codicological analysis of collation and compilation, hands, and illustrations.

Explicates Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's Italian sonnet "Chaucer," emphasizing its imitation of aspects of Chaucer's style, particularly drawn from BD.

Compares and contrasts attitudes toward age and aging in WBT, Gower's tale of Florent, and "The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle," considering these attitudes in light of late medieval social perspectives on age and marriage that were affected…

Argues for exposing students to a greater range of medieval perspectives than is afforded by traditional single-author courses on Chaucer, explaining the pedagogy of teaching Chaucer in conjunction with the TEAMS Middle English Texts anthology "The…

Describes the characteristic foods and methods of public and private food service in London during eight historical periods, deriving much of the information from literary sources and presenting the information in association with literary figures…

A series of twenty-four lectures (each 30 minutes) about the topography and social conditions of London. Lectures 4 and 5, entitled "Economic Life in Chaucer's London" and "Politics and Religion in Chaucer's London" describe the physical, economic,…

Includes a brief account (pp. 20-24) of "Chaucer's London" that summarizes the poet's life and describes several social and political events of his time. Published in the U.S. as "London: A History" (New York: Modern Library, 2004).

Anthology of poetry of London that includes GP and CkPT in Middle English.

Treats London, Southwark, and Westminster as a single "conurbation," summarizing its cultural interweaving of mercantile, courtly, political, and linguistic threads, and describing its literary production and legacy. Includes discussion of Chaucer,…

Analyzes the cultural conditions of literary production and the books produced in England, 1300-1380, focusing on English vernacular works but also attending to Latin and French ones, seeking to understand the textual communities defined by such…

Topographical and social history of late-medieval London and its environs, cast as a description of what a visitor might experience, enlivened by incidents drawn from legal and political records, and including descriptions of various political,…