John of Arderne's contemporary treatise "Fistula in Ano" is a manual for the medieval physician. Comparison with it indicates that "Chaucer's physician commits malpractice."
Hone, Ralph E., ed.
San Francisco: Chandler, 1966.
A textbook edition of "Samson Agonistes" that includes among the poem's "Antecedents" the Samson section of MkT (CT 7. 3205-3284) from Skeat's 1894 edition.
Heretofore noted for its allusions to TC, the romance "Amoryus and Cleopes" also develops many of the themes, motifs, and stylistic traits of Fragment 5 of CT (SqT and FranT), in particular "its portrayal of pagan religion, its treatment of…
The influence of Lydgate's "Troy Book" on Metham's work is often cited by critics. However, in terms of scene and tone, Metham is more indebted to Chaucer's TC and "Legend of Thisbe" (LGW) than to Lydgate.
Reconsiders Manly's distinction between the "Abhorrent Doctrine" (that Chaucer, in GP, "merely photographed his friends and acquaintances") and the "More Abhorrent Doctrine" (that Chaucer built his characters by piecing together "scraps from old…
Kane, George.
Paul Ruggiers, ed. Editing Chaucer: The Great Tradition (Norman, Okla.: Pilgrim Books, 1984), pp. 207-29.
Denounces Manly and Rickert's "The Text of the Canterbury Tales," asserting the editors' failure to state and maintain consistent editorial methods, their confused and confusing classification of manuscripts, and their error in attempting to apply…
Scanlon, Larry, and James Simpson, eds.
Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2006.
An introduction by the editors and eleven essays by various authors seek to vitalize Lydgate studies, exploring the status of poet laureate, Lydgate's poetic style, his political poetry, and a number of literary poems and forms (e.g., mumming,…
Edits twelve of Lydgate's poems, with end-of-text notes, glossary, and other apparatus. Includes "On the Departing of Thomas Chaucer," a selection from the "Troy Book," and "The Temple of Glas," among others. The Introduction (pp. ix-xii) and the…
Farvolden, Pamela, ed.
Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 2016.
Edits Lydgate's two poems for classroom study, and includes as an appendix the Latin source of his "Guy of Warwyk." The introduction to the "Fabula" addresses Lydgate's debts to Chaucer in this poem: particularly how its view of friendship was…
Provides an "anatomy of Lydgate's engagement with" ClT, documenting his "many Griseldas": muse, "haughty beloved," "antithesis of contemporary women," "exemplary spouse," woman who "falls short of being the Virgin Mary," "victim of…
Flannery, Mary C.
Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2012.
Looks at fame in medieval texts and argues that although Lydgate was Chaucer's fifteenth-century successor, he "diverges from Chaucer's treatment" of fame by "constructing a more confident model of authorship."
Nolan, Maura.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
Studies how John Lydgate's occasional poetry, including mummings and diguisings, reacts to and helps to shape an emergent notion of "public culture" that differs from that of his predecessor, Chaucer. Lydgate, Nolan argues, translated "the poetic…
Kamath, Stephanie A. Viereck Gibbs.
Chaucer Review 45 (2010): 32-58.
In both "Reson and Sensuallyte" and "Troy Book," Lydgate establishes the literary authority of English poetry by placing it in the "allegorical landscape" of the "Roman de la Rose." He frequently follows Chaucer's "method of Rose citation," while…
Pearsall, Derek.
Victoria: University of Victoria, 1997.
A documentary biography of Lydgate that prints and places in context his life-records and includes a bibliography of his major works, modern editions, and essential secondary studies. The biography includes recurrent mention of where and how…
Pearsall, John.
London: Routledge and K. Paul; Charlottesville, N.C.: University of Virginia Press, 1970.
Combines literary biography with genre-study to assess the poetry of John Lydgate, particularly his conventionality and craftsmanship, his techniques of amplification and idealization, his commonplaces and "categories of thought," internal and…
Underwood, Verne Michael.
Dissertation Abstracts International 56 (1996): 1155A.
Lane's previously unedited and unprinted pastoral poem of 1621, modeled on Spenser's "Shepheardes Calender", follows Chaucer in using verse narratives of varying genres (e.g., fabliau and romance) to illustrate its themes (the vices of the age;…
McDonald, Craig.
Studies in Scottish Literature 21 (1986): 23-34.
A close examination of Ireland's references to Melibeus suggests that, despite differences in contest and moral lesson, Ireland used Chaucer's version as his source.
A biography of John Hawley that concludes by arguing (pp. 147-55) that Hawley was at the center of a number of satirical allusions in Chaucer's GP description of the Shipman. Chaucer depicts a professional mariner, which Hawley was not, but the…
Esch, Arno.
Arno Esch, ed. Chaucer und Seine Zeit: Symposion für Walter F. Schirmer (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1968), pp. 207-39.
Assesses Gower's artistry in several tales of the "Confessio Amantis," including analysis of Gower's tale of Constance in comparison with Trevet's version and Chaucer's MLT. Argues that Gower's tale is more unified than Chaucer's and more purely…
Explores the reception of John Gower as an alchemist in the sixteenth century, including description of Elias Ashmole's notion that Gower was Chaucer's "master" and "mentor" in alchemical science.
Jamison, Carol.
Richard G. Newhauser and Susan J. Ridyard, eds. Sin in Medieval and Early Modern Culture: The Tradition of the Seven Deadly Sins (Woodbridge: The University of York/York Medieval Press, 2012), pp. 239-59.
Uses MLT and Trevet's version of the Constance story to show how Gower "infused" his Constance story in the "Confessio Amantis" with "pastoral rhetoric in order to transform Constance into a representative of Charity" and thereby offer an "'exemplum…
Examines Gower's efforts to establish his reputation as a poet. Frequently using Chaucer for comparison or contrast, Yeager explores Gower's stylistics, his concerns with audience, his relations with French tradition and particular sources, his…
Yeager, R. F.
R. F. Yeager and Charlotte C. Morse, eds. Speaking Images: Essays in Honor of V. A. Kolve (Asheville, N.C.: Pegasus Press, 2001), pp. 525-57.
Yeager contrasts Gower's uses of imagery in the 'Tale of Constance" with Chaucer's techniques in MLT, arguing that Gower is more minimalist, but that, like Chaucer, Gower challenges readers to discover the moral implications of the world he…
Peck, Russell A., and R. F. Yeager, eds.
Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2017. viii, 381 pp.
Collects sixteen essays from the Third International Congress of the John Gower Society and divides into three groups: Part 1, "Knowing the Self and Others"; Part 2, "The Essence of Strangers"; Part 3, "Social Ethics, Ethical Poetics." The collection…
