Wilson, Katharine.
Laura C. Lambdin and Robert T. Lambdin, eds. (Westport Conn.; and London: Greenwood, 1996): pp. 369-84.
Considers Chaucer's narrative persona in CT in two manifestations: as writer and as pilgrim. Writers were necessarily reciters in Chaucer's day, with opportunities in government, in religion, and as itinerant performers. Pilgrims encountered…
Carlin documents the development of public dining in London and Westminster, drawing evidence from, among other sources, GP, "Piers Plowman," and the prologue to Lydgate's "The Siege of Thebes."
Maíz Arévalo describes the functions of rhetorical questions and assesses their uses in CT, where the device is linked to "heigh style" (Harry Bailey's term) and specific genres. Rhetorical questions are used to express and elicit emotion, to…
Casey, Jim.
Kathleen A. Bishop, ed. Standing in the Shadow of the Master? Chaucerian Influences and Interpretations (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2010), pp. 224-42.
Explicitly influenced by KnT, Shakespeare's "Two Noble Kinsmen" adapts Chaucer's humor and creates a dark vision of the intersection of consumerism and sexuality.
Examines Theseus as political hero in light of the literary history of KnT. The character combines wisdom and chivalry and reflects the Tale's narrator, including his attitude toward women.
Sauer, Michelle M.
Journal of Lesbian Studies 11 (2007): 331-45.
Sauer describes the "inadequacy of lesbian criticism in today's Medieval Literary Studies" and suggests some opportunities for developing such studies, including opportunities in Chaucer studies.
Corman, Catherine Talmage.
Dissertation Abstracts International 47 (1986): 173A.
Drawing on sources in rhetoric and preaching, Chaucer saw rhetoric "not merely as a collection of stylistic figures, but as a process defined by the interaction between a speaker, his words,...and the audience." He made the audience "active…
Veldhoen, N. H. G. E.
J. Lachlan Mackenzie and Richard Todd, eds. In Other Words: Transcultural Studies in Philology, Translation, and Lexicology Presented to Hans Heinrich Meier on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday. (Dordrecht, Holland, and Providence, R.I.: Foris, 1989), pp. 107-16.
Discusses the tradition and analogues of the "demande d'amour" of FranT, compares Chaucer's use, and concludes that the young lover Aurelius has the greatest claim to the honor of being "mooste fre," although the question is exceedingly complex.
Brinton, Laurel J.
A. E. Christa Canitz and Gernot R. Wieland, eds. From Arabye to Engelond: Medieval Studies in Honour of Mahmoud Manzalaoui on His 75th Birthday (Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1999), pp. 175-99.
Documents the development of whilom from its origins as an Old English adverb, to a discourse marker associated with orality, to an adjective. Although this development does not challenge the "unidirectionality hypothesis of grammaticalization," it…
In TC, a vision of love and death, Chaucer uses black and white to portray Criseyde as ambiguous: she shares her whiteness with Venus but is linked with death and its symbolic blackness.
Kinney, Clare Regan.
Studies in Philology 89 (1992): 272-92.
In contrast to the 'Filostrato,' TC gives lyrical expression to both male and female speakers. Antigone's song is central to the female lyrical discourse in TC, establishing a "poetics of presence" that culminates in the poem's closing concern with…
Malvern, Marjorie M.
Studies in Philology 80 (1983): 238-52.
The Wife of Bath's allusion to the fable of "A Lion and a Man" indicates the "sentence" unifying her Prologue into cogent satire and emphasizes the aim of her rhetorical devices.
Freed, E. R.
Unisa Medieval Studies 2 (1985): 80-94.
Before the frame of CT establishes the brief "authenticating level," the narrator works in GP to establish that his report is an exact chronicle and that he is reliable. His veracity influences views of the Parson and the Pardoner as preachers.
Arthur, Ross G.
English Studies in Canada 13 (1987): 1-11.
Treats the relationship of the Reeve to the Miller. Comparison of RvT with Boccaccio's "Decameron" and other analogues, including the status and character of their narrators, reveals the Reeve's essential meanness: his identification with the…
McCormack, Frances.
Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin and John Flood, eds. Heresy and Orthodoxy in Early English Literature, 1350-1680. Dublin Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature, no. 3. (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2010), pp. 39-48.
Ambiguous depictions of the Parson and Pardoner reflect contemporary debate regarding false prophets. The Pardoner's negligence, hypocrisy, and language suggest heresy, but he is not accused. The Parson is orthodox, but in his rejection of oaths,…
As a triad, MkT, Mk-NPL, and NPT present such a variety of motifs, themes, and nuances that one must be mindful of their multiplicity and not reduce their reading to a "hevy" tragedy or a performance of "sentence" alone, thus falling prey to the…
Chaucer employs ekphrasis ("verbal representation of a visual representation") in the temples in KnT to comment on the social contexts and cultural production of art. The paintings and sculptures aesthetically justify Theseus's own authority, but…
Kennedy, Beverly.
Robert Myles and David Williams, eds. Chaucer and Language: Essays in Honour of Douglas Wurtele (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2001), pp. 1-32, 178-91.
Descriptions of the Wife of Bath in GP and in WBP are consciously ambiguous, a means of reminding us to suspend moral judgment because language is inherently ambiguous. Through glosses and textual choices, modern editions oversimplify the Wife by…
In HF, Chaucer's depictions of Venus's temple, the desert surrounding it, and the foundation of Fame's palace offer a vision of vernacular poetry that resembles glass. Like glass, such poetry is produced by transformation and translation of…
Fichte, Joerg O.
Paul Strohm and Thomas J. Heffernan, eds. Studies in the Age of Chaucer, Proceedings, No. 1, 1984 (Knoxville, Tenn.: New Chaucer Society, 1985), pp. 181-94.
In Wom Nob, Chaucer uses traditional "topoi" and rhetorical and syntactic structure in French style; Ros is a playful parody of these conventions.
Riddy, Felicity.
Carol M. Meale, ed. Women and Literature in Britain, 1150-1500. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 104-27.
Contrasts Julian of Norwich's "Revelation of Love" as an "insider's" representation of feminine literary subculture with Chaucer's depictions in PrT and SNT and with materials in the Vernon manuscript. Even Chaucer could not achieve the "inwardness"…
Chewning, Susannah Mary.
Robert S. Corrington and John Deely, eds. Semiotics 1993 (New York: Peter Lang, 1993), pp. 373-79.
Explores Emily's moments of speech and silence in KnT to argue that, at the end of the narrative, she is "the perfect example of the silent signifier," lacking any personal meaning beyond what is inscribed by the prevailing courtly attitudes.
Of the characters in FranT, Dorigen is "most fre" in the senses of independence and generosity. She chooses her own fate (life instead of the suicide characteristic of the scorned woman) and her own lover (her husband instead of the lusty, would-be…
