Lerer, Seth, ed.
New Haven, Conn., and London : Yale University Press, 2006.
An introduction and ten essays by various authors, with several appendices (chronology, a guide to textual studies, order and pattern within CT, and maps), plus a bibliography and an index. Aimed at an American audience, the volume seeks to "combine…
Observes legal implications in the Clerk's reference to the Wife of Bath's "secte" (oath-helpers or compurgators), and suggests that the reference "functions to interanimate" the Wife's, Clerk's, and Merchant's shared views of female mastery.
Fleming, Donna.
[Jay Ruud, ed.] Papers on the "Canterbury Tales": From the 1989 NEH Chaucer Institute, Northern State University, Aberdeen, South Dakota ([Aberdeen, S.D.: Northern State University, 1989), pp. 128-34.
Reads WBP in light of a dictionary definition of "narcissism."
Puhvel, Martin.
Studia Neophilologica 53 (1981): 101-106.
Similarities in the career of Alice Kyteler of Kilkenny, Ireland, and Chaucer's Alice suggest that the case against the former may have influenced Chaucer's portrait. Alice Kyteler was married four times and was accused of carnal relations with a…
Gilbert, Jane, and Sara Harris.
Orietta Da Rold and Elaine Treharne, eds. The Cambridge Companion to Medieval British Manuscripts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), pp. 149-78.
Includes discussion of Astr in showing that "vernacular pride" in late medieval England was "more inclusive than exclusive of other languages and cultures." Stresses the "practical utility" of Astr and how English achieves "dignity" by association…
Thiebaux, Marcelle, trans. and introd.
New York and London: Garland, 1987.
Presents translations of the "literature of medieval women from the fourth to the fourteenth century in a wide variety of genres: letters, travel accounts, lyrics, and religious works. Writers include Egeria, Dhuoda, Hrotswitha, Anna Comnena, Marie…
Miller, Jacqueline T.
Chaucer Review 17 (1982): 95-115.
A focus on book 1 of this dream poem shows the poet moving among several attitudes toward authority: they include meek acceptance and assertion of the author's own independence of it.
Crane, Susan.
Barbara A. Hanawalt, ed. Chaucer's England: Literature in Historical Context (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1992), pp. 201-21.
Asserts the importance of assaults on written documents in the so-called Peasants' Revolt of 1381, exploring the hegemony that writing represented to the rebels. Assesses how Langland's revisions of Piers Plowman reflect his concerns with the…
Lee, J. Seth.
In The Discourse of Exile in Early Modern English Literature (New York: Routledge, 2017), pp. 15-33.
Treats Nicholas Trevet's, John Gower's, and Chaucer's tales of Constance as seriatim clarifications of "mens exili" (the mind of exile) in preparation for discussing relations between "exilic experience" and "national formation and nationalistic…
Dunleavy, Gareth W.
Papers on Language and Literature 3, supplement (1967): 14-27.
Explores the pervasiveness of the influence of Boethius's "Consolation of Philosophy" on Chaucer's works, noting its role as the source of Bo, summarizing its well-recognized impact on Chaucer's "discourses on providence, 'gentilesse,' and truth" in…
Leslie, Nancy T.
Chaucerian Shakespear (Ann Arbor: Michigan Consortium for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, 1983), pp. 25-41.
The Wife of Bath and Falstaff are superb "actors" who use rhetorical tools to triumph on their "stages," citing Scripture, twisting logic, and spouting proverbs for their own purposes.
Ironic readings of the GP portrait of the Knight are undermined by an understanding of the medieval ideals of "honor," "prudence," and "moral goodness" and by recognition of their signs in the Knight's portrait. An understanding of the medieval…
Mitchell, Charles.
Modern Language Quarterly 25 (1964): 66-75.
Focuses on the characterization of the Knight in GP, cast into relief by the Squire and Prioress, especially in the application of words such as "curteys" and "worthy." Distinguishes between moral virtue and professional efficiency throughout the GP,…
Berman, Constance H., Charles W. Connell, and Judith Rice Rothschild, eds.
Morgantown: West Virginia Unviersity Press, 1985.
Twelve essays on Hrotsvita, the Skaldkonur, Heloise, Mechthild von Magdeburg, Margery Kempe, Marie de France, and others, including two essays on Chaucer. For the two essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Worlds of Medieval Women under…
Brooks, Polly Schoyer, and Nancy Zinsser Walworth.
Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1966.
Social history of western medieval Europe from the "Barbarian Invasions" to "The Last of the Middle Ages," presented for young adults. The final section of the book (pp. 221-46) focuses on Chaucer, imaginatively reconstructing his daily life and…
Rissanen, Matti.
Journal of English Linguistics 28: 7-20, 2000.
Surveys electronic databases for the historical study of English; includes a one-page summary of Old and Middle English corpora, including those with Chaucer texts, accompanied by web addresses.
Gardham, Julie, comp., and David Weston, introd.
Glasgow: Glasgow University Library, 2004.
Brief discussion of six Chaucerian books and twenty-five related works, with a highly selective bibliography. For an expanded version, see http://special.lib.gla.ac.uk/exhibns/chaucer/index.html (May 19, 2005).
Vial, Claire.
Muriel Cunin and Martine Yvernault, eds. Monde(s) en movement. Mutations et innovations en Europe à la fin du Moyen Age et au début de la Renaissance (Limoges: Presses Universitaires de Limoges, 2012), pp. 51-63.
Contains references to the expression of time and mutability in Chaucer.
Traces the theme of the decline of the world in biblical and medieval tradition, examining three literary texts: Bernard of Cluny's "De Contemptus Mundi," John Gower's "Confessio Amantis," and ClT, where the virtues of "steadfastness and patience"…
Dean, James M.
Cambridge, Mass.: Medieval Academy, 1997.
Surveys the "senectus mundi" topos in late-medieval literature, particularly in Latin, French, and English literature, from Jean de Meun to Chaucer. Separate chapters address the topos, Middle English historical writing, Jean de Meun, Dante, "Piers…
In Form Age, as in medieval tradition, Nimrod represents the final stages of decline, especially the lust for political dominance, in the world after Adam's Fall.
Josipovici, Gabriel.
Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1971.
Studies modernism in English and French literature from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century, focusing on narrative fiction and critical perception and misperceptions of what constitutes modernism. Includes a chapter (pp. 52-99) entitled…
