Browse Items (16089 total)

Trigg considers recurrent issues in the reception of Chaucer: responses to his self-shaped "poetic signature," admiration for his rhetoric and sentiment, and mourning for the loss of his genius by poets who seek to emulate him. Surveys rewritings and…

In Japanese.

Examines Chaucer's involvement with the royal family and shows how one of his descendents became heir to the throne in 1484.

By comparing Chaucer's TC with Boccaccio's "Filostrato" in sounds, grammar, word choice, similes and metaphors, ambiguities, and construction, the article investigates Chaucer's literary and linguistic imitation and humorous innovation.

Examines the apocalyptic tradition behind Nicholas's flood.

Illustrates how the descriptions of nature in TC reflect main characters' cognitive processes as well as the development of love.

Assesses the six oaths by saints--Martyn, Denys, Peter, Yves, Austyn, and Jame--in ShT, arguing that familiarity with details of the saints' lives provokes the audience to condemn the characters in the Tale.

Studies Chaucer's similes and metaphors to trace the "development of imagery in each of [his] works" from BD through CT, suggesting that Chaucer shows a "progressive awareness of the image as an essential tool of his art." Results of statistical…

Chaucer's figurative language is mostly traditional, but its effect usually transcends the merely visual: it is emotional and intellectual--aiming at more than concrete realism. Often, however, the nature of this imagery eludes us because Chaucer's…

Explores the history of the idea of nobility or gentility in European tradition, tracing the etymology of "gentilesse" and Chaucer's importance in the development of the concept in English, especially in KnT, FranT, and WBT. Links Chaucer's uses to…

If the Pardoner is taken as a hermaphrodite, it is easier to approach the question of how he can explain his false practices and still expect his listeners to be taken in by them. According to late medieval writers, the hermaphrodite's dual nature…

CT is a collection of narratives bound together in a frame with two central features: a pilgrimage and a game. The pilgrimage is the outer frame, while the game is a second, inner framing device--the organizing principle that brings the stories into…

Some characteristics of the legend of Philomene, Phyllis, and Hypermnestra are discussed. The brief conclusion proves that the poet's attitude toward LGW is ambivalent; he seems to be mocking, satirical, and at the same time serious and even…

Chaucer's attitude toward love should be observed in the continuity of his works. LGW, which comes in between TC and CT, plays an important part in this connection. Here, human love is once again taken up to be praised with some controversial…

The stories about Hypsipyle, Medea, Lucrece, and Ariadne are treated. In each case it seems that the poet finds feminine virtue in masculine vice. Except for the case of Lucrece, simplicity and flippancy on the part of women are exempted from moral…

Contrasts the "quasi-heretical," "so-called Augustinian" views of sex in marriage as always sinful with those of Thomas Aquinas and others who treat sexual love in marriage as sinless when consistent with "amicitia" (friendship) and reason, arguing…

Nineteen essays by various hands, plus an introduction. Nine of the pieces are previously published works or excerpts by Howard Patch, G. K. Chesterton, Paul G. Ruggiers, Thomas A. Garbaty, Derek Pearsall, Alfred David, Alan T. Gaylord, A. Booker…

Discusses how Chaucer's own familial relationships and home life are reflected in depictions of home and familial relationships in his works.

Argues that the pilgrimage of HF 116 was to the medieval hermitage of St. Leonard, two miles west of Windsor Castle; the associated weariness evokes the use of pilgrimages for amorous trysts.

Each of the three modes of authority--textual, experiential, visionary--complicated by the fictive dream-vision form, "fails to be authoritative because each demonstrates the lack of finality and absoluteness presumed to be characteristic of…

Allegorical reading of the CT Host as an image of Christ, a figure of the Eucharist associated with joy, heroism, and omnipotence. The Host is a guide of others and the only pilgrim not in need of penance. His name, his language, and his leadership…

Characterizes the Host as a "delightful traveling companion," summarizing details of his GP description and of his interactions with the other pilgrims in the links between the tales. He is "sometimes pompous, often impudent, and always forceful," a…

Chaucer's characters are not psychologically consistent but (like the Host, or Pardoner) are illusions based on familiar voices and attitudes to engage the audience in moral concerns, as in MerT, PardT.

Examines the Host as the "unifying feature of the whole pilgrimage fiction." Chaucer's "revisions" of the character and function of the Host increase his "realism" and serve as a structural device.

Explores Chaucer's stylistic virtuosity in his references to horses and riding, commenting on appropriateness, suggestive naming and coloring, metaphoric and imagistic implications, and comic effects. Includes comments on horses in TC, LGW, and CT.