Hanks, D. Thomas, Jr.
Chaucer Yearbook 4 (1997): 33-43.
SumP and various puns in SumT not only transform Friar John into a fart but also indicate that his prayers invert the Pentecostal wind and "suggest that his brethern share his odious nature."
Rejecting Siegfried Wenzel's view that the character Thomas suffers from insensitivity, Malone finds that Thomas shows more sensitivity to the death of his only child than his wife shows in all she says.
Astell, Ann W.
Studies in Philology 94 (1997): 395-416.
Examines Chaucer's two brief but similar references to the "St. Anne Trinity," a portrayal of Mary, Jesus, and St. Anne in the cultural context of fourteenth-century England. Concludes that the references in MLT and SNT represent two sides of a…
Heffernan, Carol F.
Chaucer Review 32 (1997): 32-45.
SqT is Chaucer's one foray into the genre of "interlace" romance, where characters and episodes are treated, then dropped, and subsequently treated again. SqT is not a parody like Th; it is a different genre that Chaucer wanted to try. He did not…
Goodman, Jennifer R.
Studies in the Age of Chaucer 5 (1983): 127-36.
Romances that parallel the SqT's interest in "meticulous attention to the niceties of courtly life joined with an inexhaustible appetite for marvels" were fashionable for Chaucer's age.
Kahrl, Stanley J.
Chaucer Review 7.3 (1973): 194-209.
Argues that SqT "presents the growing impulse toward exoticism and disorder at work in the courts of late medieval Europe," the antithesis of classical order depicted in KnT. Also comments on notions of "gentilesse" and the uses of rhetorical colors…
Burrow, J. A.
Claude Rawson, ed. English Satire and the Satiric Tradition. (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984), pp. 44-55. Also in Yearbook of English Studies 14 (1984): 44-55.
Th, according to L. H. Loomis, follows no previous pattern of burlesque. This article disputes Lommis's contention through comparison with "prise de Neuvile" in action, language, opening address, catalogues, descriptions, parody, abrupt ending, and…
Fichte, Joerg O.
Joerg O. Fichte, ed. Chaucer's Frame Tales (Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 1987), pp. 51-66.
Stresses that genre markers influence audience reception. Surveys the "mass of single works called "fabliaux proprement dits" to determine "invariant elements," which are genre markers in four categories: "communicative situation, province of…
Heffernan, Carol F.
Keith Busby and Erik Kooper, eds. "Courtly Liberature: Culture and Context." (Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 1990), pp. 261-70.
Argues that "by studying Chaucer's handling of the story told by Boccaccio we may form a very good idea of the direction in which he modified the received French fabliau (if there was one)." In Boccaccio's tale, there is no individuation of the…
Gastle, Brian W.
Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 99 (1998): 211-16.
The portrait of the five guildsmen in CT is a critique of "petty bourgeois pretensions to political power." Though each was "shaply for to been an alderman," the guildsmen were not members of the professions from which aldermen were elected. Their…
Views SNT as a "generic experiment" built "upon an epistemological premise whose axiomatic status was crumbling." Discusses analogical, hermeneutical, and hagiographic elements of the "Tale" as well.
Jankowski, Eileen S.
Dissertation Abstracts International 54 (1993): 1354-55A.
In light of Hans Jauss's reception theory, most scribes' and readers' glosses characterize SNT as either a study of Cecilia's personality or a reflection of Chaucer's religious nature. The narrative structure, however, places it at the juncture of…
Assesses Chaucer's Ret as an adaptation of rhetorical and literary conventions of prologue, epilogue, and literary confession, arguing that his uses of the conventions in both ParsP and Ret indicate that he is resisting traditional rejections of…
Beidler, Peter G.
Chaucer Review 28 (1994): 237-51.
Chaucer's RvT contains sufficient close parallels with Boccaccio's story of Pinuccio and Niccolosa to suggest that the latter might have been a source for the former. Two German versions of the cradle-trick story, although more similar in general…
Burbridge, Roger T.
Annuale Mediaevale 12 (1971): 30-36.
Compares and contrasts aspects of RvT with two analogues, the A and B versions of "Le Meunier et les .II. Clers," arguing that Chaucer's version achieves greater vitality, clearer characterizations and motivations, and a great deal of comic irony.
Regan, Charles Lionel.
American Notes and Queries 22 (1984): 97-99.
Chaucer's reference in RvT 4096 to "make a clerkes berd" (i.e., "cheat") may be echoed a few lines later in the oath "by seint Cutberd" (line 4127), suggesting terms for shaving and castration.
The red hose of the Wife of Bath may be her method of preventing venereal disease. According to the "doctrine of signatures," a fancied resemblance of a color to a disease could aid in remedy of prevention. Red was thought to be obnoxious to evil…
Crowther, J. D. W.
English Studies in Canada 8 (1982): 125-37.
In spite of many similarities to saints' legends, PhyT does not entirely conform to the genre. Instead of being a tale of faith affirmed, it is one of faith betrayed. Virginius's lack of faith leads him to slay Virginia rather than allow her faith…
Ortego, Philip D.
Chaucer Review 9 (1974): 182-89.
Surveys efforts to explain the meaning of "phislyas" (MLE 2.1189; here attributed to the Shipman), summarizing contextual concerns, manuscript variants, and several etymological hypotheses; agrees with those who treat it as a term related to…
Near, Michael R.
Pacific Coast Philology 20 (1985): 18-24.
Calls into question subject-oriented readings; proposes reading of PF as process and act. The narrator is an element of his own fiction. Refers to Chaucer's model, Graunson's "Songe Sainct Valentin."
Fowler, David C.
David C. Fowler. The Bible in Middle English Literature (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1984), pp. 128-70.
Presents an overview of Ambrose's "Hexameron" and argues the informing presence of the hexameral tradition on a deep level--though it scarcely rises to the surface--in the text of PF.
