Borroff, Marie.
Robert R. Edwards and Stephen Spector, eds. The Olde Daunce: Love, Friendship, Sex, and Marriage in the Medieval World (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1991), pp. 229-35.
Considers whether the Prioress was capable of "love celestial," examining her invocation to the Virgin Mary and suggesting that the heaviness of Mary's pregnancy is analogous to the Prioress's need to be delivered of her tale. In PrT, "affective…
Spector, Stephen.
Robert R. Edwards and Stephen Spector, eds. The Olde Daunce: Love, Friendship, Sex, and Marriage in the Medieval World (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1991), pp. 211-28, 289-300 (notes).
Explores the "joining of contradictions in irony" in the GP portrait of the Prioress and the "joining of contraries" in the "sublime paradox" in the allusion to the Incarnation in PrT. A further contradiction is "that the Prioress, whose faith and…
Edwards, Robert R.
Robert R. Edwards and Stephen Spector, eds. The Olde Daunce: Love, Friendship, Sex, and Marriage in the Medieval World (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1991), pp. 138-53, 272-76 (notes).
LGWP reflects concern with poetic art, especially the notions of translation and transformation, "making" and "enditing." Cupid's accusations against Rom and TC privilege social over artistic meaning although Chaucer and Alceste subvert this "social…
Gittes, Katharine S.
New York, Westport, Conn., and London: Greenwood Press, 1991.
In the traditions of Indian and Greek frame narratives, tensions exist between the framing story and the enclosed tales, although Western aesthetics promote tighter structure and more detailed characterization. Medieval framed narratives florished…
Discusses historical reliability of witness lists as evidence of magnate activity and relationship to the crown. Provides tabular inventory of witnesses and percentage of charters witnessed by year.
Gray, Douglas.
Helen Phillips, ed. Langland, the Mystics, and the English Religious Tradition: Essays in Honour of S. S. Hussey. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1990, pp. 185-202.
Surveys medieval treatment of cats in science, witchcraft, bestiaries, proverbs, fables, and literature. Notes Chaucer's occasional references to cats in MilT, WBP, and SumT.
Denley, Marie.
Helen Phillips, ed. Langland, the Mystics, and the English Religious Tradition: Essays in Honour of S. S. Hussey. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1990, pp. 223-41.
Includes brief discussion of ABC in light of alphabetic poems and other medieval teaching devices.
Dates the macaronic lyric "On the Times" ("Syng y wold, butt, alas!") at 1380, reading it as a commentary on events and attitudes leading to the Peasants' Revolt of 1381.
Griffiths, Jeremy, and Derek Pearsall, eds.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
Fifteen original essays on such topics as early book design, book purchasing and ownership, Caxton, and production of various kinds of books. Includes C. Paul Christianson on "Evidence for the Study of London's Late Medieval Manuscript-Book Trade,"…
Halford, Donna Allard.
Dissertation Abstracts International 52 (1991): 547A.
Of the five parts of classical rhetoric, "memoria" (including semiotics) has been insufficiently recognized. Chaucer's dream visions reveal interaction of memory and invention; "memoria" is also significant in Renaissance and Romantic poetry.
Hill, John M.
New Haven, Conn., and London: Yale University Press, 1991.
Chaucer's works explore and promote "cognitive credence"--belief as a way of knowing the truths reflected in fiction. In BD, HF, PF, and LGWP, the narrators' confrontations with various fictions show that belief and emotional involvement are…
Examines four Middle English romances against a backdrop of late-medieval penitential doctrine and practice, and assesses the presence of penitential motifs in several more. The major penitential romances--Guy of Warwick, Sir Ysumbras, Sir Gowther,…
Howes, Laura L.
Dissertation Abstracts International 52 (1991): 1322A.
Chaucer employs traditional garden topoi (locus amoenus, hortus conclusus, and paradys d'amours) to draw attention to precursors, to create discrepancy between CT context and tradition, to individualize narrators, and to show literary indebtedness in…
Kimmelman, Burt Joseph.
Dissertation Abstracts International 52 (1991): 1741A.
Mentions Chaucer among poets (Guillem IX, Marcabru, Dante, and especially Langland) who helped develop the distinction between history and fiction and who showed themselves to be individuals, not for self-promotion but to identify themselves…
Kindrick, Robert, moderator.
Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching, n.s., 2 (1991): 5-22.
Panelists (Larry Benson, John H. Fisher, Derek Pearsall, Alfred David) discuss recent difficulties and opportunities in teaching Chaucer, focusing on student interests and capabilities.
Kiser, Lisa J.
Hanover, N. H., and London: University Press of New England, 1991
Chaucer's epistemology is skeptical: he subverts written authority, obscures traditional distinctions between history and fiction, and questions the validity and representability of experience. Formalist analysis of narratorial voices discloses (1)…
Gerlach, John.
UIniversity: University of Alabama Press, 1985.
In a section on directness and indirectness in plotting, discusses Boccaccio and Chaucer works as antecedents to modern short-stories, contrasting the directness of "Decameron" 3.5 with the "indirect mode" of CT, particularly NPT (pp. 17-23).
Mann, Jill.
Atlantic Heights, N. J.: Humanities Press International, 1991.
Chaucer defines "woman" as the norm against which all human behavior is to be measured, representing women in ways that undermine traditional antifeminist categories. In HF, TC, and LGW, the antifeminist theme of betrayal is recast to reflect human…
Margherita, Gayle Margaret.
Dissertation Abstracts International 51 (1991): 4115A.
Applies Freudian and feminist theory to three extracanonical medieval texts, presenting them as the "unconscious" of works in the literary canon. Also analyzes BD and TC.
Mills, Malwyn, Jennifer Fellows, and Carol M. Meade, eds.
Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1991.
Papers read at the first meeting (1988) of the Society for the Study of Medieval Romance, ranging in chronological concern from the twelfth to the fiftennth centuries. Included are general discussions of MS Ashmole 61 and the Percy Folio. …
Morse, Ruth.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
Medieval notions of historical and literary truth derive from classical rhetorical tradition and differ from modern, empirically based notions of factuality. Basing her argument on a description of education in rhetoric, Morse demonstrates that…
North, J. D.
Mededelingen der Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, Afdeling Letterkunde, Nieuwe Reeks 54 (1991): 154-62.
Derived from North's book, Chaucer's Universe (Oxford, 1988), this article argues that Chaucer's imagination was illuminated by astrological and astronomical knowledge of an unusually high quality.
Ostade, Ingrid Tieken Boon van, and John Frankis, eds.
Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1991.
Sixteen essays encompass the interpretation of textual cruxes in Middle English, lexicography in the past and present, current and older problems in English usage, and the history of English spelling.
For an essay that pertains to Chaucer, search…
