Browse Items (15542 total)

The seven essays assess Gower and Chaucer as joint recipients of an antique heritage, as readers of (and borrowers from) each other's works, and as writers whose work reveals much about late-medieval attitudes toward language and about the constantly…

Eighteen essays comprise an "'Un'festschrift" that celebrates Terry Jones as a comedian, cinematographer, historian, and Chaucerian. For five contributions that pertain to Chaucer, search for Medieval Python under Alternative Title.

Twenty-six essays on topics from Marie de France's "Guigemar" to Edward Burne-Jones's "Miracle of the Merciful Knight," with recurrent emphasis on the intersection between visual and verbal traditions. Includes a bibliography of Kolve's publications…

Twenty-five pedagogical essays by various authors, with an introduction by the editors and a comprehensive index. For four essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Approaches to Teaching the Poetry of John Gower under Alternative Title.

Discusses Gower's influence on other Middle English writers and provides recommendations for teaching Gower, from community college to graduate programs. Includes several essays specific to Gower's relationship to Chaucer. Includes bibliography…

Explores the influence of Eustache Deschamps on the development of non-musical fixed forms in the English lyric tradition, commenting on poems from Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Rawlinson D. 913; the poems of "Ch"; and works by Chaucer and John Gower,…

Primarily discusses medieval humor in Gower, yet addresses how Gower's and Chaucer's humorous characters are female. Looks at Criseyde in TC, Alison in WBT, the merchant's wife in ShT, and Alisoun in MilT.

Unlike their biblical source, Chaucer's and Gower's allusions to Jephthah's daughter indicate concern with pain and emotional suffering. Also considers the illustration in Pierpont Morgan Library, MS M.126 that accompanies Gower's tale of Virginia in…

Considering the possibility that Gower "was the foremost poet of his age," Yeager contrasts the poetic powers of Gower and Chaucer and compares Gower's poetic techniques in "In Praise of Peace" and "Confessio Amantis" with Chaucer's techniques in CT.

Considers the importance of Spain in Chaucer's life, in the politics of his age, and in his literary allusions, arguing that Chaucer could read Spanish and that his familiarity with the tale collections of Petrus Alfonsi and Don Juan Manuel "would…

Yeager summarizes Chaucer's education and career for the purpose of identifying the books, languages, and classical and vernacular literatures with which Chaucer was clearly acquainted. Discusses Chaucer's strategies for keeping literary authority at…

Yeager finds a partisan second level of meaning underneath the sycophantic surface of the envoy of Purse - one that challenges Henry's right to rule.

Yeager reads Purse as a political poem rather than a begging poem, addressed initially to Richard. When Chaucer added the envoy, he was under duress from the court of Henry, not financial distress. The poem undermines Lancastrian legitimacy and if…

Yeager contrasts Gower's uses of imagery in the 'Tale of Constance" with Chaucer's techniques in MLT, arguing that Gower is more minimalist, but that, like Chaucer, Gower challenges readers to discover the moral implications of the world he…

According to a theological tradition of the late Middle Ages, gluttony included swearing, blasphemy, sorcery, witchcraft, and devil worship, as well as excessive eating and drinking.

Caxton's Chaucer is "moral," while Thynne's is "gentle." In their selection and rejection of texts both were guided by established critical principles.

Gower's reputation as "moral" rests on his mid-1380's stance as a reformer, a classicist, and a clear and consistent portrayer of good and evil. By citing him in TC, Chaucer encourages moral interpretation of the hero's attitude at the end of the…

A late-sixteenth-century account of Chaucer's life and works, never before published, "gives fresh insight into the nature and transmission of the poet's reputation in England during the Renaissance."

The pacifism of Gower's later writings develops from an early grounding in the legalist theories of Isidore and Gratian to an Augustinian emphasis on motivation. Chaucer's position is less clear, but also eirenic, as inferred from biographical data,…

Most people who could read and write in England in the late fourteenth century were capable of doing so in French, Latin, and English. Gower's nearly 90,000 lines of extant poetry--roughly apportioned into thirds of Anglo-Norman French, Latin, and…

Examines Gower's efforts to establish his reputation as a poet. Frequently using Chaucer for comparison or contrast, Yeager explores Gower's stylistics, his concerns with audience, his relations with French tradition and particular sources, his…

Defines "exemplum" and describes the history of the genre before Chaucer; then focuses on Chaucer's innovative uses of the device to produce comedy in MilT, SqT, and SumT, also commenting at length on exempla clusters in HF and FranT.

Errors in "Cliffs Notes" and "MAX Notes" guides on the Wife of Bath lead to an unsympathetic interpretation of the character and inaccurate reading of WBT.

Yatzeck reads Godwin's "Life of Chaucer" as an extension of Godwin's social philosophy, which combines necessity and human perfectibility. Godwin reconstructs Chaucer's life and makes generalizations about medieval life to encourage readers to…

Latin, rather than OF, sources, especially the twelfth-century "Isengrimus," provide parallels with NPT. The fifteenth-century Low German "De vos und de hane" was derived orally from the "Isengrimus." Possibly Chaucer heard an analogous English…