In TC 5.543, the use of the participle "queynt" (quenched) may have been meant by Chaucer as a pun on the noun "queynt" (pudendum). Although the pun may have been intentional, it is irrelevant to the passage in which it appears, syntactically…
Discusses the stylistic device of inverting or rearranging word order for poetic effect. Highlights the writing of William Dunbar, who acknowledged Chaucer to be included among the "masters who by making were remade."
Dinshaw, Carolyn.
Yale Journal of Criticism: Interpretation in the Humanities 1 (1988): 81-105.
The widely separate and influential readings of TC by E. Talbot Donaldson and D. W. Robertson, Jr., while based on diametrically opposed theoretical principles, nevertheless find themselves in areement by virtue of their attempt to effect some manner…
Chapin, Arthur.
Yale Journal of Criticism 8:1 (1995): 7-33.
Compares the comic treatment of sententiousness in NPT with modern philosophical uses of aphorism. Both are "Menippean" in their contrasts of high and low discourse, and both ask us to perceive their points rather than to understand conceptually.
Jordan, Robert M.
Yale French Studies 51 (1974): 223-34.
Assesses structural and stylistic features (rather than the subject matter) of medieval narratives classed as romance, analyzing the "compositional structure" of WBT, particularly its "inorganic" and "additive" incorporation of digressive materials.…
Bergner, Heinz.
Xenia von Ertsdorff and Marianne Wynn, eds. Liebe--Ehe--Ehebruch in der Literatur des Mittelalters: Vortrage des Symposiums vom 13. bis 16. Juni 1983 am Institut fur deutsche Sprache und mittelalterliche Literatur der Justus Liebig-Universitat Giessen (Giessen: Wilhelm Schmitz, 1984),pp. 140-47.
FranT mirrors contemporary contradictory beliefs about marriage, criticizing standards and legal constraints that force paradoxical and confusing demands on married partners,and exposing the predicament of three moral characters who fall short with…
Taylor, Willene P.
Xavier University Studies 9.1 (1970): 1-18.
Argues that both TC (particularly the Epilogue) and LGW evince Chaucer's "good-natured humor" which is "never vicious" but rather "shows a warm and compassionate understanding of the foibles of human beings, regardless of their sex." LGW is a "mock…
Goldberg, Catherine L.
WVUPP 44: 34-41, 1998, 1999.
In TC, the layering of sources, authors, characters, and language produces a text that "seeks consciously to exist in the present each time it is read." The complex acts of memory among the characters suggest that time is chaotic, yet a "kind of…
Studies the uses of allegory in western literature--classical, continental, and English, from Prudentius to George Herbert--with emphasis on growth and variety in the tradition, signals to allegory in the texts, and embedded uses of allegory as well…
A variety of essays, reprinted and original, by Ewald Standop, including reprinted versions of two essays that pertain to Chaucer: "Zur Allegorischen Deutung der 'Nonnes Preeste Tale'" (1961) and "Chaucers Pardoner: Das Charakterproblem und die…
Pręczkowska, Helena, trans.
Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich – Wydawnictwo, 1963.
Item not seen. WorldCat records indicate that Margaret Schlauch wrote an Introduction and that Witold Chwalewik edited the commentary in this Polish translation of selections from CT.
Howard, Margaret, Bernard Palmer, David Bellan, and Martin Souter, readers.
Worton, Oxfordshire: Classical Communications, 2004.
Extracts from GP in modern English translation (J. U. Nicolson, trans.), "intermingled with atmospheric music of the period: songs, dances and instrumental pieces" (cover notes).
Graver, Bruce.
Wordsworth Circle 52 (2020): 92-103.
Argues that Wordsworth chose to publish his translation of PrT "for a very simple reason: he wanted to give an example of close translation of Chaucer, and it was the only one ready and unobjectionable." However, various critics found the translation…
Discusses the two marginal dragons found in the Ellesmere manuscript of CT, arguing that, like dragons in bestiaries and iconography, they "symbolize the marvelous," but in addition they also "prompt readers to attend to the marvelous aspects of…
Scala, Elizabeth.
Word & Image 26.4 (2010): 381–92.
Shows that the Nun's Priest is often illustrated in manuscripts and books, even though he is not described in the GP, arguing that the illustrations are informed by the Host's comments on the Priest and by the description of the protagonist of NPT,…
Read in accord with the medieval one-handed alphabet, the hand positions in Chaucer's Hoccleve portrait form the monogram GC. These positions appear to be a constant in the tradition of Chaucer portraiture, including the Ellesmere miniature. Such…
Woolf deleted a description of Chaucer and one of the Pointz Hall library when revising materials for "Between the Acts," reflecting her growing belief that books were no longer the center of culture in 1939-40. Traces references and allusions to…
Schmidt, Gary, and Susan M. Felch, eds.
Woodstock, Ver.: Skylight Paths, 2006.
This anthology of poems, stories, essays, and excerpts that celebrate spring includes lines 1-18 of GP, in modern translation, with a brief introduction to pilgrimage and the CT.
Adaptation of NPT in Modern English pentameter verse, designed for staging by a cast of seven, with a brief introductory note for performance and stage directions. The frame-story characters are pilgrims who decide to "dramatize the Fox and…
Guare, John.
Woodstock and New York, N.Y.: Overlook Press, 2002.
Two plays by John Guare, with additional apparatus, including an "Afterword," comprised of selections from Guare's journal that records, among other things, his thoughts about Chaucer while the playwright was composing "Chaucer in Rome," a play about…
Introduces Chaucer’s life and works, with a brief selected bibliography. Includes plot summaries and/or descriptions of BD, Rom, HF, PF, TC, LGW, each of the CT, and several lyrics.
