Hill, John.
Robert G. Benson and Susan J. Ridyard, eds. New Readings of Chaucer's Poetry (Rochester, N.Y., and Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2003), pp. 165-82.
In light of Cicero's "De amicitia," the noble friendship between Troilus and Pandarus helps to elevate TC to a great tragedy.
Grennen, Joseph E.
Medievalia et Humanistica 14 (1986): 125-38.
Chaucer's concept of "fyn," or end, is illuminated by the "Nicomachean Ethics" of Aristotle, which is more important as a source for Chaucer than has been recognized.
Graybill, Robert (V.)
Proceedings of the Medieval Association of the Midwest 2 (1993): 90-98.
TC exemplifies the Aristotelian idea of tragedy, with Troilus undergoing the "perepetia" ("reversal") and the ending of the tale presenting a Christianized version of catharsis.
Examines Giles of Rome's social theory and its vision of unity and hierarchy, as well as the degree to which it might have been influential in Chaucer's time, commenting on the Wife of Bath's discussion of "gentilesse." Also refers to LGW; HF; KnT;…
Collette, Carolyn.
Jocelyn Wogan-Browne and others, eds. Language and Culture in Medieval Britain: The French of England c.1100-c.1500 (Woodbridge, Suffolk; and Rochester, N.Y.: York Medieval Press, 2009), pp. 373-85.
Collette explores interest in "mediation and moderation" in vernacular texts, commenting on the vernacular as a way to make learning more broadly available, on "the mean" in such texts as Nicole Oresme's translations of Aristotle, and on Chaucer's…
North, John
Giancarlo Marchetti et al., eds. Ratio et Superstitio: Essays in Honor of Graziella Federici Vescovini (Louvain-la-Neuve: Fédération Internationale des Instituts d'Études Médiévales, 2003), pp. 263-83.
North summarizes medieval arithmetic theory and practice, describes Chaucer's professional familiarity with arithmetic, and explores arithmetic allusions and structuring in BD, particularly its shape as an abacus.
Brewer, Derek.
Piero Boitani and Anna Torti, eds. Literature in Fourteenth-Century England (Tubingen: Gunter Narr; Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1983), pp. 155-64.
Examines arithmetic aspects of Chaucer's poetry in an effort to understand the mind of the man. The arithmetic devices of RvT, ShT, SumT, etc. indicate the strong vein of "modernistic rationalism" in Chaucer, a distinctive feature of his mentality.
Kirby, Thomas A.
Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 73 (1972): 127-33.
Gauges Matthew Arnold's familiarity with Chaucer's works, judging it to be "thin" and "not extensive until the last eight years of his life," and suggesting that Arnold might not have misjudged Chaucer's "high seriousness" if had he read more of him.
Describes Chaucer's arrangements of multiple adjectives (preposed, postposed, and combined), contrasting his practice with other Middle English writers, and exploring the poetic value of his usage, suggesting that he seems to have been "the writer…
Wallace, Kristine Gilmartin.
Rice University Studies 62.2 (1976): 99-110.
For Walter and Griselda clothing has both "political/social" and "spiritual/personal" meanings which symbolize stages in their relationship. When Walter sees that Griselda remains virtuous beneath the array of fine clothing and social status which…
Griselda's several robings and disrobings are used to suggest the difficulty of knowing the constant reality behind shifting appearances. The behavior of Griselda and Walter becomes more coherent through the different meanings they see in clothing: …
Keller, Wolfram R.
Andrew James Johnston, Russell West-Pavlov, and Elisabeth Kempf, eds. Love, History and Emotion in Chaucer and Shakespeare: "Troilus and Criseyde" and "Troilus and Cressida" (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2016), pp. 141-56.
Argues that in TC Criseyde is the "embodiment of literary invention," enacting a "poetological" claim to fame, both humble and arrogant. Through his Cressida, Shakespeare presents a similar "counter-authorship," one that reflects the playwright's…
The tautologies of the "Roman de la Rose," formally co-ordinate and semantically emphatic, Chaucer usually renders by conservation, grammatical transcategorization, amplification, or emphasized reduction.
Kaplan, M. Lindsay.
David Lee, ed. Signs of the Early Modern 1: 15th and 16th Centuries. EMF, Studies in Early Modern France, no. 2 (Charlottesville, Va.: Rookwood, 1996), pp. 101-28.
Kaplan explores medieval and early modern legal discourse about slander and defamation. Though HF is concerned with the relation between poetry and slander, in Chaucer's time "defamation was not understood as having temporal consequences for the…
Edwards, Robert R., ed.
Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1994.
Twelve essays by different hands address the "poetic art that emerges in late medieval English narrative out of multiple historical contexts." Treating Langland, Chaucer, and other late-medieval poets, the collection includes an introduction by the…
Collects essays by Woolf published over a period of thirty years. For two essays that pertain to Chaucer, search for Art and Doctrine under Alternative Title.
Finlayson reads FrT as anticlerical comic satire rather than a moral exemplum, exploring similarities between the Tale and Boccaccio's story of Ciapellatto in Decameron 1.1. The probable source of FrT is a sermon by Robert Rypon, but Boccaccio may…
Wilsbacher, Gregory James.
Dissertation Abstracts International 59 (1999): 3448A.
Examines ethical questions raised by medieval literature for modern readers in the light of modern philosophical studies (Jean-FranƯois Lyotard, Emmanuel Levinas, Jean-Luc Nancy), as shown in LGW (literature and history), Piers Plowman…
Explores how poets "guide their readers through sequences of feelings, thoughts, and attitudes" by means of verbal depictions of built spaces that orient readers' attention to the use of spaces and spatial objects. Includes discussion of the gate in…
Beidler, Peter G.
Chaucer Review 12 (1977): 90-102.
Chaucer's unprecedented use of the woman baring her buttocks to the lover's kiss significantly emphasizes both the active potential of the woman, the rejection of courtly traditions,and the association of food with sex. The addition of her fart…
Mertens-Fonck, Paule.
Actes du Congres d'Amiens 1982. Societe des Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Superieur (Paris: Didier, 1987), pp. 41-51.
In GP, the pilgrims seem to be arranged symmetrically in two groups of ten on both sides of the central group formed by the five guildsmen and their cook. Each group of ten falls into subgroups of two, three, or four, held together by a similarity…
Johnson, William C.,Jr.
South Atlantic Bulletin 40.2 (1975): 53-62.
The dreamer discovers the inner urgency of a love that sought to transcend death; the knight, the external actuality of death. Chaucer's consolation lies in the recognition of the emotional (and not doctrinal) ineffability that art is. Grief is not…
Alexander, Jonathan J. G.
Studies in Iconography 18 (1997): 51-66.
Shifts within the related fields of art history, literary history, and the study of illuminated manuscripts have led to greater emphasis on interdisciplinary scholarship; Chaucer studies (particularly those concerning the Ellesmere manuscript) are a…
