The Literature of Unlikeness

Published: Hanover, N. H., and London: University Press of New England, 1988.

Description: "Unlikeness" refers to the "coherence and contradictions" in the conviction encouraged by D. W. Robertson that "the characteristic mode of reading and writing in the Middle Ages was quite different from ours and that it assumes an underlying coherence of outlook so little questioned as to allow for multiple forms of surface contradiction that confirm rather than confute the principle of coherence." Dahlberg examines the concept in Augustine, Boethius, Chaucer,Dionysius the Areopagite, Alanus de Insulis, Andreas Capellanus, Chretien de Troyes, the "Roman de la Rose," Malory, and others. In chapter 1, Dahlberg explains that the term "land of unlikeness" originates in Augustine's "Confessions" and refers to the hierarchical, dichotomized vision that accounts for the medieval ability to see an object both in "bono" and in "malo," as derived from the dualism of Manichaeism. The opposition of good and evil is illusory in Augustine's theory of evil as exclusive contraries." In Ret, Chaucer faces the dilemma of "likeness in the land of unlikeness," which exercised both Augustine and Boethius. Influence of this idea appears in Truth, For, Form Age, Sted, and Rom and in the stylistic indirection characteristic of Chaucer's writing, as well as in versification, specifically in rhyme royal. For an essay that pertains to Chaucer, search for Literature of Unlikeness under Alternative Title.

Chaucer Subjects: Background and General Criticism.; Troilus and Criseyde.; Chaucer's Retraction.; Lyrics and Short Poems.