Chaucer's Language and the Philosophers' Tradition
- Author / Editor
- Burnley, J. D.
Chaucer's Language and the Philosophers' Tradition
- Published
- Cambridge:
- Totowa, N.J.: D. S. Brewer ;
- Rowman and Littlefield, 1979.
- Series
- Chaucer Studies, no. 02.
- Description
- The medieval tyrant "topos," with its lexicon and its various transformations, provides the means of studying Chaucer's moral vocabulary. The tyrant figure embodies passion, cruelty, injustice, and the heartlessness. Its antitype is first that of the rationally guided moral philosopher (Seneca)--who exercises prudence and temperance.
- In this tradition Chaucer shows a rationalistic distaste for love (passion), with his moral position becoming most clear in Mel and ParsT. Criseyde and the Wife of Bath are tyrantlike in their behavior; Theseus and Griselda, along with Cecilia and Prudence, are antitypes.
- Chaucer Subjects
- Background and General Criticism.
- Language and Word Studies.