Chaucer and the French Tradition Revisited : Philippe de Mézières and the Good Wife

Author / Editor
Collette, Carolyn P.

Title
Chaucer and the French Tradition Revisited : Philippe de Mézières and the Good Wife

Published
Jocelyn Wogan-Browne et al., eds. Medieval Women: Texts and Contexts in Late Medieval Britain: Essays for Felicity Riddy (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2000), pp. 151-68.

Description
Defines the French literary topos of the good wife, wherein "female virtue grounded in prudence and self-control benefits the immediate domestic and also the wider public spheres." Reflected in Philippe's "Le livre de la vertu du sacrement de mariage," the topos underlies Chaucer's ClT, Mel, and SNT in general and specific ways.

Alternative Title
Medieval Women: Texts and Contexts in Late Medieval Britain: Essays for Felicity Riddy.

Chaucer Subjects
Tale of Melibee.
Second Nun and Her Tale.
Clerk and His Tale.