'The Double Bind of Troilus to Tellen': The Time of the Gift in Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde

Author / Editor
Massey, Jeff.

Title
'The Double Bind of Troilus to Tellen': The Time of the Gift in Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde

Published
Chaucer Review 38: 16-35, 2003.

Description
TC exhibits a notable conflict between gift and not-gift economics--between ideal giving and practical commodity exchange. The rules of courtly love, ostensibly designed to ennoble the lover and enable "true" love, in practice disallow unconditional giving and reduce true love to commodity. The theories of Mauss and Derrida can profitably be applied to this text.

Chaucer Subjects
Troilus and Criseyde.