Fragments: Past and Present in Chaucer and Gower

Description: Studying how Chaucer's and Gower's uses of their sources reflect their understandings of history and their political agendas, Urban invites readers to consider parallels between the poets' uses of sources and historicist criticism. Uses various theoretical approaches to compare and contrast the poets' treatments of rebellion and vision in "Vox Clamantis" and NPT (with discussion of HF and PF), their depictions of Troy in TC and several sections of "Confessio Amantis," their mirrors for princes in Mel and "Confessio Amantis" 7, and their concern with the violated body in their tales of Virginia. Generally, Gower seeks to resolve into admonitory unity the splintered idealism of the past, while dialogic interaction typifies Chaucer's engagements with the past and with politics.

Chaucer Subjects: Sources, Analogues, and Literary Relations; House of Fame; Parliament of Fowls; Troilus and Criseyde; Tale of Melibee; Physician and His Tale