Chaucer's Merchant's Tale: Another Swing of the Pendulum

Description: Argues that MerT should be read in light of MerP (for which there is strong manuscript evidence) and that the two are unified by a "cool, controlled, acidulous" tone and a "persistent interest in sexual activity . . . that frequently borders on the morbid and perverse." Neither comic nor tragic in mode, MerT is a "remarkably daring piece of work"; all of its characters are either "contemptible" or "bitter."