The Image of Pluto and Proserpine in the "Merchant's Tale."

Author / Editor
Donovan, Mortimer J.

Title
The Image of Pluto and Proserpine in the "Merchant's Tale."

Published
Philological Quarterly 36 (1957): 49–60.

Description
Identifies parallels between the characterizations of January and May in MerT and those of Pluto and Proserpine in Claudian's "De Raptu Proserpinae." Anticipating the role of the fairy deities in Chaucer's Pear-Tree episode, Claudian's "myth of Proserpine" may also have influenced their "beneficent" role of the supernatural characters in the episode.

Chaucer Subjects
Merchant and His Tale
Sources, Analogues, and Literary Relations