Urban Chaucer: Fragmented Fellowships and Troubled Teleologies in Some Late Fourteenth-Century Texts.

Published: Turner, Marion. Urban Chaucer: Fragmented Fellowships and Troubled Teleologies in Some Late Fourteenth-Century Texts. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Oxford, 2002. Dissertation Abstracts International C70.03. Abstract available via ProQuest Dissertations & Theses.

Description: "This thesis examines the depiction of social antagonism in certain texts written in the 1380s and 1390s, in the London area. It focuses on Chaucer, looking at 'Troilus and Criseyde' and the 'Canterbury Tales' alongside other, contemporary texts. These include Thomas Usk's 'Testament of Love,' the guild returns of 1388-89, the letters accusing three London aldermen of betraying the city in 1381, 'St. Erkenwald,' Richard Maidstone's 'Concordia,' and John Gower's 'Vox clamantis.' Most critics have assumed that Chaucer's vision of society, or of social possibility, was benign. Critics writing from diverse perspectives and in various periods, have generally agreed that Chaucer's texts promote an idea of coherence, and that the author was genial and optimistic. In contrast, I argue that Chaucer's texts depict social groups as essentially fragmentary and antagonistic, and offer no hope for social - or personal - redemption. In Troilus and Criseyde, the city, and fellowship, are shown to be debased and self-seeking; equally, the Canterbury 'compaignye' is a destructive, anti-social group. Both of these works challenge an idea of teleology by suggesting that there is no final goal for society, and both refuse to offer a sense of progress or closure."