King of the barnyard, Chanticleer struts about all day. When a fox bursts into his domain, dupes him into crowing, and then grabs him in a viselike grip, Chanticleer must do some quick thinking to save himself and his barnyard kingdom.

Winner, 1959 Caldecott Medal
Notable Children's Books of 1940-1970 (ALA)
Winner, 1992 Kerlan Award

In the fourteenth century Geoffrey Chaucer, who served three kings as a customs official and special envoy, virtually invented English poetry. He did so by wedding the language of common speech to metrical verse, creating a medium that could accommodate tales of courtly romance, bawdy fabliaux, astute psychological portraiture, dramatic monologues, moral allegories, and its author's astonishing learning in fields from philosophy to medicine and astrology. Chaucer's accomplishment is unequalled by any poet before Shakespeare and--in The Canterbury Tales and Troilus and...

Nevill Coghill's masterly and vivid modern English verse translation with all the vigor and poetry of Chaucer's fourteenth-century Middle English

In The Canterbury Tales Chaucer created one of the great touchstones of English literature, a masterly collection of chivalric romances, moral allegories and low farce. A story-telling competition between a group of pilgrims from all walks of life is the occasion for a series of tales that range from the Knight's account of courtly love and the ebullient Wife of Bath's Arthurian legend, to the ribald anecdotes of the Miller and the...

A selection of the best-loved and most frequently studied of "The Canterbury Tales"
This collection is the perfect introduction to one of the cornerstones of English literature. The General Prologue provides picturesque character sketches of the colorful band of pilgrims who gather at a London inn on their way to Canterbury. The nine tales chosen range from the noble Knight's story of rivalry in love to the boastful and hypocritical Pardoner's moral treatise, and from the exuberant Wife of Bath's Arthurian legend to the Miller's worldly, ribald farce. Incorporating every type of medieval...

Set during the tenth year of the siege of Troy, this poem relates how Troilus persuades Crisyede to become his lover, only to be forced apart by the events of war. This edition contains an introduction that places the poem in the context of its times, with notes and appendices.

Spanning Chaucer's working life, these four poems build on the medieval convention of love visions' - poems inspired by dreams, woven into rich allegories about the rituals and emotions of courtly love. Together, the four create a witty and humane self-portrait of the poet.

Often called the first great English novel, Troilus and Cressida, a tragic love story set during the siege of Troy, is Chaucer's masterpiece. Troilus, a valiant warrior, is scornful of love until he catches a glimpse of Cressida. With the help of his friend and her uncle Pandarus, Troilus wins Cressida over. But their happiness is destroyed when, summoned to a Greek camp, Cressida seeks the protection of one Diomede and ultimately betrays Troilus.

"Contexts" connects the poems to their classical and medieval foundations and includes works by Virgil, Ovid, Cicero, Boethius, Dante, and Boccaccio, among others From the wealth of scholarly work available, the editor has chosen for "Criticism" six essays that address the poems' central themes. Contributors include Charles Muscatine, A. C. Spearing, R. T. Lenaghan, Richard Firth Green, Elaine Tuttle Hansen, and Steven Kruger A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included.

"Criticism" includes ten essays by a diverse group of distinguished Chaucerians, among them C. S. Lewis, E. Talbot Donaldson, Karla Taylor, Lee Patterson, and Jill Mann, that illuminate the major scholarly issues raised by this complex and challenging poem A Glossary and Selected Bibliography are also included

Marion Wynne-Davies' detailed feminist reading of The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale and The Clerk's Prologue and Tale is the first edition to address the social and cultural context of these poems' production. Her analysis of the original manuscripts of the tales, and of the questions raised about gender and cultural history, is accessible and illuminating. With glosses on the page and a bibliography to assist with further reading, this edition may be an essential study aid for all students of Chaucer, whether familiar with the poems or coming to them for the first time.