A group of pilgrims bound for Canterbury Cathedral agree to pass the weary miles by taking turns at storytelling. The travelers noble, coarse, jolly, and pious offer a vibrant portrait of fourteenth-century English life. Their narratives form English literature's greatest collection of chivalric romances, bawdy tales, fables, legends, and other stories. The Canterbury Tales reflects a society in transition, as a middle class began to emerge from England's feudal system. Craftsmen and laborers ride side by side with the gentry on the road to the shrine of St. Thomas a Becket, and...
A group of pilgrims bound for Canterbury Cathedral agree to pass the weary miles by taking turns at storytelling. The travelers noble, coarse, jolly, ...
Geoffrey Chaucer A. Kent Hieatt Constance B. Hieatt
Lively, absorbing, often outrageously funny, Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales is a work of genius, an undisputed classic that has held a special appeal for each generation of readers. The Tales gathers twenty-nine of literature's most enduring (and endearing) characters in a vivid group portrait that captures the full spectrum of medieval society, from the exalted Knight to the humble Plowman. This new edition includes a comprehensive introduction that summarizes some of the most important historical events and movements that defined the world of Chaucer and his pilgrims; two...
Lively, absorbing, often outrageously funny, Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales is a work of genius, an undisputed classic that has held a special ...
Geoffrey Chaucer R. M. Lumiansky H. Lawrence Hoffman
The procession that crosses Chaucer's pages is as full of life and as richly textured as a medieval tapestry. The Knight, the Miller, the Friar, the Squire, the Prioress, the Wife of Bath, and others who make up the cast of characters -- including Chaucer himself -- are real people, with human emotions and weaknesses. When it is remembered that Chaucer wrote in English at a time when Latin was the standard literary language across western Europe, the magnitude of his achievement is even more remarkable. But Chaucer's genius needs no historical introduction; it bursts forth from every page of...
The procession that crosses Chaucer's pages is as full of life and as richly textured as a medieval tapestry. The Knight, the Miller, the Friar, the S...
This facsimile edition is a complete reproduction of the most reliable of the medieval manuscripts of The Canterbury Tales-the Hengwrt Manuscript (or Peniarth 392 D), now in the National Library of Wales, in Aberystwyth, Cardiganshire. Because it is to serve as the basic text of the Tales for the projected multivolume Variorum Edition of Chaucer's complete works, much deliberation was given to the choice of the Hengwrt Manuscript. Scribed in the late fourteenth or early fifteenth century, it is one of the earliest extant manuscripts of the Tales.
This facsimile edition is a complete reproduction of the most reliable of the medieval manuscripts of The Canterbury Tales-the Hengwrt Manuscript (...
Once reviled as an example of Chaucer at his most tasteless and omitted from some editions of The Canterbury Tales, this scatological anecdote has over time been accorded genuine admiration, first grudging and finally unabashed.
As in The Miller's Tale, Chaucer has elaborated a simple fart joke into pungent satire against human foibles. Here too, through subtle references to religious lore, Chaucer transforms mere vulgarity into a truly clever jest and, in the opinion of some critics, a serious commentary on important issues. The particular target of the tale's satire is a...
Part Seven
Once reviled as an example of Chaucer at his most tasteless and omitted from some editions of The Canterbury Tales, this scatological ...
The Romaunt of the Rose translates in abridged form a long dream vision, part elegant romance, part rollicking satire, written in France during the thirteenth century. The French original, Le Roman de la Rose, had a profound influence on Chaucer, who says he translated the work. From the sixteenth century to the mid-nineteenth, scholars assumed that the Romaunt comprised large fragments of that translation. Subsequent debates have divided the Romaunt into two or three segments, and proffered arguments that Chaucer was responsible for one or more of them, or for none. The current consensus...
The Romaunt of the Rose translates in abridged form a long dream vision, part elegant romance, part rollicking satire, written in France during the...
"A Treatise the Astrolabe" by Geoffrey Chaucer is the work of an avid amateur astronomer who happened also to be England's greatest medieval poet. A user of the astrolabe can plot the movement of the stars, tell time, and calculate numerous other results. Chaucer translated and revised a standard Latin treatment of the astrolabe. His treatise, which is generally regarded as one of the first technical manuals in English and a model of how technical manuals should be written.
Not since 1872 has a free-standing edition of "A Treatise the Astrolabe" been published. Thanks to the expertise of...
"A Treatise the Astrolabe" by Geoffrey Chaucer is the work of an avid amateur astronomer who happened also to be England's greatest medieval poet. ...
Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.
Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republ...
This edition of the best of Chaucer' s shorter poems ranges widely over the major concerns necessary to a full understanding of the text, including its occasion, literary tradition, sources, rhetoric, language, metre, mythology and themes. It is an edition which will appeal both to students and to general readers who wish to extend their knowledge of medieval English poetry.
This edition of the best of Chaucer' s shorter poems ranges widely over the major concerns necessary to a full understanding of the text, including it...
It is impossible to overstate the importance of English poet GEOFFREY CHAUCER (c. 1343 c. 1400) to the development of literature in the English language. His writings which were popular during his own lifetime with the nobility as well as with the increasingly literate merchant class marked the first celebration of the English vernacular as a tongue worthy of literary endeavor, most notably in his unfinished narrative poem The Canterbury Tales, the format and structure of which continues to be imitated by writers today. But the impact of Chaucer s work was felt even into the 16th and 17th...
It is impossible to overstate the importance of English poet GEOFFREY CHAUCER (c. 1343 c. 1400) to the development of literature in the English langua...
