ENGL 2210 - Early British Literature: Canterbury Tales

Ideal for research, this new title in the Bloom's Guides series includes broad-ranging excerpts from interpretive essays that provide expert commentary on this timeless work. It also features an introduction by master scholar Harold Bloom, a bibliography, and an index.

This work features an introduction by master scholar Harold Bloom, a chronology detailing Chaucer's life, a bibliography, and an index.

Referring to Chaucer as the major literary artist in the English language aside from Shakespeare, Bloom examines The Canterbury Tales. Also in this edition, Bloom specifically examines "Knight's Tale" and "Wife of Bath's Tale" along with its prolog

Written in a clear, jargon-free style by experts in the field, essays cover individual works, including The Canterbury Tales, Emma, Great Expectations, Wuthering Heights, The Importance of Being Earnest, Utopia and Gulliver's Travels, exploring the themes, characterization, use of language and other nuances of these enduring pieces of literature.

A vigorous treatment of The Nun's Priest's Tale, The Pardoner's Tale, The Wife of Bath's Tale, and The Franklin's Tale. "This carefully researched and lively edition...is richly and beautifully produced....One could not ask for a more enticing introduction to Chaucer's world." -- Publishers Weekly.
Adapted for grades 4-10

Presents original essays along with classic and contemporary criticism to provide a unique insight into Chaucer's richly layered tales. Accessible to first-time readers and Chaucerians alike, this volume provides an enjoyable approach to the complexities of The Canterbury Tales, with expert discussions of the stories that have enraptured, stunned, and enlightened six centuries of readers.

Twenty-six essays and a conclusion written by leading medieval historians focus on the historical and social contexts of each of Chaucer's pilgrims, who are presented in portraiture in the "General Prologue" to The Canterbury Tales. Separate chapters are assigned to Chaucer the Poet and the Pilgrim, and the Host (Harry/Herry Bailly). Editor Rigby opens the collection with a valuable essay that, among other things, investigates the ways in which Chaucer himself can be read as one who interpreted and commented on his own late medieval England. Each chapter is replete with important information from late medieval historical sources, and the authors should be commended for writing essays that will appeal to both historians and literary scholars. Perhaps the most insightful essays are those that focus on the pilgrims (and their respective historical contexts) who do not tell tales: the Ploughman, the Yeoman, and the Five Guildsmen. This book should be required reading for anyone who teaches the "General Prologue" and The Canterbury Tales. In short, an invaluable contribution to medieval scholarship that any proper library should own. Summing Up: Essential. All academic levels/libraries.

This introduction to the Canterbury Tales is accessible to first-time readers of Chaucer and is also a significant critical study in its own right. It gives full separate readings of each tale, together with clear expositions of the historical and literary backgrounds. Using modern theoretical perspectives, the book focuses particularly on gender, political and narratological approaches. The humour in the Tales and Chaucer's gifts for story-telling and dialogue are rooted in an extraordinary perceptiveness about timeless subjects such as human vanity, class-consciousness, snobbery, rivalry, robust honesty and self-sacrificing love. This book provides both a clear guide to all aspects of the Canterbury Tales and insight into why it continues to be of importance to modern readers.

A lively microbiography of Chaucer that tells the story of the tumultuous year that led to the creation of The Canterbury Tales In 1386, Geoffrey Chaucer endured his worst year, but began his best poem. The father of English literature did not enjoy in his lifetime the literary celebrity that he has today—far from it. The middle-aged Chaucer was living in London, working as a midlevel bureaucrat and sometime poet, until a personal and professional crisis set him down the road leading to The Canterbury Tales. In the politically and economically fraught London of the late fourteenth century, Chaucer was swept up against his will in a series of disastrous events that would ultimately leave him jobless, homeless, separated from his wife, exiled from his city, and isolated in the countryside of Kent—with no more audience to hear the poetry he labored over. At the loneliest time of his life, Chaucer made the revolutionary decision to keep writing, and to write for a national audience, for posterity, and for fame. Brought expertly to life by Paul Strohm, this is the eye-opening story of the birth one of the most celebrated literary creations of the English language.

Drawing from historical and archaeological sources, as well as accounts of Chaucer's own life, this book recreates England in the age of the Canterbury Tales. It covers such topics as the science and medicine of the time.

A Companion to Medieval English Literature and Culture, c.1350-c.1500 challenges readers to think beyond a narrowly defined canon and conventional disciplinary boundaries. A ground-breaking collection of newly-commissioned essays on medieval literature and culture. Encourages students to think beyond a narrowly defined canon and conventional disciplinary boundaries. Reflects the erosion of the traditional, rigid boundary between medieval and early modern literature. Stresses the importance of constructing contexts for reading literature. Explores the extent to which medieval literature is in dialogue with other cultural products, including the literature of other countries, manuscripts and religion. Includes close readings of frequently-studied texts, including texts by Chaucer, Langland, the Gawain poet, and Hoccleve. Confronts some of the controversies that exercise students of medieval literature, such as those connected with literary theory, love, and chivalry and war.

The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer is an extensively revised version of the first edition, which has become a classic in the field. This new volume responds to the success of the first edition and to recent debates in Chaucer Studies. Important material has been updated, and new contributions have been commissioned to take into account recent trends in literary theory as well as in studies of Chaucer's works. New chapters cover the literary inheritance traceable in his works to French and Italian sources, his style, as well as new approaches to his work. Other topics covered include the social and literary scene in England in Chaucer's time, and comedy, pathos and romance in the Canterbury Tales. The volume now offers a useful chronology, and the bibliography has been entirely updated to provide an indispensable guide for today's student of Chaucer.

Examines Chaucer's literary style, describes and interprets the theories of literature, and discusses the influence of Latin, French and Italian literature throughout his career.