Chaucer and Dissimilarity: Literary Comparisons in Chaucer and Other Late-medieval Writing"The book is the first to explore the three medieval figures of comparison, imago, similitudo, and exemplum, as a web of interrelated devices which operate at different levels in his work from the individual image through thematics and narrative structure to metapoetics. Around this core, it looks back to grammatical, rhetorical, and theological traditions of comparison, in which the extent and nature of dissimilarity prove to be generically distinctive. |
Contents
| 9 | |
| 11 | |
Traditions of Comparison and Dissimilarity | 31 |
Naming and the House of Fame | 58 |
Similes | 84 |
Patterns of Comparison in Troilus and Criseyde | 119 |
Persuasive Comparisons in Troilus and Criseyde | 145 |
The Poem as Exemplum | 170 |
Notes | 207 |
Bibliography | 225 |
Index | 235 |
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Common terms and phrases
allusions appears Arcite argues argument asserts audience Bath's Prologue Boethius Boethius's Book Canterbury Canterbury Tales character Chaucerian claim Clerk's Tale context conventional Criseyde's critical dramatic dream eagle earthly effect employs example exempla exemplary exemplum experience exploited fabliau Fame's fiction figurative force function Gawain Geffrey Geoffrey Chaucer hearer House of Fame illuminate imagery imagistic imago imply interpretation Jill Mann judgment Julius Rufinianus knight Knight's Tale known language Laud Troy Book literary lovers Manciple's Tale meaning Medieval metapoetic moral narrative narrator narrator's offers Oxford Pandarus Pandarus's paradox parison particular pattern persuasion poem poem's poetic poetry present problem reader reading reveals rhetorical romance sense sexual shift significance similarity and dissimilarity simile similitudo story Studies tension things tion topic and comparator tradition Troilus and Criseyde Troilus's truth type of comparison undermines understanding whan Wife of Bath's Windeatt women words writing
Popular passages
Page 104 - Ther nas no dore that he nolde heve of harre, 550 Or breke it, at a renning, with his heed. His berd as any sowe or fox was reed, And ther-to brood, as though it were a spade. Up-on the cop...
Page 106 - I kan namore, but of thise ilke tweye, To whom this tale sucre be or soot, Though that I tarie a yer, somtyme I moot After myn auctour tellen hire gladnesse, As wel as I have told hire hevynesse.
Page 196 - After that day we hadden never debaat. God helpe me so, I was to hym as kynde As any wyf from Denmark unto Ynde, And also trewe, and so was he to me. 825 I prey to God, that sit in magestee, So blesse his soule for his mercy deere. Now wol I seye my tale, if ye wol heere." Biholde the wordes bitwene the Somonour and the Frere The Frere lough, whan he hadde herd al this; "Now dame...
Page 55 - I crye. For hit ful depe is sonken in my mynde, With pitous hert in Englyssh to endyte This olde storie, in Latyn which I fynde...
Page 158 - To what fyn sholde I lyve and sorwen thus? How sholde a fissh withouten water dure? What is Criseyde worth, from Troilus? 766 How sholde a plaunte or lyves creature Lyve withouten his kynde noriture? For which ful ofte a by- word here I seye, That ' rooteles moot grene soone deye.
Page 73 - cast up thyn ye"! See yonder, lo, the galaxye, Which men clepeth the Milky Wey, For hit is whyt; and somme, parfey, Callen hit Watlinge Strete, That ones was y-brent with hete Whan the sonnes sone, the rede, That highte Pheton, wolde lede Algate his fader carte, and gye.