The Making of Chaucer's English

The Making of Chaucer's English

Author: Christopher Cannon

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13: 9780521592741

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A substantial reappraisal of the place of Chaucer's English in the history of English language and literature.


The Making of Middle English, 1765-1910

The Making of Middle English, 1765-1910

Author: David Matthews

Publisher: U of Minnesota Press

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 9780816631858

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Before the 1760s -- with the major exception of Chaucer -- nearly all of Middle English literature lay undiscovered and ignored. Because established scholars regarded later medieval literature as primitive and barbaric, the study of this rich literary heritage was relegated to antiquarians and dilettantes. In The Making of Middle English, 1765-1910, David Matthews chronicles the gradual rediscovery of this literature and the formation of Middle English as a scholarly pursuit. Matthews details how the careers, class positions, and ambitions of only a few men gave shape and direction to the discipline. Mostly from the lower middle class, they worked in the church or in law and hoped to exploit medieval literature for financial success and social advancement. Where Middle English was concerned, Matthews notes, these scholars were self-taught, and their amateurism came at the price of inaccurately edited and often deliberately "improved" texts intended for a general public that sought appealing, rather than authentic, reading material. This study emphasizes the material history of the discipline, examining individual books and analyzing introductions, notes, glossaries, promotional materials, lists of subscribers, and owners' annotations to assess the changing methodological approaches of the scholars and the shifts in readership. Matthews explores the influence of aristocratic patronage and the societies formed to further the editing and publication of texts. And he examines the ideological uses of Middle English and the often contentious debates between these scholars and organizations about the definition of Englishness itself. A thorough work of scholarship, The Making of MiddleEnglish presents for the first time a detailed account of the formative phase of Middle English studies and provides new perspectives on the emergence of medieval studies, canon formation, the politics of editing, and the history of the book.


The Language of the Chaucer Tradition

The Language of the Chaucer Tradition

Author: Simon Horobin

Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 9780859917803

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A study of the language of Chaucerian manuscripts, printed editions and Chaucer's 15th century followers. Winner of the 2005 Beatrice White Prize for outstanding scholarly work in the field of English literature before 1590 The manuscript copies of Chaucer's works preserve valuable information concerning Chaucer's linguistic practices and the ways in which scribes responded to these. This book draws on recent developments in Middle English dialectology, textual criticism and the application of computers to manuscript studies to assess the evidence Chaucerian manuscripts provide for reconstructing Chaucer's own language and his linguistic environment. This book considershow scribes, editors and Chaucerian poets transmitted and updated Chaucer's language and the implications of this for our understanding of Chaucerian book production and reception, and the processes of linguistic change in the fifteenth century. Winner of the 2005 Beatrice White Prize for outstanding scholarly work in the field of English literature before 1590 SIMON HOROBIN lectures on English language at the University of Glasgow.


Chaucer and the Making of English Poetry, Volume 1

Chaucer and the Making of English Poetry, Volume 1

Author: P. M. Kean

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-09-23

Total Pages: 220

ISBN-13: 1000681327

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Originally published in 1972. This important work of Chaucerian scholarship deals with two aspects of the poet and his work - his individual achievement and his place in history - and demonstrates that in both these senses Chaucer is a maker of English poetry. The author assesses the extent of Chaucer’s debt to the English tradition. She considers the development of his ‘urbane’ manner as a new poetic technique and, with reference to such poems as the Parlement of Foules and the House of Fame, discusses new themes in the Love Vision. She concludes with a detailed study of Chaucer’s great debate on love Troilus and Criseyde.


The Language of Chaucer

The Language of Chaucer

Author: J. D. Burnley

Publisher:

Published: 1989

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13:

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In this book David Burnley demonstrates that an understanding of Chaucer's social, cultural, and literary world is vital to our understanding of his language and meaning. The first part of the book, drawing on modern linguistics, concentrates on the text and on approaches to interpreting the poet's grammar and syntax. The second part treats Chaucer's language and vocabulary in its broader contemporary context, dealing with language use, style and variety.


The Making of Felony Procedure in Middle English Literature

The Making of Felony Procedure in Middle English Literature

Author: Elise Wang

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2024-04-23

Total Pages: 193

ISBN-13: 0192698249

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The Making of Felony Procedure in Middle English Literature explores the literary inheritance of criminal procedure in thirteenth to fifteenth century English law, focusing on felony, the gravest common law offense. Most scholarship in medieval law and literature has focused on statute and theory, drawing from the instantiating texts of English law: acts of Parliament, judicial treatises, the Magna Carta. But those whose job it was to write about the law rarely wrote about felony. Its definition was left to its practice--from investigation to conviction--and that procedure fell to local communities who were generally untrained in the law. Left with many practical and ethical questions and few legal answers, they turned to cultural ones, archived in sermons they had heard, plays they had seen, and poetry they knew. This book reads the documents of criminal procedure--coroners' reports, plea rolls, and gaol delivery records--alongside literary scenes of investigation, interrogation, and witnessing to tell a new intellectual history of criminal procedure's beginnings. The chapters of The Making of Felony Procedure guide the reader through the steps of a felony prosecution, from act to conviction, examining the questions local communities faced at each step. What evidence should be prioritized in a death investigation? Should the accused consider narrative satisfaction when building his plea? What are the dangers of a witnessing system that depends so heavily on a few "oathworthy" men? What can a jury do if the accused's guilt seems partial or complex? And what if the defendant-for whatever reason--refuses to participate in this new, still--delicate system of justice? The book argues that answers they found, and the sources that informed them, created the system that became modern criminal procedure. The epilogue offers some thoughts about the resilience and incoherence of the concept of felony, from the start of the jury trial to the present day.


Opening Up Middle English Manuscripts

Opening Up Middle English Manuscripts

Author: Kathryn Kerby-Fulton

Publisher:

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780801478307

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This deeply informed and lavishly illustrated book is a comprehensive introduction to the modern study of Middle English manuscripts. It is intended for students and scholars who are familiar with some of the major Middle English literary works, such as The Canterbury Tales, Gawain and the Green Knight, Piers Plowman, and the romances, mystical works or cycle plays, but who may not know much about the surviving manuscripts. The book approaches these texts in a way that takes into account the whole manuscript or codex--its textual and visual contents, physical state, readership, and cultural history. Opening Up Middle English Manuscripts also explores the function of illustrations in fashioning audience response to particular authors and their texts over the course of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuriesKathryn Kerby-Fulton, Linda Olson, and Maidie Hilmo--scholars at the forefront of the modern study of Middle English manuscripts--focus on the writers most often taught in Middle English courses, including Geoffrey Chaucer, William Langland, the Gawain Poet, Thomas Hoccleve, Julian of Norwich, and Margery Kempe, highlighting the specific issues that shaped literary production in late medieval England. Among the topics they address are the rise of the English language, literacy, social conditions of authorship, early instances of the "Alliterative Revival," women and book production, nuns' libraries, patronage, household books, religious and political trends, and attempts at revisionism and censorship. Inspired by the highly successful study of Latin manuscripts by Raymond Clemens and Timothy Graham, Introduction to Manuscript Studies (also published by Cornell), this book demonstrates how the field of Middle English manuscript studies, with its own unique literary and artistic environment, is changing modern approaches to the culture of the book.


Middle English Literature

Middle English Literature

Author: Roger Dalrymple

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2008-04-15

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 047075544X

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Middle English is a student guide to the most influential critical writing on Middle English literature. A student guide to the most influential critical writing on Middle English literature. Brings together extracts from some of the major authorities in the field. Introduces readers to different critical approaches to key Middle English texts. Treats a wide range of Middle English texts, including The Owl and the Nightingale, The Canterbury Tales and Morte d’Arthur. Organized around key critical concerns, such as authorship, genre, and textual form. Each critical concern can be used as the basis for one week’s work in a semester-long course. Enables readers to forge new connections between different approaches.