Synopses & Reviews
This critical study of
The Canterbury Tales contains full separate readings of each tale, together with clear exposition of historical and literary background. The book approaches Chaucer through modern theoretical perspectives, focusing particularly on gender, political and narratological approaches, and it also presents critical views of Chaucer from the past. Chaucer's reputation as a bawdy humorist and proto-novelist, specializing in character, realism and irony, is re-examined in more modern and subtle terms than the traditional picture usually associated with him.
Synopsis
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.
About the Author
Helen Phillips is Senior Lecturer at the University of Glamorgan.
Table of Contents
Chaucer and
The Canterbury Tales *
The General Prologue * The Knight's Tale * The Miller's Tale * The Reeve's Tale * The Cook's Tale * The Man of Law's Tale * The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale * The Friar's and
Summoner's Tales * The Clerk's Tale * The Merchant's Tale * The Squire's and
The Franklin's Tales * The Physician's Tale * The Pardoner's Tale * The Shipman's Tale * The Prioress's Tale * Sir Thopas and
Melibee * The Monk's Tale * The Nun's Priest's Tale * The Second Nun's Tale * The Canon's Yeoman's Tale * The Manciple's Tale * The Parson's Tale