Synopses & Reviews
The Wife of Bath is the most vibrant character in
The Canterbury Talesandmdash;and arguably the most famous. In creating his brilliant portrayal of the talkative wife, Chaucer weaves a dazzling array of allusions to biblical, classical, patristic, and vernacular sources. These two volumesandmdash;the most recent contribution to the Variorum Chaucer seriesandmdash;integrate six hundred years of scholarship on
The Wife of Bathandrsquo;s Prologue and Tale.Editors Mark Allen and John H. Fisher present a comprehensive record of the textual traditions of the tale and of the critical commentary from the earliest manuscripts to the mid-1990s. Part A (the first volume) includes the text of Chaucerandrsquo;s poem, accompanied by exhaustive collation of the ten most valuable manuscript witnesses to the text and all twenty-two of the major editions. Also included in Part A are an introduction to the text, and extensive discussions of sources and analogues, genres, theoretical approaches, and major themes. A bibliographical index concludes the scholarly apparatus in Part A. In Part B (the second volume), the editors present a line-by-line, often word-by-word, record of the legacy of Chaucerandrsquo;s text, including variants, glosses, editorsandrsquo; notes, and observations by scholars through the ages.
Synopsis
The Wife of Bath is the most vibrant character in The Canterbury Talesandmdash;and arguably the most famous. In creating his brilliant portrayal of the talkative wife, Chaucer weaves a dazzling array of allusions to biblical, classical, patristic, and vernacular sources. These two volumesandmdash;the most recent contribution to the Variorum Chaucer seriesandmdash;integrate six hundred years of scholarship on The Wife of Bathandrsquo;s Prologue and Tale. Editors Mark Allen and John H. Fisher present a comprehensive record of the textual traditions of the tale and of the critical commentary from the earliest manuscripts to the mid-1990s.
About the Author
Mark Allen is Professor of English at the University of Texas at San Antonio. He is the author of various publications in medieval studies, and he serves as the bibliographer for the New Chaucer Society.John H. Fisherand#160;was Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Tennessee. A renowned medievalist and authority on the development of standard English, heand#160;was the author of The Importance of Chaucer and John Gower: Moral Philosopher and Friend of Chaucer, among other works. Mark E. Allen and Fisherand#160;were coeditors of The Complete Poetry and Prose of Geoffrey Chaucer and The Complete Canterbury Tales of Geoffrey Chaucer; and coauthors of The Essential Chaucer: An Annotated Bibliography of Major Modern Studies.