Table Of ContentChaucer's General Prologue to
the Canterbury Tales
An Annotated Bibliography 1900 - 1982
The General Prologue to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales is one of the most
enduring works of English literature. Beloved by scholars, teachers,
students, and general readers, it has been given a great many different
interpretations. This annotated, international bibliography of
twentieth-century criticism on the Prologue is an essential reference
guide. It includes books, journal articles, and dissertations, and a
descriptive list of twentieth-century editions; it is the most complete
inventory of modern criticism on the Prologue. The extensive annotations
provide uniquely convenient access to many publications that are
otherwise difficult to obtain.
In her introduction, Caroline Eckhardt provides a careful and
comprehensive overview of modern trends in criticism, trends which can
be traced through the bibliography. At the beginning of the century, for
example, Chaucer's Prologue was often described as a 'portrait gallery'
and praised for its realism — social, psychological, and dramatic. Later in
the century came emphases on irony, rhetoric, Freudian interpretations,
elaborate allegories, and stylistic complexities. At present, the Prologue is
often interpreted as a system of signs and symbols in which realism, if it
exists at all, serves purposes beyond itself. The smiling and serene poet of
the earlier period has been replaced by a self-conscious ironist, sometimes
with a split personality. The portrait gallery of the beginning of the
century is still there, though the spectator who walks along it tends to see
something less fixed textually (the Prologue is now commonly discussed as
work-in-progress) and more complicated structurally, generically, and
thematically. It is the spectator, of course, who has changed.
CAROLINE D. ECKHARDT is a professor of English and Comparative
Literature at Pennsylvania State University.
The Chaucer Bibliographies
GENERAL EDITOR
Thomas Hahn University of Rochester
ADVISORY BOARD
Derek Brewer Emmanuel College, Cambridge
Emerson Brown, jr Vanderbilt University
John Hurt Fisher University of Tennessee
David C. Fowler University of Washington
John Leyerle University of Toronto
James J. Murphy University of California, Davis
Russell A. Peck University of Rochester
Florence H.Ridley University of California, Los Angeles
Paul Ruggiers University of Oklahoma
Chaucer's
General Prologue to
the Canterbury Tales
AN ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY
1900 to 1982
Caroline D. Eckhardt
Published in association with the University of Rochester by
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Toronto Buffalo London
www.utppublishing.com
©University of Toronto Press 1990
Toronto Buffalo London
Printed in Canada
ISBN 0-8020-2592-7
Printed on acid-free paper
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Eckhardt, Caroline D., 1942-
Chaucer's General prologue to the Canterbury tales
(The Chaucer bibliographies; 3)
ISBN 0-8020-2592-7
Includes index.
1. Chaucer, Geoffrey, d. 1400. Canterbury tales.
Prologue—Bibliography. I. Title. II. Series.
Z8164.E34 1990 016.821'! C89-090531-2
For R.B.E.
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^ Contents
General Editor's Preface ix
Preface xv
Abbreviations and Master List of Periodicals xix
Introduction xxvii
1 Editions 1
2 Bibliographies, Indexes, and Other Research Tools 25
3 General Criticism and Cultural Background 35
4 Language, Metrics, and Studies of the Manuscripts or
Early Editions 169
5 The Springtime Setting, the Narrator, and the Gathering
at the Tabard (lines 1-42) 187
6 The Knight (lines 43-78) 211
7 The Squire (lines 79-100) 227
8 The Yeoman (lines 101-17) 235
9 The Prioress and her Companions (lines 118-64) 241
10 The Monk (lines 165-207) 273
11 The Friar (lines 208-69) 287
\\\\/Contents
12 The Merchant (lines 270-84) 299
13 The Clerk (lines 285-308) 305
14 The Serjeant of the Law (lines 309-30) 313
15 The Franklin (lines 331-60) 323
16 The Guildsmen (lines 361-78) 333
17 The Cook (lines 379-87) 339
18 The Shipman (lines 388-410) 343
19 The Physician (lines 411-44) 347
20 The Wife of Bath (lines 445-76) 355
21 The Parson (lines 477-528) 367
22 The Plowman (lines 529-41) 373
23 The Transition and the Miller (lines 542-66) 377
24 The Manciple (lines 567-86) 385
25 The Reeve (lines 587-622) 389
26 The Summoner (lines 623-68 and 673) 395
27 The Pardoner (lines 669-714) 407
28 The Narrator's Comments and Apology for His
Style (lines 715-46) 423
29 The Host and the Establishment of the Storytelling
Contest (lines 747-858) 427
Index 437
General Editor's Preface
The Chaucer Bibliographies will encompass, in a series of sixteen volumes, a
complete listing and assessment of scholarship and criticism on the writings
of Geoffrey Chaucer, and on his life, times, and historical context. Two
volumes — on Chaucer's lyrics and Anelida and Arctic, and on the trans-
lations, scientific works, and apocrypha — have already appeared. The
present volume, on the General Prologue, initiates work on the Canterbury
Tales. It will be followed by the Volume on the Knight's Tale, and by other
volumes on the Tales, though publication of volumes on Chaucer's other
poetry will appear in the next years as well. Each volume will center on a
particular work, or a connected group of works; most contain material on
backgrounds or related writings, and several will be topical in their cover-
age (music, visual arts, rhetoric, the life of Chaucer, and so on). Like all
bibliographical projects, the series places unswerving emphasis on accuracy
and comprehensiveness; yet the distinctive feature of the Chaucer Bibli-
ographies, as this and the earlier volumes make clear, is the fullness and
particularity of the annotations provided for each entry.
The individual volumes in the Chaucer Bibliographies series do not
therefore constitute a reference work in the ordinary sense of that term.
While they will enumerate virtually every publication on Chaucer worthy of
notice, and give complete coverage to materials from the twentieth century,
they go far beyond the usual compilation, bibliographic manual, or guide
to research. The bibliographies are not mechanical or machine-produced
lists. Each volume makes use of the intellectual engagement, learning, and
discretion of a scholar actively at work on Chaucer. The series therefore
serves not simply as the collection of all relevant titles on a subject, but as a
companion and reliable guide to the reading and study of Chaucer's poetry.
In this, the Chaucer Bibliographies represent an innovative and penetrating
access to what Chaucer means, and has meant, to his readers. The project
offers the full richness and detail of Chaucer's thought and world to a much
wider audience than these have, even after one hundred years of energetic
scholarship, ever before reached.
Description:The General Prologue to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales is one of the most enduring works of English literature. Beloved by scholars, teachers, students, and general readers, it has been given a great many different interpretations. This annotated, international bibliography of twentieth-century criticis
