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Chaucer

This course will provide students with an introduction to the writings of Geoffrey Chaucer, the Middle English language, and the culture of late fourteenth-century England. We will focus mainly on The Canterbury Tales, the second most widely disseminated vernacular poem in medieval England, and an extraordinarily sensitive register of that culture’s struggles and harmonies. As part of an emerging tradition of vernacular literature produced in the wake of a class revolt that centered around public literacy and control of the written word (the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381), the Tales are crucially concerned with issues of textual representation and reception: Why does one tell a story? What is the relation between the written and the spoken word and the worlds they represent? Why do some stories get told and not others? How do audiences shape texts? Why do people read? And as we journey along with Chaucer’s pilgrims and delight in the tales and environs of the gap-toothed Wife of Bath, the bawdy Miller, and the mouse-loving Prioress, we will use Chaucer’s own obsession with texts and their interpretations as a springboard for exploring changing notions of literacy and authorship, the social functions of poetry, and the complex relationship between poetry and history.

Attendance: Attendance and participation is expected at all class sessions.

Means of Evaluation: Grades will be based on class participation, a midterm exam, two 5-7 page essays, and a final.