Fall Semester 2009.
Studies in Chaucer
Wed / Fri 15:00
This course introduces some of Chaucer's works, especially the Canterbury Tales. All the lectures and reports will be in English.
Week 1 Introduction to the development of European Literature of
the Middle Ages (Korean version)
Week 2 Dante,
Boccaccio, Petrarch, Chaucer
Week 3 Boethius Consolation of Philosophy and the notion of Fortune
Week 4 Troilus
and Criseyde Books 1-2, Book 3
Week 5 [No class Friday, Chuseok] Troilus and
Criseyde Books 4 -5
Week 6 The Knight’s Tale (Abbreviated
text for class) (Abbreviated text in PDF format for printing.)
Week 7 The Knight’s
Tale continued
Week 8 Mid-term
Exams
Week 9 The
General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales (Text with
notes) (General Introduction) (Extracts
in modernized spelling PDF File for printing)
Week 10 The Miller’s Tale (Text)
(General Introduction) PDF file for printing
Week 11 The Nun's
Priest's Tale (Text) (Article)
(General Introduction) PDF file for printing
Week 12 The
Wife of Bath : Prologue and Tale
(General Introduction) (Texts in modern spelling) PDF file for printing Romance of the Rose
Week 13 The Wife of Bath continued
Week 14 The
Pardoner's Introduction, Prologue
and Tale (General Introduction) Texts in modern spelling PDF file for printing Read my
article (also in Korean)
Week 15 The Pardoner continued Retraction
Week 16 Exams
Textbooks
For the English
text of the Canterbury Tales: Brother Anthony and Lee Dong-Chun, Textual
Criticism of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (SNU Press) This contains the text,
together with introductions and notes in Korean. Short versions of Troilus and Criseyde and the Knight's
Tale can be printed out using the links in the syllabus on Br Anthony’s home page.
Brother
Anthony's Literature in English Society Part 1: The Middle Ages (Sogang
University Press) gives more background to the course.
Assignments
For the Midterm
Evaluation, each student will write a report comparing the ways the
themes of Fortune, gain and loss of happiness, and love are treated in Troilus and Criseyde and the Knight's Tale
(due on the Tuesday after the exams).
Each student
will prepare a final report of some length (due on December 21), discussing the narratorial strategies and the
different varieties of “story-telling” found in the Miller's Tale, the Nun's Priest's Tale, the Wife of Bath's
Prologue & Tale and the Pardoner's Prologue and Tale. Discuss the
relationship of Teller and Tale in each case.
Evaluation
In addition to the above assignments, there will be a midterm and a
final examination. Each exam and report will be of equal importance
More Links
My home page's Introduction to Chaucer My Chaucer links. Medieval links.
Jane Zatta's 14th-century History
The Cambridge Troilus picture. The Caxton editions.
The Knight's Tale Read my
article
The General Prologue to the Canterbury
Tales
(Edwin Duncan's online text)
Images from Ellesmere. Images from several Mss.
The Nun's Priest's Tale Marie de France's Fable Read my
article then read my other article.
The Nun's Tale Read my
article
* The influence of Boethius (Consolation of Philosophy) and
the question of destiny and human freedom in the Knight's Tale. The
way in which the pre-Christian setting affects our reading.
* The social and individual (moral) aspects of the portraits in the
General
Prologue. The ways in which the narrator influences (and does not influence)
readers' responses to the various pilgrims.
* The contrast between the idealized love of the Knight's Tale
and the frankly physical desire of the Miller's Tale.
* The confusing rhetoric of the Nun's Priest's Tale and
the question of how an audience is to find the 'moral / meaning' of a story.
* The anti-feminist attitude to women expressed in (or challenged in)
the Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale.
* The relationship between the Christian message and the people working
in and for the Church in the General Prologue and the Pardoner's
Prologue / Tale