The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer

Description

The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer is an extensively revised version of the first edition, which has become a classic in the field. This new volume responds to the success of the first edition and to recent debates in Chaucer Studies. Important material has been updated, and new contributions have been commissioned to take into account recent trends in literary theory as well as in studies of Chaucer's works. New chapters cover the literary inheritance traceable in his works to French and Italian sources, his style, as well as new approaches to his work. Other topics covered include the social and literary scene in England in Chaucer's time, and comedy, pathos and romance in the Canterbury Tales. The volume now offers a useful chronology, and the bibliography has been entirely updated to provide an indispensable guide for today's student of Chaucer.

Piero Boitani is Professor of Comparative Literature in the Department of English at the University of Rome 'La Sapienza'. He is the author of many volumes including The Tragic and the Sublime in Medieval Literature (Cambridge 1989), The Shadow of Ulysses. Figures of a Myth (1994) and The Bible and its Rewritings (1999). Jill Mann is Notre Dame Professor of English at the University of Notre Dame and Life Fellow of Girton College, Cambridge. She has written extensively on Geoffrey Chaucer and medieval authors including Langland, Malory and the Gawain-poet. Her most recent book is Feminizing Chaucer (2002).

'The Anglo-Italian editorial team is to be congratulated for giving new focus to what has become a classic guide to England's greatest mediaeval poet.' Contemporary Review 'The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer is appealing to both scholars and students who are already familiar with Chaucer but wish to achieve a greater understanding of this major medieval poet. The various voiced herein further dialogue with him, contribute significantly to the field of Chaucer studies, contextualize Chaucer's major works, and underscore the classical reputation of the Cambridge series.' Sixteenth Century Journal 'The first edition, sound, intelligent, and rich as it is, has been an important resource and orientation point both for students and for scholars for almost two decades ... the editors' decision to eschew an essay formula has born fruit in liveliness and originality as well as intellectual richness.' English Studies