2023/24

This module allows students to read the major works of the most influential medieval poet in English alongside selections from the broader European literature that inspired him. Term 1 focuses on his early dream poems and his philosophical romance set in the Trojan War, Troilus and Criseyde. It will also introduce Chaucer’s unfinished experiment in writing a story-collection, The Legend of Good Women, and the General Prologue and manuscripts of The Canterbury Tales. Term 2 examines the range of Chaucer’s writing in The Canterbury Tales, introducing students to the important medieval genres of romance, exemplum, miracle, and fable. We will also consider Chaucer’s afterlife and some of the continuations to his work produced in Middle English and Older Scots in the century after his death.