ENL 5216 Fall 2018 Fumo

This course is an intensive study of Geoffrey Chaucer's great story collection, the Canterbury Tales (in the original Middle English), considered in light of the literary-historical and intellectual interests of late-medieval England. Our primary goal is to explore Chaucer's artistic goals and strategies while becoming familiar with the textual and cultural conditions that shaped the early circulation of Chaucer's text.

Our concerns will include: the status of the Tales as a story collection that bears both a closural framework and a brazenly open textuality; the poet's use and abuse of his sources and influences in designing individual tales; medieval theories of authorship as they inform Chaucer's various authorial and narratorial guises; and the generic multivalence of the tales and of Chaucer's artistic design. In exploring these issues, we will reflect repeatedly on how the Tales, which Chaucer himself largely denounced-tongue quite possibly in cheek-in his "Retractions," contribute to Chaucer's status as the first canonical English vernacular author. We will read nearly all of the Tales as well as a healthy cross-section of 20th- and 21st-century criticism on them, paying attention to the work's (highly problematic) overall structure as well as the dynamic of its internal components. Instead of advocating for any one critical or methodological position, this course promotes a balanced, integrated view of various fruitful scholarly perspectives, so that seminar participants will emerge as versatile and analytically sentient readers of Chaucer. No prior experience with Middle English is expected, although learning to read and pronounce Middle English is a formal expectation of the course and will involve a collective effort. Requirements tentatively include regular, active participation in seminar; a Middle English recitation of a passage of your choice, with contextual discussion; a book review; a research proposal with annotated bibliography, and a substantial final research paper.

NOTE ON TEXTBOOK: The specific edition required for this course is Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales: Complete, ed. Larry D. Benson (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000). Alternatively, The Riverside Chaucer, ed. Larry D. Benson may be used, but no other editions are permitted. Affordable used copies of both of these editions are readily available on Amazon, so please plan ahead.