Dr%20Jenni%20Nuttall: List of publications

A range of approaches (literary, historical, art-historical, codicological) to this mysterious but hugely significant manuscript.

This chapter outlines and illustrates various models of author–patron relationships in late medieval literary culture. It explores why Chaucer may have avoided establishing patronage relationships despite his close connections to the royal court, discussing in particular the ambivalent and perplexing representation of encounters with patrons in the Book of the Duchess and the Prologue to the Legend of Good Women. It ends by considering what consequences Chaucer's avoidance of patronage had for the forms of his literary works.

This article charts the development of the lenvoy (or envoy) in English courtly verse in the fifteenth century, looking in particular at the poetry of Hoccleve and Lydgate. It first offers a brief account of the lenvoy’s formation. Then, drawing on recent theorizations of poetry’s self–authorizing form, it argues that these authors use changed, elaborated or upgraded form to emphasize poetry’s ability to legitimate itself. It explores the role this legitimating form plays in establishing the relationship of poet and poem to patron and audience. In Lydgate’s Fall of Princes, the lenvoy moves from a work’s periphery to become a key structural element of this advice text. A concluding section traces the lenvoy’s influence as a site for self–theorization on later Lancastrian and early Tudor authors

James I’s The Kingis Quair is a hidden gem of medieval poetry, written in 1424 by a Scottish king held prisoner in England from the age of eleven until almost thirty years old. The poem narrates his capture and imprisonment, and how he fell in love one beautiful spring morning with an English noblewoman, Joan Beaufort. In a dream vision, we find out what King James learned about good and bad fortune from the goddess Minerva and from Fortune herself, and how he discovered the nature of true love. The poem was influenced by Chaucer’s dream visions, but also has its own whimsical charms. This ebook offers an accurate yet very readable prose translation of The Kingis Quair. This version of the poem in contemporary English is designed for students and for readers wishing to explore fifteenth-century poetry who might find the original Middle Scots language difficult to understand. This translation is presented stanza-by-stanza so it can be easily read alongside the original text.

‘Troilus and Criseyde’, Geoffrey Chaucer’s most substantial completed work, is a long historical romance; its famous tale of love and betrayal in the Trojan War later inspired William Shakespeare. This reader’s guide, written specifically for students of medieval literature, provides a scene-by-scene paraphrase and commentary on the whole text. Each section explains matters of meaning, interpretation, plot structure and character development, the role of the first-person narrating voice, Chaucer’s use of his source materials and elements of the poem’s style. Brief and accessible discussions of key themes and sources (for example the art of love, the holy bond of things, Fortune and Thebes) are provided in separate textboxes. An ideal starting point for studying the text, this book helps students through the initial language barrier and allows readers to enjoy and understand this medieval masterpiece.

Lancastrian authors such as Thomas Hoccleve and the authors of the anonymous works Richard the Redeless, Mum and the Sothsegger and Crowned King made creative use of languages and idioms which were in the process of escaping from the ...