ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

University of Western Ontario

ENGLISH 214

Middle English Language and Literature

COURSE INFORMATION

Instructor                     Russell Poole

Location                      Talbot College Room 304

Meeting times              Tuesday 2-3pm and Thursday 2-4pm

Prerequisite                 English at 020-level

INSTRUCTOR INFORMATION

Email                           rpoole@uwo.ca

Office location                        University College Room 76

Phone                          661-2111 ext. 85782

Biography                    BA, MA, University of Otago; PhD University of Toronto. Taught at                                 Massey University, NZ, from 1976 until 2002. Publications on Old                                                 English and Old Icelandic; nineteenth-century fiction; development                                        of mediaeval studies.

CONTACT

Office hours are Tuesdays 3-5pm; Thursdays 4-5pm.

You are welcome to phone and (if necessary) leave voice-mail messages outside office hours; I will usually be able to attend to them on a same-day basis. Brief e-mails are also welcome. If they are sent on a normal working day within business hours I can usually attend to them within an hour or two. Please, however, do not send attachments of any kind (not even signatures) without consulting me first. Essays or other assignment work must never be submitted by attachment.

GENERIC DESCRIPTION OF THE COURSE

This course introduces students to the English language as it was written between the eleventh and the fifteenth centuries and provides a survey of the literature of the period. Students will study developments of the language during the period, largely through translating selected passages of prose and poetry.  They will also read a selection of texts, many (but not all) from the fourteenth century.

AIMS OF THIS SECTION OF THE COURSE

I hope that you will benefit from this course in Middle English in at least four ways:

1. It will give you the opportunity to practise and enhance your language-learning skills. Research shows that skills acquired in learning one language are transferable to learning another. If at some later stage you need to learn a foreign language the skills acquired in this course will help you – even though Middle English is not truly “foreign” to speakers of modern English.

2. It will help you towards a heightened awareness of modern English – useful for anyone proposing to communicate professionally in this language. Simply, you appreciate the copious resources and the subtleties of English better if you know where it has come from! Middle English (like Renaissance English) offers a particularly fine vantage-point from which to witness the enlargement and diversification of the English language.

3. It will give you the opportunity to practise and enhance your skills in research, analysis, and interpretation of literary texts. The set texts include works, such as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, Langland’s Piers Plowman, the anonymous Pearl and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and Thomas Malory’s Morte Darthur, that are acknowledged by critics as among the finest in English of any period. At the same time, this literature participated in a different social dynamic from ours and therefore used different forms and conventions. A recognition of these differences will stimulate you into a greater awareness of how literature in general functions in society and help you in your thinking about cultural studies. To foster work on cross-disciplinary lines is particularly the objective of the research-oriented essay set for Fall Term.

4. It will help you towards writing your own stories. The essay set for Winter Term is designed to enhance your awareness of medieval story-telling techniques, many of which still possess power and effectiveness nowadays.

BOOKLIST

NB: All of the following books are required. The listing below is based on the lists held by the bookstore. (You should not use this format in your essays.)

Morte d’Arthur. ISBN: 0451528166 Author: Malory   Publisher: Signet

Middle English Literature. ISBN: 0824052978 Author: Dunn   Publisher: Garland

Everyman Medieval Plays. Paperback. ISBN: 046087280X Author: Cawley   Publisher: Everyman Pb

Riverside Chaucer. ISBN: 0395290317 Author: Chaucer   Publisher: Houghton Mifflin

The following book is suggested (but not required).

Vision of Piers Plowman. ISBN: 0460875094 Author: Langland   Publisher: Everyman

READING REQUIREMENTS

You are required to read and study all texts or excerpts from texts shown below in the Course Schedule (except if otherwise notified during the year).

INTELLECTUAL HONESTY

In using any book or website towards your essays you should keep in mind University protocols on intellectual honesty. Ignorance of them is no excuse; failure to observe them can attract serious penalties. Please see the section on “Plagiarism” in the sheet “INFORMATION FOR STUDENTS” issued by the English Department.

COURSE SCHEDULE

Dates for tests and essays are shown below; quizzes will also be set, at times to be arranged.

CT = Chaucer, Canterbury Tales; DB = Dunn and Byrnes; GP = General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales; PP = Piers Plowman; SGGK = Sir Gawain and the Green Knight; MD = Malory, Morte Darthur.

ASSESSMENT: ESSAYS AND FINAL EXAMINATION

The final grade will be calculated as follows:

Short tests and quizzes                        15% (four will be set, with your best three marks to count)

October Test                           05%

Essay 1                                                20%

January Test                            05%

Essay 2                                                15%

Final Exam                              40%

EXTENSIONS

Extensions on essays or make-up tests and quizzes will not normally be possible. If, however, you can demonstrate that you are incurring personal hardship of some kind (usually because of illness, bereavement, or financial crisis) special arrangements can be made but you should initially consult the relevant academic counsellor rather than me. Please see the sheet entitled “Information for students”, issued by the English Department, for further guidance.

FINAL EXAMINATION

The exam will consist of three sections:

            1. “seen” passages for translation (10%)

            2. an “unseen” passage for translation (10%)

            3. an academic essay on a choice of literary topics (20%)

ESSAYS

Essay 1: Research Presentation

Due date: see Course Schedule. Submit your essay by the close of the business day (4.30pm).

Recommended length: 1500 words.

As early as possible in Fall Term you should identify some special interest that you have in relation to medieval English literature and culture (where “medieval” is defined as ranging from 1100 to 1500). Using one of the set texts as a “launching pad” you follow up one of its distinctive themes by considering the wider cultural context. A list of possible topics is attached below, but you may want to nominate some other topic (if so, please consult me first). Choose ONE topic only.

You should develop your topic by looking at some relevant books and websites: the appended bibliography will give you suggestions. You should do all you can to show your awareness and appreciation of recent developments in research into medieval English topics. Your task is not to argue a case or prove a point, but to come up with a solidly informative treatment.

Having done your research, decide on an “angle” of interest and present it for the information of an intelligent but non-specialist reader. The style of an informed magazine article or other media presentation (say an item on the Discovery or History channel) would be at about the right level. Add references on a separate page for my information (keyed to the main text by end-note numbers). You will need an introduction that motivates the reader to continue and a conclusion that rounds things off and (preferably) links back to your introduction. Study a few quality magazine articles if you are unsure of these standard techniques. Be sure to choose a catchy title.

The paragraphing, grammar, spelling, and other “mechanical” aspects should be accurate. Consult a manual on essay writing if in doubt. (I recommend Clanchy and Ballard, Essay Writing for Students. A Practical Guide, Melbourne: Longman, 2nd+ edition but you may substitute other such texts.)

The print-out or handwritten version must be tidy, with room in the margins for me to comment: 1.5 spacing is a good idea. Definitely one side of the page only and no printer glitches. Copy that doesn’t meet these standards will be returned for an upgrade before any mark can be assigned.

Submission of essays must happen via the English Department office – not to me personally.

Choose one of the following topics:

1. The General Prologue in relation to medieval pilgrimages.

2. The Miller’s Tale in relation to medieval student life and town versus gown disputes.

3. The play Noah’s Flood  in relation to medieval shipbuilding.

4. The Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale in relation to medieval clothing and/or the garment industry.

5. Malory’s Morte Darthur in relation to medieval knights and chivalry.

6. The Pardoner’s Tale in relation to medieval plagues and/or hospitals.

7. The Prologue to Piers Plowman in relation to medieval theories about dreams.

8. The Second Shepherds’ Pageant  in relation to medieval farming.

Essay 2: Practice in Narrative Technique

Due date: See Course Schedule. Submit your essay by the close of the business day (4.30pm).

Recommended length: 1000 words.

Choose one of the following possibilities:

1.                  Re-tell the Fable of the Fox and the Grapes in the style Chaucer uses in the Nun’s Priest’s Tale. Your first task will be to locate this Fable in its basic version (try searching the Web on “Aesop, fables”) and consider very carefully what its possibilities are for full Chaucerian treatment. You should amplify the basic narrative with descriptions, characterisations, rhetorical devices, and references to science and/or philosophy and/or theology (these can be modern references if you choose).

2.                  Re-tell the story of Little Red Riding Hood (also available on the Web) so that it forms the main illustration in a sermon after the style of Chaucer’s Pardoner’s Tale. Decide what sin it exemplifies best! You should try to emulate the typically loose logic and extravagant rhetorical devices seen in that Tale, as also the Pardoner’s methods of analysing and condemning sins. Add other briefer supporting examples and illustrations where possible, perhaps from modern public and political life.

3.                  Re-tell the Marriage of Cana (from the Gospel according to St John chapter 2: see below for text from Vulgate Bible) after the style of the plays set for this course. Obviously you need to bring out the theological message of the story. At the same time, however, you must try (without irreverence) to incorporate a comic/humorous/farcical element: for instance, you could devise a squabble between the bride’s family and the groom’s family concerning the shortfall in alcohol supplies before Christ performs his miracle. The treatment should be in dialogue format, with occasional stage directions.

4.                  Re-tell either the story of the Battle of Bannockburn (available at http://www.braveheart.co.uk/macbrave/history/bruce/banseq.htm)
or the story of the death of Joan of Arc (available at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/nider-stjoan1.html )
within a dream framework. Watch for opportunities to blend reality and fantasy and to create links between the frame and the inset story.

Your re-telling should be written in modern English prose. While I would not absolutely outlaw a verse treatment, it is likely to lead to forcing of the style, vocabulary, and narrative logic unless you are experienced in this medium.

Appendix: Text of Marriage of Cana from the Douay Bible

2:1. And the third day, there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee: and the mother of Jesus was there. 2:2. And Jesus also was invited, and his disciples, to the marriage. 2:3. And the wine failing, the mother of Jesus saith to him: They have no wine. 2:4. And Jesus saith to her: Woman, what is that to me and to thee? My hour is not yet come. 2:5. His mother saith to the waiters: Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye. 2:6. Now there were set there six waterpots of stone, according to the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three measures apiece. 2:7. Jesus saith to them: Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim. 2:8. And Jesus saith to them: Draw out now and carry to the chief steward of the feast. And they carried it. 2:9. And when the chief steward had tasted the water made wine and knew not whence it was, but the waiters knew who had drawn the water: the chief steward calleth the bridegroom, 2:10. And saith to him: Every man at first setteth forth good wine, and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse. But thou hast kept the good wine until now. 2:11. This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The following lists are given merely as a pointer to the huge resources available. You are not expected to read your way through these lists but they may come in handy when you are searching for guidance towards the essays and exam preparation.

GENERAL

Burrow, J. A. Ricardian Poetry: Chaucer, Gower, Langland and the “Gawain” poet. London: Routledge, 1971.

Green, Richard Firth. Literature and Law in Ricardian England. A crisis of truth. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1999.

Aers, David, and Lynn Staley. The Powers of the Holy: Religion, Politics, and Gender in Late Medieval English Culture. University Park: Pennsylvania State UP, 1996.

Hieatt, Constance. The Realism of Dream Vision: The Poetic Exploitation of the Dream Experience in Chaucer and His Contemporaries. Hague: Moulton, 1967.

Lawton, David, ed. Middle English Alliterative Poetry and its Literary Background. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1982.

Levy, B.S., and Paul Szarmach, edd., The Alliterative Tradition in the Fourteenth Century. Kent, OH: Ohio UP, 1981.

Spearing, A.C. Medieval Dream Poetry. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1976.

Strohm, Paul. Hochon’s Arrow: The Social Imagination of Fourteenth-Century Texts. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1992.

Aers, David. Community, Gender, and Individual Identity: English Writing 1360-1430. New York: Routledge, 1988.

Turville-Petre, Thorlac. The Alliterative Revival. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1977.

Hanawalt, Barbara, ed. Chaucer’s England: Literature in historical context. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1992.

Chambers, E.K. Malory and Fifteenth-Century Drama, Lyrics, and Ballads. Oxford History of English Literature, 3. Oxford: Clarendon, 1990.

CHAUCER

Other editions and manuscript reproductions

Kolve, V.A., and Glending Olson, edd. The Canterbury tales: nine tales and the General Prologue: authoritative text, sources and backgrounds, criticism. New York: Norton, 1989.

Blake, N.F., ed. Geoffrey Chaucer. The Canterbury Tales. [From the Hengwrt manuscript.] London: Arnold, 1980.

Robinson, F.N., ed. Works of Geoffrey Chaucer. London: Oxford UP, [1957].

Ruggiers, Paul G., Donald C. Baker, A.I. Doyle, and M.B. Parkes, edd. The Canterbury Tales: a facsimile and transcription of the Hengwrt manuscript with variants from the Ellesmere manuscript. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1979.

The Ellesmere Chaucer reproduced in facsimile. Ann Arbor, MI: U Microfilms, 1979.

Editions of individual Canterbury Tales

Winny, James, ed. The General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales. London: Cambridge UP, 1979.

Schmidt, A. V. C., ed. The General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales and the Canon’s Yeoman’s Prologue and Tale. London: U of London P, 1974.

Ross, Thomas W., ed. The Miller’s Tale. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1983.

Cigman, Gloria, ed. The Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale and The Clerk’s Prologue and Tale from the Canterbury Tales. London: U of London P, 1975.

Wynne-Davies, Marion, ed. The Tales of the Clerk and The Wife of Bath. London: Routledge, 1992.

Spearing, A.C., ed. The Franklin’s Prologue and Tale from the Canterbury Tales. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1966.

Morgan, Gerald, ed. The Franklin’s Tale from the Canterbury Tales. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1980.

Coghill, Nevill, and Christopher Tolkien, ed. The Pardoner’s Tale. London: Harrap, 1958.

Pearsall, Derek, ed. The Nun’s Priest’s Tale. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1983.

Background and literary parallels

Boitani, Piero and Jill Mann, edd. The Cambridge Chaucer Companion. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1986.

Pearsall, Derek. The Life of Geoffrey Chaucer: a critical biography. Oxford: Blackwell, 1992.

Benson, Larry D., and Theodore M. Andersson. The Literary Context of Chaucer’s Fabliaux: texts and translations. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1971.

Rowland, Beryl. Blind Beasts: Chaucer’s animal world. Kent, OH: Kent State UP, 1971.

Miller, Robert P., ed. Chaucer: sources and backgrounds. New York: Oxford UP, 1977.

Mann, Jill. Chaucer and Medieval Estates Satire: the literature of social classes and the General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales. London: Cambridge UP, 1973.

Elliott, Ralph W.V. Chaucer’s English. London: Deutsch, 1974.

Criticism

Bronson, Bertrand H. In Search of Chaucer. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1960.

Brewer, Derek. Chaucer and his World. Woodbridge: Brewer, 1992.

Brewer, Derek. Chaucer: the poet as storyteller. London: Macmillan, 1984.

Brewer, Derek. A New Introduction to Chaucer. London: Longman, 1998.

Aers, David. Chaucer. London: Harvester, 1986.

Patterson, Lee. Chaucer and the Subject of History. London: Routledge, 1991.

Mann, Jill. Geoffrey Chaucer. Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities P International, 1991.

Jordan, Robert M. Chaucer and the Shape of Creation: the aesthetic possibilities of inorganic structure. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1967.

David, Alfred. The Strumpet Muse: art and morals in Chaucer’s poetry. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1976.

Kolve, V.A. Chaucer and the Imagery of Narrative: the first five Canterbury tales. Stanford, CA: Stanford UP, 1984.

Pearsall, Derek. The Canterbury Tales. London: Allen and Unwin, 1985.

Howard, Donald R. Chaucer and the Medieval World. London: Weidenfeld, 1987.

Richmond, Velma Bourgeois. Geoffrey Chaucer. New York: Continuum, 1992.

Donaldson, E. Talbot. Speaking of Chaucer. London: Athlone P, 1970.

Knight, Stephen. The Poetry of the Canterbury Tales. Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1973.

Lawler, Traugott. The One and the Many in the Canterbury Tales. Hamden, CT: Archon, 1980.

PLAYS

Brown, John Russell. The Complete Plays of the Wakefield Master: in a new version for reading and performance. London: Heinemann, 1983.

Stevens, Martin, and A.C. Cawley, ed. The Towneley Plays. Oxford: Early English Text Society, 1994. 13-14, vols. 1 and 2.

Rose, Martial, ed. The Wakefield Mystery Plays. New York: Norton, 1969.

Cawley, A.C., ed. The Wakefield Pageants in the Towneley Cycle. Manchester: Manchester UP, 1958.

Kolve, V. A. The Play Called Corpus Christi. London: Edward Arnold, 1966.

Hindley, Alan, ed. Drama and Community: people and plays in medieval Europe. Turnhout: Brepols, 1999.

Young, Karl. The Drama of the Medieval Church. Oxford: Clarendon, 1933.

Happé, Peter. English Drama before Shakespeare. London; New York: Longman, 1999.

Axton, Richard. European Drama of the Early Middle Ages. London: Hutchinson, 1974.

Harris, John Wesley. Medieval Theatre in Context: an introduction. London/New York: Routledge, 1992.

Hillman, Richard. Self-speaking in Medieval and Early Modern English drama : subjectivity, discourse, and the stage. New York: St. Martin’s P, 1997.

SIR GAWAIN AND THE GREEN KNIGHT

Tolkien, J. R. R., and E. V. Gordon, edd. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Oxford: Clarendon, 1967, 1955

Barron, W. R. J., ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Manchester: Manchester UP; New York: Barnes and Noble, 1974.

Waldron, R. A., ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. London: Edward Arnold, 1970.

Blanch, Robert J., ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: a reference guide. Troy, NY: Whitston, 1983.

Borroff, Marie. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight; a stylistic and metrical study. Hamden, CN: Archon Books, 1973.

Stainsby, Meg, ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: an annotated bibliography 1978-1989. New York: Garland, 1992.

Tolkien, J.R.R., trans, and Christopher Tolkien, ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo. London: Unwin, 1979.

Anderson, J.J., ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight; Pearl; Cleanness; Patience. London: Dent; Vermont: Tuttle, 1996.

Brewer, Elisabeth, ed. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: sources and analogues. Woodbridge/Rochester, NY: Brewer, 1992.

Brewer, Derek, and Jonathan Gibson, edd. A Companion to the “Gawain”-Poet. Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 1997.

Putter, Ad. An Introduction to the Gawain Poet. Longman Medieval and Renaissance Library Series. London: Longman, 1997.

Blanch, Robert J., and Julian N. Wasserman. From Pearl to Gawain: Forme to Fynisment. Gainesville, FL: UP of Florida, 1995.

Stanbury, Sarah. Seeing the Gawain-Poet: Description of the Act of Perception. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1991.

PEARL

Check with SGGK titles above and see also:

Prior, Sandra Pierson. The Pearl Poet Revisited. New York: Twayne, 1994.

Prior, Sandra Pierson. The Fayre Formez of the Pearl Poet. Medieval Texts and Studies, 18. East Lansing, MI: Michigan State UP, 1996.

Bishop, Ian. Pearl in its Setting. Oxford: Blackwell, 1968.

Blanch, R. J., Julian N. Wasserman, and Miriam Youngerman Miller, edd. Text and Matter: New Critical Perspectives of the Pearl-Poet. Troy, NY: Whitston, 1991.

Borroff, Marie. Pearl: A New Verse Translation. New York: Norton, 1977.

Glasscoe, Marion, ed. Medieval Mystical Tradition in England. Cambridge: Brewer, 1984.

Kean, P. M. The Pearl: An Interpretation. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1967.

Marti, Kevin. Body, Heart, and Text in the Pearl-Poet. Lewiston, NY: Mellen, 1991.

Moorman, Charles. The Pearl-Poet. New York: Twayne, 1968.

MORTE DARTHUR

Vinaver, Eugene, ed. Malory: Works. New York: Oxford UP, 1966.

Waite, A. E. The Holy Grail: The Galahad Quest in the Arthurian Literature. New York: University Books, 196l.

Moorman, Charles, ed. The Book of Kyng Arthur: The Unity of Malory’s Morte Darthur. Lexington: U of Kentucky P, 1965.

Lumiansky. R. M., ed. Malory’s Originality: A Critical Study of Le Morte Darthur. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1964.

Matthews, William. The Ill-Framed Knight: A Skeptical Inquiry into the Identity of Sir Thomas Malory. Berkeley: U of California P, 1966.

Bennett, J. A. W., ed. Essays on Malory. Oxford: Clarendon, 1963.

Archibald, Elizabeth and A. S. G. Edwards, edd. A Companion to Malory. Arthurian Studies, 37. Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 1996.

Field, P. J. C. The Life and Times of Sir Thomas Malory. Arthurian Studies, 29. Cambridge: Brewer, 1993.

Hanks, Thomas D. Sir Thomas Malory: Views and Re-Views. AMS Studies in the Middle Ages, 19. New York: AMS, 1992.

Kennedy, Beverly. Knighthood in the Morte Darthur. Arthurian Studies, 11. Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 1992.

Lacy, Norris J, Geoffrey Ashe, and Debra N. Mancoff. The Arthurian Handbook. Garland Reference Library of Humanities, 1920. New York: Garland, 1997.

Lynch, Andrew. Malory’s Book of Arms: The Narrative of Combat in Le Morte Darthur. Arthurian Studies, 39. Cambridge: Brewer, 1997.

McCarthy, Terence. An Introduction to Malory: Reading the Morte Darthur. Arthurian Studies, 20. Cambridge: Brewer, 1991.

Parins, Marylyn, ed. Sir Thomas Malory: The Critical Heritage. The Collected Critical Heritage: Medieval Romance. London: Routledge, 1995.

Elizabeth Edwards, The Genesis of Narrative in Malory’s Morte Darthur. Arthurian Studies. Cambridge: Brewer, 2000.

PIERS PLOWMAN

Schmidt, A. V. C., ed. The Vision of Piers Plowman: A Critical Edition of the B- Text. 2nd ed. Rutland, Vt.: Everyman, 1995.

Pearsall, Derek, ed. Piers Plowman by William Langland: An Edition of the C-Text. Berkeley and Los Angeles: U of California P, 1978.

Kane, George, and E. Talbot Donaldson, edd. Piers Plowman: The B-Version. 2nd edn. London and Los Angeles: U of California P, 1988.

Schmidt, A.V.C., ed. Piers Plowman. A Parallel-Text Edition of the A, B, C and Z Versions. London: Longman, 1995.

Schmidt, A.V.C. The Clerkly Maker: Langland’s Poetic Art. Cambridge: Brewer, 1987.

Justice, Steven. Writing and Rebellion: England in 1381. Berkeley and Los Angeles: U of California P, 1994.

Scase, Wendy. “Piers Plowman” and the New Anticlericalism. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989.

Kerby-Fulton, Kathryn. Reformist Apocalypticism and “Piers Plowman”. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1990.

Burrow, John. Langland’s Fictions. Oxford: Clarendon, 1993.

Frank, Jr., Robert Worth. “Piers Plowman” and the Scheme of Salvation. New Haven: Yale UP, 1957.

Harwood, Britton J. Piers Plowman and the Problem of Belief. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1992.

Kaulbach, Ernest. Imaginative Prophecy in the B-Text of Piers Plowman. Cambridge: Brewer, 1993.

Tavormina, M. Teresa. Kindly Similitude: Marriage and Family in Piers Plowman. Piers Plowman Studies, 11. Cambridge: Brewer, 1995.

Bloomfield, Morton W. “Piers Plowman” as a Fourteenth-Century Apocalypse. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1961.

Aers, David. Piers Plowman and Christian Allegory. London: Arnold, 1975.

Stokes, Myra. Justice and Mercy in Piers Plowman. A Reading of the B Text Visio. London: Croom Helm, 1984.

Alford, John A., ed. A Companion to “Piers Plowman”. Berkeley and Los Angeles: U of California P, 1988.

Davlin, Mary Clemente. A Game of Heuene: Word Play and the Meaning of “Piers Plowman” B. Cambridge: Brewer, 1989.

Rudd, Gillian. Managing Language in Piers Plowman. Piers Plowman Studies, 9. Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 1994.

Justice, Steven, and Kathryn Kerby-Fulton, edd. Written Work: Langland, Labor, and Authorship. Middle Ages Series. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1997.

Duboulay, F.R.H. The England of “Piers Plowman”: William Langland and his Vision of the Fourteenth Century. Cambridge: Boydell and Brewer, 1991.

Hussey, S. S., ed.  “Piers Plowman”: Critical Approaches. London: Methuen, 1969.

Wittig, Joseph S. William Langland Revisited. Twayne’s English Author Series, 537.
New York: Twayne, 1997.

Hanna, Ralph III, Piers Plowman. Aldershot: Variorum, 1993.

SIR ORFEO

See http://icg.harvard.edu/~chaucer/bibliography/ for periodical articles and chapters in books.

KING HORN

See http://icg.harvard.edu/~chaucer/bibliography/ for periodical articles and chapters in books.

WEBSITES

Remember that in accordance with the requirements of intellectual honesty any information you take from websites must be credited to the site where you found it.

The New Chaucer Society, with links to other Chaucer sites.

http://ncs.rutgers.edu/

The Langland Home Page, with many Langland links.

http://dept.english.upenn.edu:80/~lwarner/piers.html/

Hypertext edition of Piers Plowman: The Piers Plowman Electronic Archive.  http://www.iath.virginia.edu/piers/archive

Copyright (c) 1994 by Hoyt N. Duggan, all rights reserved. (Note the copyright regulations posted on the site.)

Medieval English Literature links from The Voice of the Shuttle.

http://vos.ucsb.edu/index-netscape.asp

The Labyrinth: a remarkably comprehensive index to medieval sources on the Web.

http://www.georgetown.edu/labyrinth/

ORB: the Online Reference Book for medieval studies contains lots of articles: be sure to cite them fully if you use them.

http://orb.rhodes.edu/

Derek Pearsall’s Thirty Year Working Bibliography is particularly helpful on periodical literature (not covered in the lists above).

http://icg.harvard.edu/~chaucer/bibliography/

The Lollard Society: see especially the links page, which has information on much more than just Lollards.

http://home.att.net/~lollard/home.html