The concept of kingship was a major preoccupation for the Ricardian poets, as this full treatment shows.

The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower reviews the most current scholarship on the late medieval poet and opens doors purposefully to research areas of the future. It is divided into three parts. The first part, "Working theories: medieval and modern," is devoted to the main theoretical aspects that frame Gower’s work, ranging from his use of medieval law, rhetoric, theology, and religious attitudes, to approaches incorporating gender and queer studies. The second part, "Things and places: material cultures," examines the cultural locations of the author, not only from geographical and political perspectives, or in scientific and economic context, but also in the transmission of his poetry through the materiality of the text and its reception. "Polyvocality: text and language," the third part, focuses on Gower’s trilingualism, his approach to history, and narratological and intertextual aspects of his works. The Routledge Research Companion to John Gower is an essential resource for scholars and students of Gower and of Middle English literature, history, and culture generally.

In a culture as steeped in communal, scripted acts of prayer as Chaucer's England, a written prayer asks not only to be read, but to be inhabited: its "I" marks a space that readers are invited to occupy. This book examines the implications of accepting that invitation when reading Chaucer's poetry. Both in his often-overlooked pious writings and in his ambitious, innovative pagan narratives, the "I" of prayer provides readers with a subject-position thatcan be at once devotional and literary - a stance before a deity and a stance in relation to a poem. Chaucer uses this uniquely open, participatory "I" to implicate readers in his poetry and to guide their work of reading. In examining Christian and pagan prayers alongside each other, Chaucer's Prayers cuts across an assumed division between the "religious" and "secular" writings within Chaucer's corpus. Rather, it emphasizes continuities andapproaches prayer as part of Chaucer's broader experimentation with literary voice. It also places Chaucer in his devotional context and foregrounds how pious practices intersect with and shape his poetic practices. These insightschallenge a received view of Chaucer as an essentially secular poet and shed new light on his poetry's relationship to religion.

Fama, or fame, is a central concern of late medieval literature. Where fame came from, who deserved it, whether it was desirable, how it was acquired and kept were significant inquiries for a culture that relied extensively on personal credit and reputation. An interest in fame was not new, being inherited from the classical world, but was renewed and rethought within the vernacular revolutions of the later Middle Ages. The work of Geoffrey Chaucer shows a preoccupation with ideas on the subject of fama, not only those received from the classical world but also those of his near contemporaries; via an engagement with their texts, he aimed to negotiate a place for his own work in the literary canon, establishing fame as the subject-site at which literary theory was contested and writerly reputation won. Chaucer's place in these negotiations was readily recognized in his aftermath, as later writers adopted and reworked postures which Chaucer had struck, in their own bids for literary place. This volume considers the debates on fama which were past, present and future to Chaucer, using his work as a centre point to investigate canon formation in European literature from the late Middle Ages and into the Early Modern period. Isabel Davis is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Literature at Birkbeck, University of London; Catherine Nall is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London. Contributors: Joanna Bellis, Alcuin Blamires, Julia Boffey, Isabel Davis, Stephanie Downes, A.S.G. Edwards, Jamie C. Fumo, Andrew Galloway, Nick Havely, Thomas A. Prendergast, Mike Rodman Jones, William T. Rossiter, Elizaveta Strakhov.

First full study of Chaucer's readings and translations of Petrarch suggests a far greater influence than has hitherto been accepted.

This volume explores literary censorship from 1660 to 1820 and examines the relationship between pervasive literary modes of the long eighteenth century and the control of seditious libel and punishment in the public pillory.

The late fourteenth century was the age of the Black Death, the Peasants' Revolt, the Hundred Years War, the deposition of Richard II, the papal schism and the emergence of the heretical doctrines of John Wyclif and the Lollards. These social, political and religious crises and conflicts were addressed not only by preachers and by those involved in public affairs but also by poets, including Chaucer and Langland. Above all, though, it is in the verse of John Gower that we find the most direct engagement with contemporary events. Yet, surprisingly, few historians have examined Gower's responses to these events or have studied the broader moral and philosophical outlook which he used to make sense of them. Here, a number of eminent medievalists seek to demonstrate what historians can add to our understanding of Gower's poetry and his ideas about society (the nobility and chivalry, the peasants and the 1381 revolt, urban life and the law), the Church (the clergy, papacy, Lollardy, monasticism, and the friars) gender (masculinity and women and power), politics (political theory and the deposition of Richard II) and science and astronomy. The book also offers an important reassessment of Gower's biography based on newly-discovered primary sources. STEPHEN RIGBY is Emeritus Professor of Medieval Social and Economic History at the University of Manchester; SIAN ECHARD is Professor of English, University of British Columbia. Contributors: Mark Bailey, Michael Bennett, Martha Carlin, James Davis, Seb Falk, Christopher Fletcher, David Green, David Lepine, Martin Heale, Katherine Lewis, Anthony Musson, Stephen Rigby, Jens Röhrkasten.

In An Introduction to the Gawain Poet, John Bowers surveys an expanded selection of the works of Chaucer's anonymous contemporary, considering Sir Gawain and the Green Knight alongside the poet's lesser known but no less brilliant works. In addition to his succinct introductions and plot summaries, Bowers skillfully details the cultural, historical, political, and religious contexts for these works, synthesizing them with close reading of selected passages. Perhaps his most exciting contribution to the field is his choice to historicize the poet's life and works in the context of the royal culture of King Richard II, boldly contending that it was highly possible the Gawain Poet was a frequent visitor to Richard's court in London. The final chapter surveys the works influenced by, as well as the influences reflected in, the poet's work, from the Bible to The Lord of the Rings. The attention Bowers pays to the critical tradition that has developed around these texts over the past hundred years makes An Introduction to the Gawain Poet an ideal volume for both undergraduate students and scholars of the Gawain Poet. Bowers has marshaled his formidable skills to create a book impressive in its balanced combination of breadth and depth.

An examination into aspects of the sexual as depicted in a variety of medieval texts, from Chaucer and Malory to romance and alchemical treatises.

The current focus on the theme of authorship in Medieval and Early Modern studies reopens questions of poetic agency and intent. Bringing into conversation several kinds of scholarship on medieval authorship, the essays in Author, Reader, Book examine interrelated questions raised by the relationship between an author and a reader, the relationships between authors and their antecedents, and the ways in which authorship interacts with the physical presentation of texts in books. The broad chronological range within this volume reveals the persistence of literary concerns that remain consistent through different periods, languages, and cultural contexts. Theoretical reflections, case studies from a wide variety of languages, examinations of devotional literature from figures such as Bishop Reginald Pecock, and analyses of works that are more secular in focus, including some by Chaucer and Christine de Pizan, come together in this volume to transcend linguistic and disciplinary boundaries.