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Chaucer’s Narrators and the Rhetoric of Self-Representation

by Michael Foster (Author)
©2008 Monographs 196 Pages

Summary

Methods of representing individual voices were a primary concern for Geoffrey Chaucer. While many studies have focused on how he expresses the voices of his characters, especially in The Canterbury Tales, a sustained analysis of how he represents his own voice is still wanting. This book explores how Chaucer’s first-person narrators are devices of self-representation that serve to influence representations of the poet. Drawing from recent developments in narratology, the history of reading, and theories of orality, this book considers how Chaucer adapts various rhetorical strategies throughout his poetry and prose to define himself and his audience in relation to past literary traditions and contemporary culture. The result is an understanding of how Chaucer anticipates, addresses, and influences his audience’s perceptions of himself that broadens our appreciation of Chaucer as a master rhetorician.

Details

Pages
196
Publication Year
2008
ISBN (Softcover)
9783039111213
Language
English
Keywords
Ich-Form Social History Chaucer, Geoffrey Autor Selbstrepräsentation Middle English Historical Text Rhetorical Topoi
Published
Oxford, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Frankfurt am Main, New York, Wien, 2008. 196 pp.

Biographical notes

Michael Foster (Author)

The Author: Michael Foster is currently a postgraduate teaching fellow at the University of Nottingham, where he is conducting research on the manuscript transmission of the Middle English romances. He has published on Chaucer, rhetoric, and narrative.

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Title: Chaucer’s Narrators and the Rhetoric of Self-Representation