Langland, Gower, Chaucer.
- Author/Editor
- Erzgräber, Willi.
- Title
- Langland, Gower, Chaucer.
- Published
- Erzgräber, Willi. "Langland, Gower, Chaucer." In Willi Erzgraber. Europaisches Spatmittelalter. Wiesbaden: Athenaion; 1978, pp. 221-74.
- Review
- In German. Erzgräber's is a survey of English literature's rise at the end of the fourteenth century through Chaucer and Gower to the level of French and German poetry of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. (Langland, whom he sees as a religious poet, becomes more prominent after the Reformation.) Although Gower appears throughout by way of comparison with Chaucer and Langland, primary discussion is localized at 224-27 and 239-246. In the latter pages he discusses the three major works, dwelling primarily on the "Vox Clamantis" and the "Confessio Amantis," with brief consideration of the "Mirour de l'Omme." He points out affinities with Boethius and the frequent reliance on Ovid, calls Gower's style "graphisch" (227), comparing it favorably to Chaucer's "malerischen" style. He presents Gower as a "powerful critic of his times," and positions him in the company of Robert Manning, William of Waddington, and Dan Michel of Northgate (239). [RFY. Copyright. John Gower Society. eJGN 43.1]
- Date
- 1978
- Gower Subjects
- Backgrounds and General Criticism
Style, Rhetoric, and Versification
Sources, Analogues, and Literary Relations