Pleonastic 'as' in Gower's Confessio Amantis

Author/Editor
Iwasaki, Haruo

Title
Pleonastic 'as' in Gower's Confessio Amantis

Published
Iwasaki, Haruo. "Pleonastic 'as' in Gower's Confessio Amantis." In Philologia Anglica: Essays Presented to Professor Yoshio Terasawa on the Occasion of his Sixtieth Birthday. Ed. Oshitari, Kinshiro, and others. Tokyo: Kenkyushi, 1988, pp. 176-183.

Review
Iwasaki lists a number of different constructions involving as from CA, e.g. "as forto," "as for," "as in," "as of," "as be weie of," "as touchende," "as tho," and "as thanne." In almost all cases the as is evidently pleonastic, and included for sake of meter alone, and to prove the point Iwasaki lists other passages that seem in every way similar in both meaning and construction but that omit the as. He also points to a small number of passages in which as cannot be omitted (e.g. "as for" in the sense of "concerning"), and in which as has some restrictive force [PN. Copyright The John Gower Society. JGN 12.1]

Date
1988

Gower Subjects
Language and Word Studies