Pace, George B., ed.; David, Alfred, ed., The Minor Poems (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press. A Variorum Edition of the Works of Geoffrey Chaucer. Vol. 5, 1982).

Text name(s): Truth; Gentilesse; Lak of Stedfastnesse; The Former Age; Fortune; The Complaint of Chaucer to His Purse; Adam Scriveyn; The Envoy to Bukton; The Envoy to Scogan; To Rosemounde; Merciles Beaute; Womanly Noblesse; Against Women Unconstant; Proverbs

Number of pages of primary source text: 62

Medieval Author(s): Chaucer, Geoffrey

Dates: 1370 - 1400

Archival Reference: BM Add. 10340; BM Add. 10392; BM Add. 16165; BM Add. 22139; BM Add. 34360; BM Add. 36983; BM Add. 38179; Ashmole 59, Bodleian; Bannatyne, Edinburgh; Bodley 638, Bodleian; BM Cotton Cleopatra D.VII; MS 176 Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge; etc.

Original Language(s): English - Middle English;

Translation: Original language included.

Translation Comments:

Geopolitical Region(s): England;

County/Region: London

Apparatus: Index Bibliography Introduction

Comments:

This edition is the first of two volumes of Chaucer’s minor poetry. Each poem has its own specific introduction. This edition is meant for serious students and scholars, and the introductory material gives a good deal of information about each poem, its texts and critical history. The poems in this edition are not bound by date or style, but are less similar than are the poems in the second volume, which are nearly all courtly “complaints.” Four of the poems in this first group are addressed to individuals (The Envoy to Bukton, The Envoy to Scogan, Adam Scriveyn, and The Complaint of Chaucer to His Purse, which is addressed to King Henry IV); four poems are about love (To Rosemounde, Merciles Beaute, Womanly Noblesse, and Against Women Unconstant); five are moral or didactic and influenced by Boethius’ Consolation of Philosophy (Truth, Gentilesse, Lak of Stedfastnesse, The Former Age, and Fortune); and the Proverbs are very short verses. Although Chaucer is known mainly for his narrative poetry, such as the Canterbury Tales, it is likely that he wrote more short poetry than what we have today. Considered by many to be one of the greatest poets of the English language, Geoffrey Chaucer was born in London in the 1340s. He was a page in the household of Elizabeth, Countess of Ulster, who was married to Prince Lionel, one of King Edward III’s sons, and fought in France in 1359. After that he served Edward as a messenger and diplomat, customs agent, clerk of the king’s works (where he oversaw construction and renovation of the king’s houses and properties), and Justice of the Peace. His literary career began in translating works such as the Romance of the Rose and Boethius’ Consolation of Philosophy into English, and his first original work, the Book of the Duchess, was written in 1369-70. He died in or around 1400; the date on his 16th-century tomb in Westminster Abbey is October 25, 1400.

Introduction Summary:

The 43-page introduction includes discussion of the poems included, the texts used, manuscripts and printed editions in which the poems appear, the method of collation, and explanation of the annotations to the poems.

Cataloger: RLL