Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 4. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Chaucer: Canterbury Tales How disappointing; I guess I should have paid more attention to the table of contents. The book didn't indicate that it was only a selection, leaving me wondering if anything was redacted from the four tales as it stands.
It was claimed that spelling was changed to make Chaucer's Middle English more readable; I went with this work over a "translation" to modern English I have on the shelf because Chaucer is a po Chaucer: Canterbury Tales How disappointing; I guess I should have paid more attention to the table of contents. It was claimed that spelling was changed to make Chaucer's Middle English more readable; I went with this work over a "translation" to modern English I have on the shelf because Chaucer is a poet and changing the language undoes the poetry.
Now I wonder as well if more than just spelling changes were made. The "scholarly" notes and explanations were terrible. Some explanations for certain words were in the margin, while others were in footnotes, with no apparent rhyme or reason for one or the other. Some explanations were unnecessary or even misleading. Norton even felt the need to explain the word "debate" in the margins I'm sorry to say I'm not making that up.
Worst of all, the notes explaining Chaucer give the reader background as to some of Chaucer's references and allusions, to include St. The folks at Norton go on to explain St. Jerome as an "anti-feminist" and his writing as "anti-feminism. Indeed, if one interprets St. Jerome's teaching as antithetical to modern feminism, one would have to characterize feminism as "anti-Jeromism" to avoid being anachronistic about it.
Anyway, this sort of "anti-scholarship" on the part of Norton ranges between disappointing and astounding. So I would give Norton one star but for Chaucer. His work I would give four, at least from this presentation. He is hilarious, insightful, and downright raunchy. Those maintaining various myths about the Middle Ages, from the dark, dreary, drab picture painted by modern rationalists to the romantic picture painted by the likes of Chesterton, G.
Not only is Chaucer a medieval person writing in his own authentic style, but he represents exaggerated, to be sure archetypes of figures familiar to his readers. The hypocrisy, lewdness, and blasphemy of many of the characters refute the idealized notions Chesterton likes to promote about the Middle Ages and Christendom. At the same time, Chaucer's own irreligion and the contemporary popularity of his works is proof positive against an overbearing Church squashing the least bit of blasphemy; the merry state of his character reveal a color, zest, and humor to the era that is frequently not represented in modern depictions.
Now I have to go in search of a complete compilation of the Tales that isn't ruined by "translation" or other editing and start again. Based on what I was able to read here, I am definitely interested in tackling the whole work when I find a suitable source. Dec 14, S.
I didn't read everything in this book, only Beowulf so far, and it was my first time reading it. Fantastic is the only word that comes to mind. The prose and the format took a little getting used to, but other than that, I love the feeling of "epic" it gives off. I look forward to reading more of the stories in this book in the future! Aug 10, Matt rated it it was amazing Shelves: lit-crit , fictions-of-the-big-it , poesy , top-shelf , anthologies.
This is one of those big, clunky things you find in your parent's castaway bookshelf when you're 15 and, if you're impetuous enough, you start to get deeper and deeper into until you're up over your head in some of the most powerful works ever known to man. This is one of the treetrunk books of my life- most of the branches come out from this root. The footnotes and explanatory stuff pretty much made everything come alive for me, whetting my appetite for going out and getting my hands on the Ro This is one of those big, clunky things you find in your parent's castaway bookshelf when you're 15 and, if you're impetuous enough, you start to get deeper and deeper into until you're up over your head in some of the most powerful works ever known to man.
The footnotes and explanatory stuff pretty much made everything come alive for me, whetting my appetite for going out and getting my hands on the Romantics, Joyce, etc etc etc I've never really been the same since. A milestone!
Read many selections for a course but not the entirety. Hard to rate the whole of British literary history in one go; there were good ones and uninteresting ones. A Fine selection with great introductions to the periods and the major authors! Mar 03, Sara rated it it was amazing. Has helped me so much in my studies.
I still love to re-read sections of this book. From Beowolf through the 20th century, and my college textbook for a survey course. Seems obvious now that it's thoroughly devoid of diversity, and sort of a throw-back. But a rather wonderful capture of what the academy used to consider the sum total of worthwhile literature.
This was for my British Literature 2 class this semester. I liked the selection in it. Video Audio icon An illustration of an audio speaker. Audio Software icon An illustration of a 3. Software Images icon An illustration of two photographs. Images Donate icon An illustration of a heart shape Donate Ellipses icon An illustration of text ellipses.
The Norton anthology of English literature Item Preview. EMBED for wordpress. Want more? Advanced embedding details, examples, and help! Firmly grounded by the hallmark strengths of all Norton Anthologies -- thorough and helpful introductory matter, judicious annotation, complete texts wherever possible -- the Eighth Edition has been revitalized through the collaboration of six new editors and six seasoned ones. Chaucer, Geoffrey. Stephen Greenblatt et al.
Vol A. New York, NY: W. In parentheses, type the author's last name, a comma, the year "," another comma and the page number from which you drew the information. If you mention the author's last name in the body of your essay, put "" in parentheses after the author's name and the page number in parentheses at the end of the sentence.
For example:. Chaucer compares the Wife of Bath's husbands to the husbands of the Samaritan woman at the well p. Cite the text in your bibliography by writing the author's last name, followed by the first initial and a period. Write after the author's name. Write the title of the text, capitalizing only the first letter of the title and any proper nouns. If there is no author, write the title followed by If there is a cited translator, write the translator's first initial and last name in parentheses, followed by "Trans.
Greenblatt, M. Abrams, A. David, B. Lewalski, L. Lipking, G. Simpson Eds.
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