Dream Visions and Other Poems

by Geoffrey Chaucer, Kathryn L. Lynch (Editor)

Contexts connects the poems to their classical and medieval foundations and includes works by Virgil, Ovid, Cicero, Boethius, Dante, and Boccaccio, among others From the wealth of scholarly work available, the editor has chosen for Criticism six essays that address the poems central themes. Contributors include Charles Muscatine, A. C. Spearing, R. T. Lenaghan, Richard Firth Green, Elaine Tuttle Hansen, and Steven Kruger A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included. "

Genres: Poetry, Classics, Medieval, School, British Literature, Fiction, College

396 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1368

About the author

Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1343 – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for The Canterbury Tales. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He was the first writer to be buried in what has since come to be called Poets' Corner, in Westminster Abbey. Chaucer also gained fame as a philosopher and astronomer, composing the scientific A Treatise on the Astrolabe for his 10-year-old son, Lewis. He maintained a career in the civil service as a bureaucrat, courtier, diplomat, and member of parliament.
Among Chaucer's many other works are The Book of the Duchess, The House of Fame, The Legend of Good Women, and Troilus and Criseyde. He is seen as crucial in legitimising the literary use of Middle English when the dominant literary languages in England were still Anglo-Norman French and Latin. Chaucer's contemporary Thomas Hoccleve hailed him as "the firste fyndere of our fair langage" (i.e., the first one capable of finding poetic matter in English). Almost two thousand English words are first attested to in Chaucerian manuscripts. As scholar Bruce Holsinger has argued, charting Chaucer's life and work comes with many challenges related to the "difficult disjunction between the written record of his public and private life and the literary corpus he left behind". His recorded works and his life show many personas that are "ironic, mysterious, elusive [or] cagey" in nature, ever-changing with new discoveries.

Reviews

[Sydney ✨ · Rating 2 out of 5]

No thank you. Class killed me with this one. Glad we're done.

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

My first experience with Chaucer. I think I need to take a class on his writing in order to better understand him, but the more I read the easier it became. I can see some of the influences he had on Shakespeare and I appreciate the bard a little better now because of him. I plan on eventually reading The Canterbury Tales, if not for a class for my own edification.

[Jaclyn]

I was hoping that upon opening this book I'd remember why I bought it. That didn't happen. I think my interest in Chaucer was less about the poetry/literary value and more about the workings of Middle English in practice.

Normally I value lots of gloss and footnotes, as a fan of Shakespeare these are invaluable, but with this, between the gloss, footnotes and "translating" the text as I read it's all a bit too much.
I gave up about halfway through The Book of the Duchess. I read the forwards to the other poems and read the short poems and commentary.

[Vanessa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Uff, this is hard to comment on. Medieval texts are challenging for me, in his case not for the Middle English but I usually find them rather dry at first. But reading it in class and getting hinted towards the underlying irony and multi-perspective it got really interesting - still challenging though. Glad I had a great professor open for any thoughts and discussion to get a grip on Chaucer and his narrative persona. So a personally surprising rating of 3-4 stars.

[Jesse Remi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of those books that you want to turn to whenever you feel down or stuck in a dilemma. It is filled with stories that you can apply to the real world via building connections through them. It bridges the gap between dreams and life experiences. Simply wonderful.

[Joel Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Slaps

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

it was aight

[Sophia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good considering it’s Chaucer, bad by my regular standards.

[laura nicholson · Rating 4 out of 5]

alexa play fame by irene cara

[Alicia]

I support this published work that simply exists to make fun of Dante

[addie beck · Rating 4 out of 5]

read for chaucer class

[Elena · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed The Parliament of Fowls and The Legends of Good Women. The first was very humorous and the second was a nice defense of womanhood against courtly love and exploiting men. My edition also had critical essays and background sources. The sources were interesting and a few of the essays were but some of them really got on my nerves. Over all, I enjoyed reading the Middle English because it's pretty similar to modern English but different enough that it was like reading a foreign language at times--a fun challenge.

[J. Alfred · Rating 3 out of 5]

So some of us don't know much about Chaucer (cringing) and those of us who know only a very little bit think of him as primarily a comic writer. He may well be, but he's also intensely skilled, and can be downright thoughtful and serious when he wants to. Still nothing I'd pick up for pleasure on a Friday night, but worth your while figuring out all the irritating Middle English quirks. ("Hir" means "their," not "her." What the heck, Middle English??)

[Nicholas · Rating 4 out of 5]

All of Chaucer's dream visions are strange entrances into a medieval and fantastic world. Unfortunately, these works are often forgotten because < u>The Canterbury Tales steals the focus. "The Parliament of Fowls" is a fun dream vision to read around Valentine's Day. In addition to his shorter poems and the visions, this Norton edition includes excerpts from Chaucer's sources which serve to contextualize his allusions.

[Greg Kerestan · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is Chaucer's B-sides, essentially: unfinished epics, short poetic works and so on. It's all high quality stuff, especially famous poems like "The Parliament of Fowls" and "The House of Fame," but compared to "Canterbury Tales" or "Troilus and Creseyde," it can't hope to measure up, because that's not what this is. Every author has their additional material alongside their great works, and Chaucer was simply paving the way for others from Shakespeare to Stephen King in this regard.

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read "The Parliament of Fowls," "Gentilesse," and "Truth." Also read "Scipio's Dream," "Commentary on Scipio's Dream," "The Consolation of Philosophy," and "Romance of the Rose" from the Contexts section. The contexts were more interesting than the dream visions, but I would like to read more of them at some point.

[Xavier Guillaume · Rating 1 out of 5]

I must admit, I didn't understand the point of Dream Visions. This was the last book I read of my undergraduate career, and I must have been beyond tired at this point.

I probably have to reread it to fairly assess this, but it was definitely not as good as Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde.

[Tiffany · Rating 5 out of 5]

These stories were great! They are entertaining and thoughtful on the surface level, but offer even more as allegories. What's more, the stories are short which makes it easy to pick them up and put them down whenever you have time.

[Justine · Rating 4 out of 5]

We started off the Canterbury Tales course with the House of Fame and the Book of the Duchess. I enjoyed them both, but I'm more partial to the House of Fame

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I, for one, don't think The House of Fame is unfinished at all.

[Highlyeccentric · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really good edition; superceded when I acquired a Riverside.

[Robyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is nothing that I'll ever revisit (I mean, outside of a paper), but I'm glad that I was required to read it.

[Taylor Hondos · Rating 3 out of 5]

Can you say boring?! I was reading this for my Eng 363 class and just BLAHHH

[aya · Rating 5 out of 5]

The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne,
Th'assay so hard, so sharp the conquering,
The dredful joy alwey that slit so yerne
-Parliament of Fowls
[and then I died]

[Renee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm a Chaucer nerd. I will not lie. I also love old stories in middle English.