| Product Summary | | Format: Hardcover | | ISBN: 9780872207554 | | Publisher: Hackett Pub Co Inc | | Publish Date: 3/31/2005 | | Buy.com Sku: 39987107 | | Item#: R2M9YH | | Dimensions (in Inches) 8.75H x 6L x 1T | | Pages: 348 |
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| Author Bio| Geoffrey Chaucer | | Son of a prosperous wine merchant, Chaucer grew up helping his father in the business that made his family part of the increasing English middle class. In his teens, Chaucer became a page in the household of one of the sons of Edward III--a post that would affect the remainder of his life, which he spent as part of the circle of friends of the various reigning monarchs. His wife was a member of this aristocracy who held her own post at court. Chaucer fought in the king's army and served as diplomat to Italy and France. He was also a Justice of the Peace and Knight of the Shire (i.e. a member of Parliament) for Kent. At his death, he lived in a house situated in the garden of Westminster Abbey. Throughout his long, busy, and distinguished career, Chaucer was also composing his memorable poems. Among his early endeavors was a translation of the courtly, allegorical 13th-century "Roman de la Rose", a permanent influence on his own work, as were the Latin writers Virgil and Ovid. During his 1372 sojourn in Italy he discovered Dante, Petrarch, and--chiefly--Boccaccio, whose work was an enormous influence not only on the "Canterbury Tales" but on "The Parliament of Fowles" and "Troilus and Criseide". His first major work was "The Book of the Duchess" (c. 1370), an elegy for the wife of one of his patrons, John of Gaunt. The last 14 years of his life were devoted to the "Canterbury Tales", which he worked on obsessively while continuing to perform his court duties. If Chaucer has one outstanding quality as a writer, it is the ease with which he enters into the daily lives of people from all walks of life--as well, of course, as the ability to communicate that experience in verse tales full of bawdy wit, inventive language, and the harsh but affectionate clarity of a sensitive, observant man of the world. Chaucer is now considered the first great English poet. |
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