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The neglected thirteenth-century English poem on the subject of Jacob and Joseph is striking for the addition, within the brief (and fragmentary) but lively narrative, of material that is not found in the Vulgate, and as such forms part of the popular vernacular tradition of the Bible. The text can be related to an Anglo-Norman or French narrative pattern represented in a number of (larger) biblical poems, though it is not as close to the Bible of Herman de Valenciennes as has been suggested. The relationship with the later English Cursor Mundi is also complex. Some of the extrabiblical elements are matched in iconography. In spite of the focus upon the much-retold romance of Joseph, the central figure is Jacob, something made clear at several points. The clearly didactic work (by a clerically trained poet or minstrel) may have been intended for a baronial audience as a warning against injustice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates one of Laȝamon’s most significant transformations of his source material, namely his greatly expanded use of dialogue. This is discussed in the context of Old English literature to examine what it might teach us about Laȝamon’s literary heritage. Many different theories have been proposed for Laȝamon’s connections to earlier English literature, but, in terms of dialogue, it is classical Old English poetry, particularly the saints’ lives and heroic verse, which most closely resembles Laȝamon’s work. The use of dialogue is one of a number of major divergences between Laȝamon and the poetry of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and, in light of this, arguments linking Laȝamon to the Chronicle poems in particular are critically reviewed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper offers the first comprehensive survey of the combination of a third person singular pronoun and the demonstrative pronounthis, which is assumed to be peculiar to Middle English. Through a close analysis of the data extracted from the Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse, particular attention is paid to how far this usage is attributable to direct Latin influence, as has been previously suggested. A detailed study of theWycliffite Bibleexamines how often Latin demonstrative pronouns which refer to persons in the Vulgate (e.g.hic,iste) are translated ashe/she this. It will be demonstrated that, other than such translation effects, the pronominal combination is also subject to several conditioning factors such as the Northern dialect, metrical requirements and the set of contexts where a special emphasis is very likely to be intended on the person in question. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Discusses Geoffrey Chaucer's use of conventionalized rhetorical forms to familiarize his audience with his subject matter. Chaucer's avowal to speak in plain English; Exemplification of Chaucer's voicing in his so-called dream poems; Poetic communicative strategies; Description of the composition of English poetry during the Middle Ages.

Examines the poetic vein phlebotomy in Middle English and Anglo-Norman verse. Evaluation of the short middle English metrical treatise on the 32 veins of the body; Copy of the treatise; Use of each particular vein; Critical apparatus to the poem.

Discusses poems on death and transience in the so-called Vernon refrain series that are exceptional among Middle English mortality lyrics for their reflective and non-homiletic quality. Tendency to approach religious themes from a moral rather than homiletic angle; Poems' dependence on the biblical book of Ecclesiastes to provide them with the dignified and personalized generations on death and transience.

Studies alleged allusions to the New World in the work of late medieval Scottish poet William Dunbar. Passages in Dunbar's poem 'This waverand warldis wretchidnes'; Lines relevant to the problem of dating; New World to which Dunbar has often thought to refer.

Presents a reappraisal of the authorship of the Middle English poem 'The Owl and the Nightingale.' General acceptance that the author was Nicholas of Guilford; Reasons why the poem would be an unsuitable vehicle with which the young clerk would try to further his ambitions; Relationship of Nicholas and the author.

Discusses the dissolution of the templar ideal in the medieval poetry 'Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.' Demonstration of the incapacities of 14th-century knighthood; Accomplishments and failures of the lead character.

Explores the structure and meaning of the Middle English alliterative poem 'Morte Arthure.' Predominance of the interpretation that the poem condemns King Arthur's moral deterioration; Structural divisions of the poem that appear to present Arthur's conduct as entirely consistent and praiseworthy; Arthur's attempt to work out his destiny as it had been revealed in his dream.

Focuses on the controversy surrounding the authorship of the Middle English poem 'The Owl and the Nightingale.' Types of rhetoric or 'ars praedicandi'; Themes tackled by the poem; Problem of the interdependence and the essential unity of the virtues.

Focuses on the aesthetic aspects of the 'General Prologue' of the 'Canterbury Tales,' a Middle English epic poem by Geoffrey Chaucer. Emergence of an authentic middle class; Class structure of medieval society; Pre-eminence of the greater crafts.

Discusses the conclusion of Middle English poet Geoffrey Chaucer's 'House of Fame.' Conjecture about what the 'man of great auctorite' was about to say at the end of the poem; Potential symmetries within the poem; Categories of suggested endings for the poem; Suggestion that the man of great authority could be the poet Virgil; Chaucer's references to poets in the poem.

Focuses on a third text of the six-line Middle English lyric beginning with 'Say me viit in be brom.' Contents of the lyric's first and second texts; Possible relation of the lyric to other manuscripts in the Library of Lambeth Palace.

Interprets lines 427-8 of the early Middle English poem 'The Owl and the Nightingale.' Translation to modern English; Explanations which do not fit well with the context; Possibility that the word 'flockes' was actually flakes.