A lively and accessible introduction to the variety, depth, and wonder of Chaucer's best-known poem.

List of illustrations; List of contributors; Preface; Note on the text; Chronology; List of abbreviations; 1. The form of the Canterbury tales Marion Turner; 2. Manuscripts, scribes, circulation Simon Horobin; 3. The general prologue Steven Justice; 4. The knight's tale and the estrangements of form Mark Miller; 5. The miller's tale and the art of solaas Maura Nolan; 6. The man of law's tale Catherine Sanok; 7. The wife of bath's prologue and tale Elizabeth Scala; 8. The friar's tale and the summoner's tale in word and deed David K. Coley; 9. Griselda and the problem of the human in the clerk's tale Holly A. Crocker; 10. The franklin's symptomatic sursanure Peter W. Travis; 11. The pardoner and his tale Kathy Lavezzo; 12. The prioress's tale Steven F. Kruger; 13. The nun's priest's tale Mishtooni Bose; 14. Moral Chaucer Frank Grady; 15. Chaucer's sense of an ending Patricia Clare Ingham and Anthony Bale; 16. Postscript: How to talk about Chaucer with your friends and colleagues; Reading Chaucer: Easier than you think? David Matthews; Scholarship or distraction? new forums for talking about Chaucer Ruth Evans; Talking about Chaucer with school teachers David Raybin; Who will pay? Stephanie Trig; Further reading, Index.

University of Missouri, St Louis