Geoffrey Chaucer: Love Visions (Penguin Classics)

Nice to know a poet from the 1300s admired women!

This review relates to the volume -Geoffrey Chaucer:Love Visions/The Book of the Duchess; The House ofFame; The Parliament of Birds; The Legend of GoodWomen-, Penguin Classics, Translated with an Introductionand Notes by Brian Stone. 1983. 262 pp. This volume is a modern English translation of GeoffreyChaucer's four "love visions." As Brian Stone says inthe Introduction: "The four long poems presented intranslation span nearly the whole of Chaucer's workinglife. *** Chaucer was the fourteenth-century [Middle]English poet who, basing his work on that of his Frenchand Italian peers and also, like them, on the work ofthe classical and late Latin poets, created highlyoriginal narrative poems, with a skill in story-tellingin which he equalled , if not surpassed his masters.Ovid, whose outlook on women and sense of the greatvariety of life including the absurd, make him of theancients most akin to Chaucer, may beat him forsensuousness and richness of detail, and Virgil andDante for high seriousness and epic scope, but Chauceroffers a subtle humour which enhances the seriousnessand complexity of what he has to say, as well as akaleidoscopic range of tone and subject matter."Each of the four poems has an excellent Introduction.The four poems are: "The Book of the Duchess"; "TheBook of Fame" (which is subdivded into 3 Books); "TheParliament of Birds [Fowles]" (the shortest of thepoems); and "The Legend of Good Women", which hasa Prologue; then meeting of Chaucer with an angryGod Of Love who threatens to take revenge on Chaucerfor writing poorly about the powers of Love, andcausing wise people to withdraw from Love's rule,thinking that "a person is a perfect fool/Who lovesintensely with a burning fire." Then QueenAlcestis intervenes on Chaucer's behalf and tellsthe God of Love to be "more reasonable" (a lovelybit of irony). Chaucer has offended the God ofLove by his translation of -The Romance of theRose-, and his writing of the poem of -Troilusand Criseyde- in which he portrayed love andwomen in a poor light. In compensation, Chaucerawakens from his dream concerning this meetingwith the God of Love and Alcestis and begins his"Legend of Good Women", which is subdivided into thesections titled: "The Legend of Cleopatra, Queenof Egypt, Martyr"; "The Legend of Babylonian Thisbe,Martyr"; "The Legend of Dido, Queen of Carthage,Martyr"; "The Legends of Hypsipyle and Medea,Martyrs"; "The Legend of Roman Lucrece, Martyr";"The Legend of Ariadne of Athens"; "The Legend ofPhilomela"; "The Legend of Phyllis"; "The Legend ofHypermnestra." There are excellent Notes from page233 253, a Select Bibliography, and an Index ofProper Names.These works are very accessible and highly enjoyableand insightful. For many who might "pass up" onChaucer because of the "Middle English difficulty,"this volume will soothe all your fears and delightyour intelligence and your sensibilities. For theseModern English translations are excellent, and arein poetic format [not prose], but they are notstilted or hard to understand. -- Robert Kilgore.