Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Note on the text
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- I Chaucer's Good Woman
- II The God of Love
- 4 The God of Love
- 5 The accusation
- 6 The defence: tyrants of Lombardy
- 7 The defence: matere and entente
- III The Palinode
- IV The Legends of good women
- V The Legend as courtly game
- Epilogue
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL LITERATURE
7 - The defence: matere and entente
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 October 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Note on the text
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- I Chaucer's Good Woman
- II The God of Love
- 4 The God of Love
- 5 The accusation
- 6 The defence: tyrants of Lombardy
- 7 The defence: matere and entente
- III The Palinode
- IV The Legends of good women
- V The Legend as courtly game
- Epilogue
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL LITERATURE
Summary
Alceste has a list of excuses to offer the God of Love which may be applicable to Chaucer's crime:
Or elles, sire, for that this man is nyce,
He may translate a thyng in no malyce,
But for he useth bokes for to make,
And taketh non hed of what matere he take,
Therfore he wrote the Rose and ek Crisseyde
Of innocence, and nyste what he seyde…
He ne hath not don so grevously amys
To translate that olde clerkes wryte,
As thogh that he of maleys wolde endyte
Despit of love, and hadde hymself ywrought.
G 340–52/F 362–72
In spite of Alceste's concern for justice, she expresses no high regard for Chaucer's abilities and in fact believes him guilty of the crime of enditing ‘despit of love’. Having put the notion of wrongful accusation to one side she broaches the possibility of mitigating circumstances or diminished responsibility. It is not easy to gauge how seriously the audience might have regarded a defence which depends on Chaucer's mental capacity or lack of it. Was he, as Alceste says, too ‘nyce’ (ignorant or foolish) to know what he was doing, and therefore ‘innocent’ of the implications of what his translations were saying? In this context, being innocent and thus free of ‘malice’ or evil intent has no very flattering connotation.
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- Information
- Chaucer's Legendary Good Women , pp. 130 - 148Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1998