The Naked Text

A sequel to her seminal book on Chaucers House of Fame, Sheila Delanys elegant and innovative study of Chaucers Legend of Good Women explores what it meant to be a reader and a writer, and to be English and a courtier, in the late fourteenth century. The richness of late medieval art, philosophy, and history are powerfully brought to bear on one of Chaucers most controversial works. So too are the insights of modern critical theorysemiotics, historicism, and gender studies especiallymaking this a unique achievement in medieval and Chaucerian studies. Delanys strikingly original readings of Chaucers Orientalism, his sexual wordplay, his theological attitudes, and his treatment of sex and gender have given us a Chaucer for our time. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Presss mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1994.