Chaucer and Fame

The questions of fame and reputation are central to Chaucer's writings; the essays here discuss their various treatments and manifestations.

The questions of fame and reputation are central to Chaucer's writings; the essays here discuss their various treatments and manifestations.

Fama, or fame, is a central concern of late medieval literature: where fame came from, who deserved it, whether it was desirable and how it was acquired and kept. An interest in fame was not new but was renewed and rethought within the vernacular revolutions of the later Middle Ages.
The work of Geoffrey Chaucer collates received ideas on the subject offama, both from the classical world and from the work of his contemporaries. Chaucer's place in these intertextual negotiations was readily recognized in his aftermath, as later writers adopted and reworked postures which Chaucer had struck, in their own bids for literary authority. This volume tracks debates onfama which were past, present and future to Chaucer, using his work as a centre point to investigate canon formation in European literature from the late Middle Ages and into the Early Modern period.

Isabel Davis is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Literature at Birkbeck, University of London; Catherine Nall is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Literature at Royal Holloway, University of London.

Contributors: Joanna Bellis, Alcuin Blamires, Julia Boffey, Isabel Davis, Stephanie Downes, A.S.G. Edwards, Jamie C. Fumo, Andrew Galloway, Nick Havely, Thomas A. Prendergast, Mike Rodman Jones, William T. Rossiter, Elizaveta Strakhov.

Introduction - Isabel Davis
Chaucer Joins theSchiera:The House of Fame, Italy and the Determination of Posterity - William T. Rossiter
"I wolde [...] han hadde a fame": Dante, Fame and Infamy in Chaucer'sHouse of Fame - Nick R Havely
"And kis the steppes where as thow seest pace": Reconstructing the Spectral Canon in Statius and Chaucer - Elizaveta Strakhov
'"I nolde sette at al that noys a grote": Repudiating Infamy inTroilus and Criseyde andHouse of Fame - Alcuin Blamires
The Early Reception of Chaucer'sThe House of Fame - Julia Boffey and A S G Edwards
Fame's Penitent: Deconstructive Chaucer Among the Lancastrians - Andrew Galloway
After Deschamps: Chaucer's French Fame - Stephanie Downes
"Fresch anamalit termes": The Contradictory Celebrity of Chaucer's Aureation - Joanna Bellis
Chaucer the Puritan - Mike Rodman Jones
Revenant Chaucer: Early Modern Celebrity - Thomas A Prendergast
Ancient Chaucer: Temporalities of Fame - Jamie C. Fumo
Bibliography