The Knight's Tale of medieval wars and chivalry is the first tale told to the pilgrims as they set out to Canterbury. It concerns Theseus, returning from fighting at Thebes, two brother knights Palamon and Arcite, imprisoned but yearning for their loves. But the real hero of this recording is Richard Bebb who, with the help of Professor Derek Brewer, the leading expert on Chaucerian pronunciation, make the original Middle English not only comprehensible to the modern ear, but exciting.
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A well-established and respected series with titles in the original Middle English.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
By Doc Barbara
TOP 500 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
... it was published before Terry Jones' book "Chaucer's Knight" (which I have reviewed on this website) Otherwise it contains all that the student/reader of Chaucer needs: an authoritative text; notes; glossary and a helpful introduction. In particular, the explanations of some terms of classical/medieval rhetoric are excellent and necessary to any understanding of the Tale, whether you take the older approach or that of Terry Jones. Spearing, the editor, defines these crucial designations clearly, for example "occupatio" which means mentioning something only to say that one is not going to describe it further - as in the laborious use of the device in the 46 lines about Arcite's funeral. There are other aspects dealt with in the introduction but the reader is well advised to buy Terry Jones' book also before deciding on an interpretation. This newer view is that the Knight is, in fact, a mercenary, and that his Tale is typical of his lack of chivalric values in its bloodthirstiness and ineptitude of narration. Chaucer, in this light, has taken the "Teseida" of Boccaccio and stripped it of its courtly love values of generosity, sympathy, respect, humility and even love. The two men love each other more than the wooden Emily, Theseus is a ruthless tyrant, Venus and Mars are both of them harsh and unforgiving, the tournament and death of Arcite as gruesome as one would expect from a professional soldier of those times. It therefore fits into the Canterbury Tales as a satire on the decline of knighthood and a Tale whose teller does not fully understand what he is revealing. It explains the dark brutality of the story and is an hypothesis that I fully support.
2 of 14 people found the following review helpful
By petal
Format:Audio CD
The product was listed as delivered form the UK but was shipped from the us and so took much longer. Otherwise all was fine.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
3.5 out of 5 stars
2 reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good Condition
4 Mar 2013
By Rhianna Antonopoulos
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Once again, this came in the condition I thought it would. I would recommend this product. It stayed true to the description.
2 of 9 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
Read a Modern English version first
18 Mar 2010
By Bruce S.
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Audio CD
Unless you are versed in M.E,you may want to read or re-read The Knight's Tale in Modern English before listening to this. Otherwise it may be rather difficult to follow; in fact, it probably will be anyway, although pieces of it should be comprehensible. No one really knows what M.E. actually sounded like, as those pre-Luddite Middle English obdurately refused to record their spoken language. Towards the end, having pretty much given up on parsing the interpretation, I got a bit ear-weary, but carried on with it to the end. Fun, of a sort.
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3.5 out of 5 stars
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