The Age of Chaucer
France now
boasted of Froissart, Chaucer’s contemporary, while Italy prouded itself with
Boccaccio.
Chaucer also had
his own contemporaries in England – but they still used Latin as their medium.
The reason was because, English was still a disinherited tongue, used mainly
for translations, and the first of our great translators was Sir John Trevisa, a contemporary of
Wyclif at Oxford. He translated Higden’s Polychronicon
into English. But soon, the situation changed. After the Black Death, English
was used as a medium of instruction in schools. A statute of 1362 ordered legal
proceedings to be conducted in English on the grounds that French was no longer
sufficiently understood.
Chaucer’s Contemporaries
Chaucer was
widely known amongst the literati of the day. His English contemporaries were:
John Gower,
John Wyclif,
John Trevisa,
John Mandeville,
Thomas Hoccleve,
William Langland, etc.
 |
| Piers the Plowman |
John Gower: Chaucer seems
to have been particularly close to ‘Moral’
Gower, as he dubs him in Troilus and
Criseyde, giving him power of attorney when he left for Italy in 1378. In
the first version of his Confessio
Amantis, Gower makes a flattering reference to Chaucer as composing ‘ditees
and songes glad’ in the flower of his youth. John Gower wrote his best-known
work Confessio
Amantis (A Lover’s Confession) in English, was written at the King's
command. Gower’s ‘confession’ uses the concept with a degree of irony. He uses
stories to recount the seven deadly sins of love (Amans), deriving considerable
inspiration from the Latin poet Ovid, in a mock-religious dream vision. At the
end, when the speaker has confessed all his sins, he announces that he will
renounce love – but only because he is old, and nature has overtaken his
capacity to love. A farewell to love rather than a vow of chastity is the
ironic outcome.
‘Gower and
Hoccleve were seemingly their equals in popularity in the fifteenth century’.
Thomas Hoccleve: His
principal works are The Regement of Princes, written for the edification of Henry V,
consisting of a string of sermons; La Male Regie, partly autobiographical,
The
Complaint of Our Lady; and Occleve's Complaint.
As the fourteenth century wears on we notice the
greater use of prose. The writings of four men in particular - Mandeville,
Trevisa, Wyclif and Nicholas of Hereford are of importance to us.
 |
| The Adventures of John Mandeville |
John Mandeville compiled and published a French book of travels
between 1357 and 1371. This French work was very popular, and it was translated
into several languages, including English.
Everyone knows about the incredible things
he pretends to have seen: the gigantic race with one eye in the middle of the
forehead, people with no heads but with eyes in their shoulders, others with great ears hanging to
their knees, snails so great that many persons may lodge in their shells, and
scores of other marvels. Setting out to write merely a guide-book for those who
might be making a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, he gives the usual account of
routes, and towns, and places of interest at the more important points. But
when this
part of his plan is finished he continues with his travels in Egypt,
Asia Minor, Persia, India, Cathay or China, and many other places. He professes
to have been born at St. Albans, to have left England in 1322, and, after
spending years on his vast journey, to have arrived at Liége, where he was
persuaded to write down his experiences.
As Legouis & Cazamian comment, “he was
able to pass them off as more genuine than the matter of Marco Polo”, because
of the credulity of the age. This literature, with its imaginary English hero, based
on a hoax, was to root itself deeply in England.
Trevisa, Wyclif and Nicholas of Hereford were contemporaries at Queen’s College.
John
Trevisa was born in Cornwall. He entered Oxford in
1362, and later became a fellow of Queen’s College, Oxford from 1372-76 at the
same time as John Wyclif and Nicholas of Hereford. Apart from his having
translated the Bible, his most important works are his translations of Higden’s
Polychronicon.
Nicholas
of Hereford was a Fellow of The Queen's College,
Oxford. He collaborated in producing the English-language version of the Bible
known as Wycliffe's Bible. He is believed to have been entrusted with
the translation of the Old Testament, the major part of
which was completed by 1382.
John
Wyclif was an
Oxford professor. He developed a number of doctrines. To him, the Bible is the
supreme authority, and the clergy should hold no property. Wyclif’s ideas, were
adopted by his followers - the Lollards – which became a mass movement that
spread rapidly after his death. In his own lifetime, he was strongly supported
by his colleagues at Oxford and by powerful laymen, such as John of Gaunt. In
1382, John Wyclif translated the Vulgate edition of The Bible,
published in Latin, into Middle English but caused controversy because many
people believed that English was not a language worthy of conveying the
profound moral sentiments of the Bible. Yet, translation was strongly
stimulated by Wyclif. To the second of the Wyclifian versions is sometimes
given the name of John Purvey, the Lollard leader who succeeded Wyclif.
William
Langland - The
dream-vision - a form which was to become one of the most frequent in mediaeval
literature, is popular in Authors like Chaucer and Langland in which the
narrator describes another world – usually a heavenly paradise – which is
compared with the earthly human world.
If satire is the mocking observation of human
behaviour, Langland can, with Chaucer, be considered a worthy forerunner of
what was to become a notable tradition. The major work of William Langland, Piers Plowman, has been described as
a ‘satire’. The dreams tell of how England might be reformed, and of truth in
justice and behaviour. A credo or ‘Do Well’ leads to a disillusioned view of
human nature, in which the church, which should exemplify salvation, is shown
as corrupt. As in The Canterbury Tales,
the friar is seen as weak and corrupt, and Piers is seen, in his own dream, as
the honest man.
Next -
Chaucer’s Imitators and Disciples in England (English Chaucerians)
Chaucer’s Imitators and Disciples in Scotland
(Scottish Chaucerians)
Source(s)
English
Literature by Edward Albert [Revised by J. A. Stone]
History of
English Literature, by Legouis and Cazamian
The Routledge
History of Literature in English: Britain and Ireland, by Ronald Carter and
John McRae
A Literary
History of England. II Edition. Edited by Albert C. Baugh. Volume I
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