Geoffrey Chaucer, The Squire's Tale

Helen Cooper (University of Cambridge)

Ed. by David Fuller, University of Durham
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.02: English Writing and Culture: High and Late Medieval, 1066-1485.
Vol. editors: Kate Ash-Irisarri (University of Edinburgh), Rory Critten (Université de Lausanne), David Fuller (University of Durham), Natalie Hanna (University of Liverpool), Hugh Magennis (Queen's University Belfast), Jamie McKinstry (University of Durham), Sarah Peverley (University of Liverpool), Sebastian Sobecki (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen)

Dates

First circulation or publication c. 1387

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Poetry (any)
Story

Resources

The Squire’s Tale (Canterbury Tales, V.1-708, including its framing material) is in many ways one of the more puzzling of the Canterbury sequence, and it has elicited critical disagreement to match. Its date of composition is a matter of dispute; its sources are uncertain; its position in the sequence varies widely between manuscripts; its unfinished state (it promises, or threatens, to be very long indeed, containing as it does two distinct parts and the opening couplet of a third, with an epic-sized plot summary of what is to come) makes an estimation of its narrative and thematic qualities difficult; and readers’ evaluations of it have differed to extremes over time, with Milton longing to “call up him who …

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1941 words

Citation: Cooper, Helen. "The Squire's Tale". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 29 September 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=19958, accessed 24 November 2024.]

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