Model
Digital Document
Publisher
Florida Atlantic University
Description
The Renart cycle, which originated in France in the last
years of the twelfth century in a series of "branches,"
am o ng them in particular Branch II-Va of Pierre de Saint-Cloud, eventually appeared in England in Chaucer's "Nun's
Priest's Tale." Nineteenth-century criticism of the Roman de Renart, emphasizing true-to-life detail, has been rejected by twentieth-century critics who defend especially
the satiric elements in the story. There is, however,
another dimension to the Renart cycle, that is, the
disruptive yet attractive force of the fox, which Chaucer
allows to emerge in the "Nun's Priest's Tale," although
Chaucer criticism has generally neglected the importance of
daun Russell in the tale. He is glorified throughout the
"fable section," and his presence is felt indirectly
throughout the whole tale. The fox-trickster represents the
comic and "accidental" view of life developed by Chaucer in
his Canterbury Tales.
years of the twelfth century in a series of "branches,"
am o ng them in particular Branch II-Va of Pierre de Saint-Cloud, eventually appeared in England in Chaucer's "Nun's
Priest's Tale." Nineteenth-century criticism of the Roman de Renart, emphasizing true-to-life detail, has been rejected by twentieth-century critics who defend especially
the satiric elements in the story. There is, however,
another dimension to the Renart cycle, that is, the
disruptive yet attractive force of the fox, which Chaucer
allows to emerge in the "Nun's Priest's Tale," although
Chaucer criticism has generally neglected the importance of
daun Russell in the tale. He is glorified throughout the
"fable section," and his presence is felt indirectly
throughout the whole tale. The fox-trickster represents the
comic and "accidental" view of life developed by Chaucer in
his Canterbury Tales.
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