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E-book
Author Minnis, A. J. (Alastair J.)

Title Fallible authors : Chaucer's Pardoner and Wife of Bath / Alastair Minnis
Published Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, ©2008

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Description 1 online resource (xvi, 510 pages)
Series The Middle Ages series
Middle Ages series
Contents Cover; Title; Copyright; Contents; Preface; Introduction: Authority and Fallibility in Medieval Textual Culture; Chapter 1. De officio praedicatoris: Of Preaching, Pardons, and Power; I. Constructing the Preacher: Authority, Knowledge, Attributes; The Sinful Preacher: Secrecy, Scandal, and Skill; Art versus Virtue: The Challenge of Aristotle; Theory into Practice: Codes of Conduct in Preachers' Handbooks; II. Consecrating the Sacraments: Priestly Power and the Keys to Heaven; Sin versus Sacrament: Evil Ministers of the Mass; Vetula baptizat, et baptizatum est: The Power to Baptize
Authority and Agency in the Tribunal of PenanceIII. Making Indulgences: Spiritual and Material Economies; Marketing the Divine Mercy; Authority and Jurisdiction in the Dispensing of Pardon; Honoring Becket: The Case for Canterbury; Chapter 2. Moral Fallibility: Chaucer's Pardoner and the Office of Preacher; I. Alms and the Man: The Deviant Pardoner; II. Prechyng for coveityse: The Deviant Preacher; III. Breaking Bodies: The Drunkard's Eucharist; IV. Geldyng or mare: The Deviant Body; Chaucer and the Queering Eunuch; Reclaiming Public Deviancy
Chapter 3. De impedimento sexus: Women's Bodies and the Prohibition of Priestly PowerI. Sex versus Sacrament: The Constrictions of Symbolism; Sexus non est in anima: Orthodox Positions; Crowning Glories; A Woman's Touch; II. Silence in Church: Private Teaching and the Denial of Public Office; Confining the auditrix and doctrix; Limiting Biblical Precedent; III. Unnatural Selection: Authorization Through Inspiration; Prophecy and Purity of Life: In Defense of Holy Women; Affirming Biblical Precedent; IV. Sexus non est in anima: Heterodox Reactions; John Wyclif: A Shameless Worker for Women?
Walter Brut: Female Ministry in the Absence of MenConfronting the praedicatrix; Feminizing Donatism; Women Priests and Absolute Power; Changing Bodies: Pythagoras and the Transactions of Polemic; Chapter 4. Gender as Fallibility: Chaucer's Wife of Bath and the Impediment of Sex; I. Alisoun Among the auctoritees; II. Unbridling Desire: Female Sexuality and the Making of Marriage; An Unstable Human Matter; Only for Amorous Love; III. Old Wives' Tales: Vetularity and Virtue; Challenging Obscenity: From coilles to bel chose; The Wisdom of Old Women
IV. Beyond the Body? Alisoun on Sovereignty of SoulThe Lusts of Loathly Damsels: Sovereignty as Sexual Possession; Sourcing Dominion: gentillesse and Gender; Publishing the Private; List of Abbreviations; Notes; Bibliography; General Index; A; B; C; D; E; F; G; H; I; J; K; L; M; N; O; P; Q; R; S; T; U; V; W; Y; Z; Index of Biblical Citations; Acknowledgments
Summary Can an outrageously immoral man or a scandalous woman teach morality or lead people to virtue? Does personal fallibility devalue one's words and deeds? Is it possible to separate the private from the public, to segregate individual failing from official function? Chaucer addressed these perennial issues through two problematic authority figures, the Pardoner and the Wife of Bath. The Pardoner dares to assume official roles to which he has no legal claim and for which he is quite unsuited. We are faced with the shocking consequences of the belief, standard for the time, that immorality is not necessarily a bar to effective ministry. Even more subversively, the Wife of Bath, who represents one of the most despised stereotypes in medieval literature, the sexually rapacious widow, dispenses wisdom of the highest order.This innovative book places these "fallible authors" within the full intellectual context that gave them meaning. Alastair Minnis magisterially examines the impact of Aristotelian thought on preaching theory, the controversial practice of granting indulgences, religious and medical categorizations of deviant bodies, theological attempts to rationalize sex within marriage, Wycliffite doctrine that made authority dependent on individual grace and raised the specter of Donatism, and heretical speculation concerning the possibility of female teachers. Chaucer's Pardoner and Wife of Bath are revealed as interconnected aspects of a single radical experiment wherein the relationship between objective authority and subjective fallibility is confronted as never before
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 467-488) and indexes
Notes English
Subject Chaucer, Geoffrey, -1400. Pardoner's tale.
Chaucer, Geoffrey, -1400. Wife of Bath's tale.
SUBJECT Chaucer, Geoffrey, d. 1400. Wife of Bath's tale
Chaucer, Geoffrey, d. 1400. Pardoner's tale
Pardoner's tale (Chaucer, Geoffrey) fast
Wife of Bath's tale (Chaucer, Geoffrey) fast
Subject Literature -- History and criticism.
LITERARY CRITICISM -- Medieval.
Literature
Genre/Form Criticism, interpretation, etc.
Form Electronic book
LC no. 2007017366
ISBN 9780812205718
0812205715