Paul Strohm > Quotes

“people can die of mere imagination - Geffrey Chaucer, Canterbury Tales”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“people can die of mere imagination”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“There is no difference, truly, Between a wife of lofty social rank Who treats her body shabbily And a poor wench, other than this: If their behavior’s equally amiss The gentle one of highly ranked estate Is still called “lady” in the terms of love And if the other is alone and poor She ends up being called a wench or whore.”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“For when your labor is all done, And you’ve done all your reckonings, You hasten home without delay, And, just as dumb as any stone, You sit and read another book Until completely dazéd is your look.”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“The general hunger for spoken accounts of novelties and news abetted what might be called a gossip culture. The very word is a medieval English invention. “Gossip” is a contraction of “god-sib,” or “good friend,” with whom one shared private information or news.”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“This is, in fact, the subject of his House of Fame, a poem of his midcareer written, among other motives, to twit his illustrious predecessor Dante as a fame-seeking windbag.”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“conscientia,”
― Paul Strohm, Conscience: A Very Short Introduction

“prostitutes streamed toward Westminster and, especially, the freewheeling adjacent area of Charing Cross.”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

“You have no news at all About love’s folk, how they have fared, Or anything at all that God has made. Not just events in foreign lands Remain mysterious to you, You don’t know a thing—and hear Nothing else besides—about the folks Who dwell outside your very doors.”
― Paul Strohm, Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury