Chaucer

by Adolphus William Ward

This biography of Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1340 1400) was published in the first series of English Men of Letters in 1879. Its author, Sir Adolphus William Ward (1837 1924), a prominent scholar who became President of the British Academy, wrote on English literature from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, translated Curtius' History of Greece, and was a historian of both Britain and Germany. He approached the task of writing Chaucer's life as a historian rather than as a literary critic, emphasising the archival sources from which information on Chaucer the man, the civil servant and the courtier could be drawn, and placing the life very much in the context of the times. An epilogue discusses the legacy of the 'father of English poetry' to the poets and dramatists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and the renewal of interest in Chaucer's works in the nineteenth century.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction

148 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1968

About the author

Sir Adolphus William Ward (2 December 1837 – 19 June 1924) was an English historian and man of letters.

Reviews

[Richard Raw · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thorough account of Chaucer

This is the most thorough account of Chaucer and his works and times that I have yet read. I really recommend this one. Truly fascinating.

[R · Rating 2 out of 5]

Year 2 starts here.