Реферат: Chaucer And The House Of Fame Essay

, Research Paper

QUESTION 7.

DISCUSS THE CULTURAL NATURE OF FAME AND ITS TEXTUAL

EXPRESSION WITH REFERENCE TO ONE OR MORE OF THE FOLLOWING:

ORAL HEROIC POETRY, CHAUCER’S DEPICTION IN THE HOUSE OF FAME

AND THE MODERN CONSTRUCTION OF THE CANON OF ENGLISH

LITERATURE.

YOU SHOULD FOCUS YOUR ANALYSIS ON THE INTERPLAY OF ORAL

AND LITERARY TRADITIONS IN THESE CONTEXTS.

Many critics have noted the complexities within Chaucer’s The House of Fame, in

particular, the complexities between the oral and the literary. The differences between

these methods are constantly appearing; Chaucer is well aware of rapidly changing

communicative practises and contrasts the preservation of utterance with the longevity

of literary texts. He achieves this by discussing the nature of “Fame” and the

difficulties that arise from it. “Fame” can both destroy and create. It can result in the

eternal preservation of great works and their creators. However, Chaucer is quick to

note the precarious nature of “fame” noting the unreliable process of attaining it and its

potentially momentary existence. Every creator with their respective work/s naturally

crave and desire “fame”; they want their subjects to remain fresh in the minds of their

audience. Chaucer, while neither totally praising the written nor the oral, reveals how

essentially the written word is far more likely to become eternal as opposed to the oral.

The relative “fame” of any work is dependent on many factors. Many traditional and

classical ideas result in the formation of the English canon, yet as Chaucer indicates,

the “fame” of these works can easily become annihilated. The arrival of new readers

with different ideals and thereby changing tradition, can reject classical or “canonical”

work and their “fame” will melt into nothingness.

Most stories, histories and legends that emerge from oral heroic poetry are to

herald the achievement of the powerful and wealthy so that their histories will not fade

from the memories of the population. The stories of Beowolf are a clear example of

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