The Knight's Tale

by Geoffrey Chaucer, Richard Bebb (Read by)

Overview

The classic respected series in a stunning new design. This edition of The Knight's Tale from the highly-respected Selected Tales series includes the full, complete text in the original Middle English, along with an in-depth introduction by A. C. Spearing, detailed notes and a comprehensive glossary.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9789626344156
Publisher:	Naxos Audiobooks Ltd.
Publication date:	09/01/2006
Series:	Complete Classics Series
Edition description:	Unabridged, 2 CDs, 3 hours
Product dimensions:	4.90(w) x 5.60(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	16 - 18 Years

About the Author

CHARLES D. JONES, Regents Professor of Art, is the director and master printer of the LaNana Creek Press at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas and has taught printmaking since 1971. MARC GUIDRY received his Ph.D. from Louisiana State University. He has published essays on Chaucer in The Chaucer Review and Medieval Rhetoric, a Routledge casebook.

Read an Excerpt

PART III I TROW, men would but deem it negligence If I forget to tell the great expense Of Theseus, who prepares so busily To furnish all the lists full royally; A theatre so noble has he made, I say the world its like had ne'er surveyed. Its ample circuit went a mile about, 1029 All strongly walled with stone, and ditched without. Round was its shape, with rising circles dight, Arranged in steps, full sixty yards in height, So that, as rank by rank each step withdrew, No man might hinder other from the view. Eastward there stood a gate of marble white ; And westward, such another, opposite ; And, shortly to describe it, such a place Was none on earth, in such a little space. For in the land no craftsman could be found Skilled in arithmetic or measuring ground, 1040 No draughtsman, none who carved in stone or wood, But Theseus gave him meat and wages good The theatre to fashion and devise. And, more to do his rite and sacrifice, He eastward hath, upon the gate above, In Venus' worship—goddess she of love — Contrived an altar and an orat'ry. And westward, in regard and memory Of Mars, he such another hath designed, That cost him many a load of gold refined. 1050 And northward, in a turret on the wall, Of alabaster white and red coral An oratory, marvellous to see, In worship of Diana's chastity, Hath Theseus contrived with rich array. But yet have I forgotten to portray The noble carvings, and the sculptures rare, The shapes, the ornaments, the figures fair Displayed within these oratories three. And first, in Venus' temple may'st thou see 1060 Wrought on the wall, full piteous to behold, The broken slumbers and the sighings cold; The sacred tears, the lamentations dire;The fiery torments of extreme...

Table of Contents

Preface; Introduction; Note on the text; The Portrait of the Knight; The Knight's Tale; Notes; Glossary.