Descrizione

About the Book:-Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales assumed its present shape in or about the year 1390; and the first three Books of Spenser’s Faerie Queene were published in 1590, so that almost exactly two centuries separate these two great works. But Chaucer lived on to 1400 and spenser had made himself a name some dozen years before the first part of his magnum opus was published; so that between the Epochs or Ages of these poets a period of less than two centuries only 179 or, in round numbers 180 years intervenes. Yet when Spenser looked back across the space of five generations that lay between him and Chaucer, the figure of his famous predecessor stood out high and clear unobstructed by any forms of like or comparable dimensions. Many forms were to be seen; but they were those of lesser though not insignificant men. The dominating presence of our literary past was undoubtedly Chaucer and he had no rival, however considerable the merits of many who had flourished since his day and enjoyed a limited lordship which is still conceded them.

Edizione: 1905