Chaucer and His Times — A Reader’s Guide

Character-Drawing Beyond Moral Judgment

Hadow's chapter on character-drawing argues that Chaucer's comic treatment of figures like the Cook and the Wife of Bath disarms conventional moral criticism. She notes that the Cook, named Hogge, is a "genial rascal" whose drunken fall from his horse becomes farce, yet he remains "a live man, not a mere occasion of mirth." The Wife of Bath, described as "foul-mouthed" and "coarse-grained," nonetheless earns the reader's tolerance through her good humour and ability to amuse the company. Hadow contrasts this with non-comic characters from Richardson and Dickens to show how Chaucer's comedy creates a "peculiar tolerance" that lets readers see these figures as they see each other—"extraordinarily human."

Wit as Intellectual Sword-Play

In her discussion of wit, Hadow distinguishes it from farce by its independence from physical action: wit appeals "as much to a blind man as to one who can see." She cites Restoration comedy's "wit-traps" as pure examples, where the remark's amusement does not depend on the speaker. Chaucer, however, rarely detaches wit from character. Hadow observes that Falstaff's jests without Falstaff lose their savour, and the wit of Rosalind or Beatrice is "too intimate a part of her personality for the two to be divorced." This analysis, drawn from the excerpts, shows Hadow using comparative literary examples to illuminate Chaucer's method of embedding wit within character rather than deploying it as ornament.

The Limits of the Excerpts: What the Text Does Not Reveal

The provided excerpts cover only the prefatory matter, the chapter on humour, and the Project Gutenberg boilerplate. They do not include Hadow's chapters on Chaucer's life, works, sources, descriptive power, or influence. The catalog subjects—"England -- Civilization -- 1066-1485" and "Poets, English -- Middle English, 1100-1500 -- Biography"—suggest a broader cultural history, but the excerpts show Hadow focusing on literary technique rather than historical context. Readers should note that the full book likely contains more biographical and historical material than these samples indicate. The excerpts also lack Hadow's treatment of Chaucer's sources and his influence on later poets, which the table of contents promises.

Hadow's book, part of the Home University Library series, assumes a general reader familiar with Chaucer's major works but not necessarily with Middle English scholarship. The pronunciation guide and the comparative references to Shakespeare, Dickens, and Restoration drama suggest an audience with some literary background. Readers approaching this text should have a Chaucer edition handy to follow the quotations, which Hadow draws from Skeat's single-volume edition. The book's value lies in its close, evidence-based observations rather than in sweeping claims about Chaucer's world.