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Chaucer's Jobs. By David Carlson. The New Middle Ages. New York:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. Pp. viii + 168. $65; £42.50.
The opening sentences of David Carlson's book lay out his thesis and his
strategy for its development:
Chaucer was the police, not in an attenuated or metaphoric sense: in the
better part of his mature employments, he was an official of the repressive
apparatus of state. Before that he was a lackey, in domestic personal
service. As a poet, he was both, police officer and domestic servant,
in differing ratios, in different poems, at differing times in his literary
career. (p. 1)
Indeed, the strategy is the thesis. The persuasive weight falls not on
the mustering and analysis of evidence, but on the emotive force of key
words or phrases: "the police," "the repressive apparatus of state," "lackey."
It is immediately clear that this is a work that wishes to situate Chaucer
in a rhetorical framework that is less interested in historical accuracy
than in the articulation of personal indignation about the perceived nature
of Chaucer's life and works.
A.S.G. Edwards
De Montfort University
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