Sources of the 'Boece' by Tim William Machan, A. J. Minnis

Abstract

478 Reviews scopophilia' (p. 85) forall thepurityof Chaucer's (notthe Knight's) portrait (A I033 55) of her (even by comparison with Boccaccio's Emilia). It is theportrait (A 3233-70) ofAlisoun (not 'afterall, the Miller's creation', p. 7 I)with itsshiftingpoints of view that is by contrast voyeuristic. The reference toTheseus's 'habitual anger' (p. 9I) suggests a failure todistinguish between emotions and acts ofwill. In a section entitled 'The Erotics ofAmbivalence' (pp. 204-09) we are introduced to a Platonic Wife of Bath who ison theverge of 'aPauline renunciation of sexuality' (p. 206). The Clerk's Tale isnot the 'story [... .]of awife's unconditional love forher husband' (p. 2 I6) and does not display 'theClerk's skinny asceticism and antieroticism'(p. 247). It is rather an exemplification of obedience as a moral virtue (in the logical but uncomfortable manner of a great philosopher). Such amoral virtue requires the contradiction of an individual's will, as when a soldier goes to his death in battle. Hence Grisilde is not guilty of 'self-regarding obsessiveness' or of 'amonstrous dereliction ofmaternal duty' (p. 232: as ifawife is responsible fora husband's murder of theirchildren). For a philosophical account ofChaucer's poetry thepersonal voice of theexpositor is irritatinglyintrusive ('I will pursue thatquestion indepth' (p. I44); 'my whole way of proceeding interpretively' (p. I84)). This is more in themanner ofTroilus on pre destination than ofAristotle orAquinas. Readers enlightened by such formulations as 'a paradigmatic site for fetishistic reification' (p. I49) or the 'figuration of female genitals in the artifactual enclosure of theGarden of Love' (p. 159) will find in this book a source of continuous delight. Nevertheless, even Miller cannot begin 'as it were, in medias res, in themidst of a situated subject's engagement with philosophical problems' (p. 3 ). TRINITY COLLEGE DUBLIN GERALDMORGAN Sources of the 'Boece'. Ed. by TIM WILLIAM MACHAN with theassistance ofA. J. MIN NIS. Athens: University ofGeorgia Press. 2005. xiv + 3I pp. $85. ISBN 978 o-8203-2760-o. Sources of the 'Boece' is a volume of theChaucer Library, founded in 1946 topublish writings used by Chaucer. Machan here edits a vulgate text (not an 'authorial' one) of De consolationephilosophiae byBoethius; Li Livres de confort,a translation of the same by Jean deMeun (c. 1240-c. 1305); and notes on Boethius by theEnglish Dominican, JohnTrevet (c. I265-after 1334). The book has an introduction, fortypages ofLatin and French variants, and bibliography. Its publication concludes decades of exacting labour. Yet what is an ending for Machan is a beginning forothers. All who work on Boethius and Chaucer (or other writers, such as Henryson) will findSources of the 'Boece' a vital tool. It offers three special advantages. Readers can compare Chaucer's writings with his sources minus the distracting refinements of normal editions of Boethius. They also have a textofChaucer's Jean deMeun improved on thatofV. L. Dedeck-Hery, 'Boethius' De Consolatione by Jean deMeun', Mediaeval Studies, 14 (I952), I65-275. They have inaddition extracts fromTrevet's commentary (previously unpublished), and glosses from the tradition of Remigius ofAuxerre (c. goo), William of Conches (io8o-i I45), and a thirteenth-century revision ofWilliam. Machan edits Boethius fromCambridge, University Library, MS Ii.3.2I, of about I400. For Li Livres de conforthe uses Besancon, Bibliotheque municipale, MS 434, while thenotes by Trevet come mainly fromE. T. Silk's unfinished edition. All this is progress. But the book is not presented (p. 12) as the lastword. The swarm of manuscripts still unscrutinized would daunt all but the doughtiest researcher. The long-sought manuscript containing Boethius, Li Livres, and aTrevetian commentary namable as Chaucer's source hence remains unfound. MLR, I02.2, 2007 479 Yet there are benefits. Text comparison is now a simple operation, as instances show. When Chaucer describes how primeval men andwomen 'slepen holsome slepes uppon the gras', Machan (pp. 72, 75) lets us see how Chaucer followed Jean's 'II se dormoient sus les herbes' rather than 'Sompnos dabat herba salubres': 'Avegetarian dietmeant healthy sleep' inBoethius. Again, though editors suppose Chaucer's 'cruel day' for 'sera dies' ('last day') isdue to a corrupt reading seva,Machan (p. 285) states that his Cambridge manuscript unexpectedly reads sera. Or again, when...