Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0005277, Tue, 4 Jul 2000 08:51:49 -0700

Subject
Chaucer's HOUSE OF FAME (fwd)
Date
Body
From: Arthur Glass <goliard@worldnet.att.net>

It is interesting, and no doubt conincidental, that Chaucer's 'House of
Fame' like John Shade's 'Pale Fire,' is an unfinished poem. My Chaucer
professor in graduate school said that she had devised a single line that
would bring it to a close.

----- Original Message -----
From: Galya Diment <galya@u.washington.edu>
To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2000 6:19 PM
Subject: Chaucer's HOUSE OF FAME


> For those who are not terribly familiar with Chaucer (who is, actually,
> one of my favorites): Ken Tapscott probably meant Chaucer's THE HOUSE OF
> FAME -- which is 2125 lines long and unfinished.
>
> THE HOUSE OF FAME contains a poet's dream where he travels to the
> Houses of Fame and Rumor to hear tidings of love. Many famous couple of
> lovers from Greek and Roman epic poetry and mythology are mentioned here.
> The House is, indeed, in the middle of a very strange land whose
> isolation and "sterility" contrast with the "togetherness" and fertility
> featured in the temple:
>
> "When I out at the dores cam,/I faste aboute me beheld./Then sawgh I but a
> large feld,/As fer as that I myghte see,/Withouten toun, or hous, or
> tree,/Or bush, or grass, or eryd lond;/For al the feld nas but of sond/As
> smal as man may se yet lye/In the desert of Lybye;/Ne no maner
> creature/That ys yformed be Nature/Ne sawght I, me to rede or wisse./"O
> Crist!" thoughte I..."
>
> Galya Diment
>