The great household and an economics of power -- The political economy in the late fourteenth century -- Service allegory: the great household in Geniuss confession -- Courtly love and the lordship of Venus -- Women as household exchange in Geniuss tales -- Justice and the affinity -- Retribution as household exchange in Geniuss tales -- Total reciprocity and the problem of kingship
Summary
In a sustained new reading of John Gower's major English poem, Confessio Amantis (1390-3), Elliot Kendall shows how deeply the great household shaped the way Gower and his contemporaries (including Chaucer, Clanvowe, chroniclers, and parliamentary petitioners) imagined their world
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 266-291) and index