Chaucer and Plath + Hughes Context

What were the names of Plath and Hughes' children?

Frieda and Nick

What is confessionalism also known as?

The New Poetry

What post WW2 movement inspired by Freud was Plath inspired by?

Surrealism

What did the second wave of feminism provoke conversation about?

Women's rights e.g. domestic abuse, reproduction, beauty standards

Who wrote 'The Second Sex'

Simone de Beauvoir

Who wrote 'The Feminine Mystique'?

Betty Freidan

What are some literary techniques involved in Modernism?

Stream-of-consciousness and fragmented language

In which year did Plath and Hughes visit Finisterre?

1961

In which year did Plath and Hughes take a road trip across Canada?

1959

What was the post-WW2 attitude towards women?

Government keep to encourage women to give up jobs so men have jobs after demobilisation, lead to baby boom

What was the name of Plath's horse in Devon?

Ariel

Why was Plath hospitalised in 1961?

Appendectomy and miscarriage

When did Plath and Hughes marry?

1956

When did Plath and Hughes divorce?

1962

Which book by Robert Graves were both Plath and Hughes inspired by?

'White Goddess'

What time was Plath particularly inspired by?

4 AM

Who made the commencement address at Smith college?

Adlai Stevenson

Quote from Adlai Stevenson:

'very pressing and particular problems of domesticity' - return to domestic sphere

When did Plath write lots of poems?

October 1962 - near her birthday

How many poems did Plath write in October 1962?

Where did Plath meet Sexton?

Lowell's poetry class at Boston University

What 1962 event may Plath have been inspired by?

Cuban Missile Crisis

Who did Plath stay with after separating from Ted?

Kathy Kane

How old was Plath when her dad died?

8

How many women abandoned uni to marry in the Mid-50s?

Half

When did Plath and Hughes live in Heptonstall?

1956

What is T.S. Eliot's poetic self?

Depersonalised, no direct emotion

Whose direct poetic voice did Hughes adopt?

Yeats

Where did Hughes' dad fight?

Gallipoli

Who did Ted have an affair with?

Assia Wevill

When did Hughes work in London Zoo?

1956

Which three poets was Hughes inspired by?

Eliot, Blake, Yeats

Who was Plath inspired by?

Woolfe

What did Hughes support the desacralisation of?

the landscape

What did Hughes reject the sentimentalisation of?

Nature

What did Ted see the role of the poet as?

Seer/Shaman

Name three concepts Hughes was influenced by:

sublime, romanticism, astrology

What was the name of the land-based hierachy in Medieval England

Feudalism

Why did the rising middle class create anxiety?

Outside traditional feudal hierachy leading to new opportunities, threatening power of dominant aristocracy

Where were the pilgrims travelling to and from?

To the shrine of Thomas a Becket in Canterbury Cathedral from London

Classical Literary influence on Chaucer:

Dante’s ‘Inferno’

Boccaccio’s ‘Decameron’

Homer

Ovid

Plato

Virgil

The Bible

What fraction of the population was killed by the Black Death in 14th century?

1/3

When was Thomas a Beckett assassinated?

1170

What was the average number of pregnancies a woman had?

5-7 (seen as commodities from childbearing/satisfying needs)

How did Eve impact the perception of women in Medieval society?

seen as evil, used by men to justify abuse by saying they were punishing Eve (Chaucer progressive in viewing this as degrading and perceiving genius and subtlety of female mind)

Who did Chaucer marry and what was her position?

Phillippa Roet, above his class

What was Chaucer’s marriage like?

worked for different members of royal household so apart a lot but had 2 children and long lasting union

Which misogamous text was a contemporary source for Chaucer?

Deschamps’ ‘The Miror de Mariage’ (1398)

Quote from Deschamps about women being deceptive:

“This is the way she lies, twists, this is the way she deceives”

Which genre of French poetry is prolific in the poem?

Courtly Love

Why was courtly love deemed slightly subversive?

It was passionate contrasting the usual transactional marriage, it also gave women choice and control over their lover and advocated chivalry in men to woo unattainable women

Who thought up the Wheel of Fortune and what does it mean?

Boethius in ‘Consolation of Philosophy’

Usually female gendered, means gifts fleeting - if pin hopes on must realise risk, the wheel must turn so aspire to higher things e.g. God not temporary earthly things

Who is Priapus?

Minor rustic fertility god in Greek myth, protector of gardens and male genitalia

Why are Pluto and Proserpina significant?

Represented winter/spring and death/rebirth like January and May

Rape story adds irony to Pluto’s words

Dissonance when discussing Christian authorities

Why are references to the story of Eden significant?

About women succumbing to temptation in a garden

why are references to the Song of Solomon significant?

very erotic poems interpreted to be about Christs love and the church but misinterpretation by January and the Merchant makes them foolish

Who is Marchan and why is he referenced?

a poet, who wrote about the wedding of Philogie and Mercury

Why is the Roman de la Rose a significant text?

French medieval allegory based on Courtly love tradition, the poets love from his lady where she is represented as a rosebud in a beautiful garden and is unattainable - January’s attempt to reproduce this garden is an example of his hubris and his richly deserved downfall

What is the significance of the Decameron?

100 stories not 24, basis for the Canterbury Tales

Similarly features a wife cheating on her husband in relation to a tree - she convinces him the tree made him think he saw her sleeping with her lover, he believes but chops down the tree