This new collection of specially commissioned essays on Chaucer’s poetry is a single-volume guide to the best and most inventive work in Chaucerian studies today. The first such book written with American undergraduate and graduate students in mind, The Yale Companion to Chaucer provides up-to-date information on the history and textual contexts of Chaucer’s work, on the ranges of current critical interpretation, and on the poet’s place in English and European literary history. With close readings of major texts, the book offers ample material for studying philology, history, and textual criticism as they bear on Chaucer’s work in particular and medieval literature in general. Both interpretation and information are presented, and each essay is accompanied by a detailed bibliography and guide to further study and research.