Interesting points - but I think it rather stretching it to turn Chaucer
into a Lollard ( one must separate the movement in its theological, social,
political, European etc. etc. ramifications - certainly, from the evidence
of the Lollard Sermons published a few years back by the EETS and Wycliffe
himself, it's questionable whether there was any such existing single, ideal
thing as a 'Lollard'.)
Questionable, also, whether Chaucer could've figured such a thing as a
'Semite or the theory of race or blood implied in it ( the word only arose
in English in the first half of the nineteenth century and specified, as it
still does in rigorous usage, Arabs, Hebrews, Assyrians, etc. - indeed, not
all Jews are semites....) Chaucer was anti-Jewish, from the evidences of the
Prioress' Tale, and possibly held to the historical reality of the Blood
Libel; 'Anti-Semite' is just pure anachronism.....
Vis-a-vis the Yeats' postings - does the edition note the editing, by Yeats,
of his earlier poems, altering their nationalism? ( A friend has recently
done a dissertation on this point, saying that it's a subject not largely
discussed (?))
CGHughes
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