{"collection":"Sacred Texts: Legends and Sagas","full_text_available":false,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/sacred_texts_v1_neu_eng_mect_mect60_htm/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/sacred_texts_v1_neu_eng_mect_mect60_htm","id":"sacred_texts_v1_neu_eng_mect_mect60_htm","license":"unknown_pending_legal_review","rights_basis":"sacred_texts_v1_preview_gate_primary_text_only; acquisition-method/ToS and compilation-copyright questions still open, not resolved by this gate","source":"sacred_texts_v1","source_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/neu/eng/mect/mect60.htm","summary":"This is a passage from Book 3 of Geoffrey Chaucer's *Troilus and Criseyde* (late 14th century), a Middle English narrative poem in the courtly love tradition, loosely adapted from Boccaccio's *Il Filostrato*. The excerpt opens with an invocation to Venus and Love as cosmic forces governing all living things, then shifts to the long-anticipated scene where Troilus, bedridden and lovesick, finally confesses his devotion to Criseyde, mediated throughout by the scheming go-between Pandarus. Troilus, tongue-tied with shame and desire, can barely speak his prepared declaration, while Criseyde accepts his suit with measured dignity \u2014 granting her love but explicitly refusing to cede sovereignty, warning him she will rebuke him if he errs. Pandarus orchestrates the encounter with comic energy, weeping theatrically, prodding his niece, and exulting when the lovers finally embrace. The passage closes with Pandarus delivering a private, morally uneasy speech to Troilus in which he acknowledges the ethical compromise of having pimped his own niece, extracting a vow of secrecy to protect her reputation. Chaucer's distinctive contribution is the layered irony: the scene is romantic triumph and tainted manipulation simultaneously, and the narrator's knowing asides keep both registers alive at once.","tags":[],"text":null,"title":"The Canterbury Tales and Other Works of Chaucer (Middle E...","tradition":"Sacred Texts: Legends and Sagas","translated_text":null,"word_count":14802}