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Rhetorical Ductus In Chaucerian Ekphrasis, Emily Laura Pez

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

My thesis investigates how the rhetorical device of ekphrasis functions in Geoffrey Chaucer’s poetry, specifically The Book of the Duchess, The Parliament of Fowls, The House of Fame, and The Knight’s Tale. I argue that Chaucer’s ekphrases incorporate medieval memory techniques, which connect the ekphrases integrally to their respective texts. Chaucer’s early uses of ekphrasis in The Book of the Duchess and The Parliament of Fowls guide the audience’s interpretation and therefore contribute to the ductus, defined by Mary Carruthers as the text’s “overall direction” (“Concept of Ductus . . .” 196). In the …