{"product_id":"gower-john-1","title":"GOWER, John.","description":"\u003cp\u003e.Fine, unsophisticated copy, virtually unpressed, of the third edition of this milestone of medieval English poetry (despite its Latin title), once as successful as  The Canterbury Tales  and  Piers Plowman . What is known about the life of John Gower (1330-1408) comes mostly from his works, written in French, Latin and English, employing allegory to tackle moral, religious and political questions. His English vocabulary shows Kent and Suffolk influence. This edition of the  Confessio    his most successful work   is a close reprint of Berthelet s (1532), based on a ms collated with Caxton s edition. (Pforzheimer II, p.411). Berthelet s dedication to the reader is a literary essay which explains how the work originated, i.e., from a conversation with King Richard II in the 1380s; it also  canonises  Gower by mentioning his acquaintance with Chaucer, who dedicated his  Troilus and Criseyde  to him, and his rich tomb at Southwark Cathedral. . \u003cbr\u003e\n. \u003cbr\u003e\n..The Prologue summarises Gower s desire to produce a book  somewhat of lust, and somewhat of lore , to elicit the interest of a varied readership. Like Boethius s  De Consolatione , it is a work of consolation and meditation; like Chaucer s  Canterbury Tales  and Boccaccio s  Decameron , it presents a myriad of delightful, short exemplary stories on sundry topics, populated by interesting characters. The narrative frame is the confession of an ageing lover to the chaplain of Venus, the epilogue being assigned to the goddess herself. The short stories are told by the confessor to explain moral points during their conversation: e.g., against arrogance, lust, sexual violation or vain glory, and in defence of chastity and continence. For instance, one tells the story of King Antiochus  incestuous passion for his own daughter, whom he violated after his wife s death. Interestingly, Part VII is devoted to the best  regimen sanitatis  according to Aristotle, the well-being of the soul linked to the well-being of the body. It includes a verse summary on the subcategories of philosophy, including music and mathematics, the elements, humours, organs, terrestrial geography, the planets, zodiac and constellations. The c1700 annotator wrote an amusing comment on Gower s description of the horses pulling the Sun s cart through the heavens, suggesting  it may be he [Apollo] has got a new set of horses since Ovid s days  to highlight a discrepancy with the source. He also glossed two pages on stars and their corresponding minerals and herbs, marking the herb called  Annabulla  (i.e., Annabella, sage) as probably  an allusion of the printer s to H[enry] 8[th] s time . .\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"GOWER, John.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57868673319247,"sku":"L4032","price":42500.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1016\/2425\/0703\/files\/L4032-4-4-1.jpg?v=1781793657","url":"https:\/\/sokol-books-ltd.myshopify.com\/products\/gower-john-1","provider":"Sokol Books Ltd","version":"1.0","type":"link"}