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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
The influence of the Romance of the Rose upon Chaucer has been generally recognized, Chaucer scholars differ, however, concerning the extent and the time of this influence. The relatively older view (represented by Mr. E. G. Sandras in his Étude sur Chaucer, Paris, 1859) that Chaucer is an imitator of the Romance of the Rose who has never freed himself sufficiently from this influence to appreciate the greater art of his Italian model, seems now generally put aside by those who, following the lead of Mr. ten Brink, bring the English poet before us as having not only fully grasped the value of his Italian models, but as having actually surpassed at least some of them.
page 552 note 1 I first treated of the Influence of the Romance of the Rose upon Chaucer in a report for a seminar given by Professor John M. Manly at the University of Chicago several years ago. Though I did not in that report reach the results I now present, yet the intelligent direction then received has no doubt influenced the present paper, and it seems only fair to acknowledge my indebtedness.
page 555 note 1 The lines have been numbered according to The Complete Works of Geoffrey-Chaucer, edited by W. W. Skeat, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1900, and the edition of the Romance of the Rose, edited by Francisque Michel, Paris, 1864.
