Review by Booklist Review
Gr. 6-10. This large, slender volume contains prose versions of seven of the tales: ``The Knight's Tale,'' ``The Miller's Tale,'' ``The Reeve's Tale,'' ``The Nun's Priest's Tale,'' ``The Pardoner's Tale,'' ``The Wife of Bath's Tale,'' and ``The Franklin's Tale.'' Hastings' retellings ring with graceful prose, though some might quarrel with the selection. ``The Miller's Tale,'' Chaucer's classic story of cuckoldry, is coarser than one might expect in a book whose full- color illustrations on every double-page spread suggest an intended audience of elementary- school children. Cartwright's illustrations feature shaded forms touched with bright, heraldic colors painted in a rather naive style, lightly echoing the art of Chaucer's day. His interpretation of the stories is literal, yet his storytelling finds expression through carefully constructed layers of color and formal compositions. With the recent Cohen/Hyman edition of the tales [BKL S 1 88], libraries now have two excellent choices for young people. For young people old enough to read Chaucer with (most of) the bawdiness intact and those who are drawn to the illustrations, this rendition will supply a good introduction to the tales. CP.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Like Charles Lamb's edition of Shakespeare, Hastings's loose prose translation of seven of Chaucer's tales is more faithful to the work's plot than to the poet's language. This is not a prudish retelling (even the bawdy Miller's tale is included here) but the vigor of Chaucer's text is considerably tamed. In the original, the pilgrims possess unique voices, but here the tone is uniformly bookish. The colloquial speech of the storyteller is replaced by formal prose; for example, while Cohen (see review above) directly translates Chaucer's ``domb as a stoon'' as ``silent as stones,'' Hastings writes ``in solemn silence.'' Cartwright's startling paintings skillfully suggest the stylized flatness of a medieval canvas, but often without the accompanying richness of detail. Like Punch and Judy puppets, the faces and voices of these pilgrims are generally representative but lack the life and charm of the original text. Ages 10-up. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
This unabridged edition features some of the BBC's best narrators giving voice to the outrageous personalities of Chaucer's motley crew of medieval pilgrims. Essential. (Audio Oldies but Goodies, ow.ly/6s5xH) (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 3 Up Hastings' retelling consists of seven tales, an introduction, a scene at The Tabard, and roughly two sentences introducing each teller: Knight, Miller, Reeve, Nun's Priest Pardoner, Wife of Bath, and Franklin. This smooth, easy reading version includes a simple illustrated index, cuts Chaucer's moralizing (not even Chanticleer's fox comments on his folly), and leaves much bawdry. ``The Miller's Tale'' is the best slapstick cuckoldry farce ever told, and ``The Reeve's Tale'' is a comedy of vengeful bed-hopping. Cartwright's primitive, thick acrylic illustrations, with selected parchment pages, recall medieval art. Even ink and type are careful choices. Too bad he didn't reread the original (i.e., Chaucer's Miller wears white with blue; Cartwright's is in green, scarlet, and blue, etc.). The picture book format belies the content, but the pictures don't. In ``The Miller's Tale'' the illustrations of Absalon branding the mooning Nicholas' bare buns, as nude Alison covers herself in bed while her husband falls into the scene, tell all. This is simplistic for high school and salacious for grade school, but could be great adult remedial reading. For children, try Cohen's fuller rendering (Lothrop, 1988), sans Knight, Miller, and Reeve, with Hyman's researched illuminations that make Cartwright's look stiffly muddy and tell more about The Tabard and the tellers than Hastings and Cartwright together. Helen Gregory, Grosse Pointe Public Library, Mich. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Burton Raffel has made two key decisions in his rendition of Chaucer's greatest work. While most editions stick to the half-dozen or so best-known storiesthe raunchy "Miller's Tale" and the proto-feminist "Wife of Bath's Tale" being the most popular with contemporary readersRaffel offers modern English versions of even such unfinished fragments as "The Squire's Tale" and such often-skipped sections as "The Parson's Tale." Few today will be burning to hear from the longwinded parson, but in general this unabridged edition is a delight. It lets you appreciate the masterful way Chaucer unifies his stylistically and topically diverse stories with a few overarching themes: the proper relationship between man and woman (the answer's not what you'd expect from a 14th-century civil servant), the role of the clergy (they're only human in his realistic portraits), the all-powerful impact of chance on our destinies. Having the full text also enables readers to enjoy the sly way Chaucer toys with them, allowing his raconteurs to interrupt their narratives with such tantalizing phrases as, "but nothing like that can be included here." The unabridged edition provides more opportunities to savor the counterpoint of Chaucer's earthy humor against passages of piercingly beautiful lyric poetry. That glorious languagethere's the rub in Raffel's second decision. Most modern editions of Chaucer include his Middle English text on the facing page; it's the simplest way to make sure readers know what's going on but still hear Chaucer's distinctive voice. Raffel's modern English captures to a large extent the polyphonic vigor of Chaucer's verse and prose. But he cannot capture Chaucer's voice. "When April arrives, and with his sweetened showers / Drenches dried-up roots, gives them power / To stir dead plants and sprout the living flowers / That spring has always spread across these fields," is lovely. Can it equal, "Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote / The droghte of March hath perced to the roote, / And bathed every veyne in swich licour / Of which vertu engendred is the flour"? Of course not, and it would be unfair to expect it. But it would be nice to look across the page from Raffel's lucid, lyrical rendition and be able to see the gnarled yet delicate taproot from which grew Shakespeare, John Donne and the King James Bible. You can't blame Raffel or Modern Library. An unabridged dual-language version would run more than 1,000 pages, making it prohibitively expensive and inaccessible to non-students who might want to use it somewhere other than at their desks. Keeping the oldest portions of our literary heritage alive for contemporary readers always involves compromise. If we lose some of the deepest levels of Chaucer's poetry here, we are partly compensated with the full sweep of his zestful, unsentimental understanding of human nature and his abiding love for all kinds of good stories. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
