Chaucer's Experiments in dreaming in “the book of the Duchess”

Abstract

Chaucer's “The Book of the Duchess” is usually read by critics as the poet's consolation to his patron, John of Gaunt, at the death of Blanche. They suggest that the poet's interest in talking face-to-face with Gaunt concerning the death of Blanche inspired the use of the poem's dream framework, thus contextualizing its consoling content. This view seems insightful; nonetheless, it restricts the poem's value to the poet's sociopolitical status in the English court. While it is undeniable that serving as a spokesperson of Gaunt may have influenced Chaucer's artistic choices in “The Book of the Duchess”, this paper argues that the use of dream framework represents the poet's experimentation in the science of dreams. The paper showcases how the poem represents a simulation of dream nature and mechanism(s), which reflects Chaucer's contribution to the classical and medieval heritage of sleep and dreaming. We read the poem as a composition of three main sections, namely the pre-dream stage, the dream experience, and the post-dream stage — a structure that enables the poet to show how to conjure up a dream, how to control its content, and how to narrate it. The paper concludes that the poem is an experimental treatise on dreaming, sleep mechanisms, and memory processes, which precedes the modern theories of dreaming developed by Freud and other psychologists.

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