Structure

Abstract

Abstract This chapter analyses how aspects of the ‘double sorrow’ in Troilus and Criseyde make Chaucer’s accomplishment in form and five-book structure part of the poem’s commentary on its subject. One chapter-section sets out how Chaucer’s fashioning of a symmetrical structure works with the rise and fall in the lovers’ fortunes, with doublings and inversions matching each other across the poem’s mid-point at the lovers’ greatest happiness together. The following section explores the structure provided by the poem’s references to the social and architectural setting of the action, particularly as this influences possibilities for privacy and secrecy. Next comes analysis of the role played by narrative plotting of time, in a mixture of detailed chronology and studied ambiguity. A final section explores the poem’s references to the state of the heavens in relation to the narrative, concluding by reviewing interpretations of the ascent of Troilus’ soul.