[Next Project] The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

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Emma Sweeney

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Nov 11, 2022, 2:46:23 PM11/11/22
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While I'm finishing up Faerie Queene I would like get started on The Canterbury Tales.

The best edition in the public domain is edited by David Laing Purves. It contains some modernized spelling but retains some Middle English for meter. The footnotes help with learning Middle English words/phrases as you read. Project Gutenberg provides a transcription, but it will require a lot of work.

The transcription has removed all of the accent marks, but these are very important for meter and need to be restored. When the Canterbury Tales was written, the "e" at the end of certain words were pronounced, adding a syllable. Today, these "e"s are silent. Purves shows where the e is pronounced by marking with a diaeresis (ë). In the example, "The tender croppës, and the youngë sun" there are ten syllables in the line. Purves also uses the acute accent mark to show which words should be pronounced as dissyllables ("salvatión," "opinión,").

The PG transcription also needs all of the footnotes converted into endnotes. My guess is that there will be ~6,000 endnotes when I'm done.

This one will definitely keep me busy!

PG transcription: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2383/pg2383.html
page scans: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021


Emma

Emma Sweeney

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Nov 11, 2022, 3:01:35 PM11/11/22
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I found a painting for the cover. The first story is The Knight's Tale.

canterybury-tales-1.jpg


Emma

Alex Cabal

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Nov 12, 2022, 1:15:42 PM11/12/22
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Alex Cabal

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Nov 12, 2022, 1:18:02 PM11/12/22
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Looks good, thanks!

On 11/11/22 2:01 PM, Emma Sweeney wrote:
> I found a painting for the cover. The first story is The Knight's Tale.
>
> canterybury-tales-1.jpg
> Source link
> <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg>
> PD proof (p. 32)
> <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover>
> https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021>
>
>
> Emma
>
> --
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Emma Sweeney

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Apr 28, 2023, 6:53:35 PM4/28/23
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The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer is ready for review.


Notes:
  • There are a lot of accent marks! These are important for meter, forced rhyme, and eye rhyme.
  • I think this is the first book I've read involving farts... Fun fact: the Middle English word for fart... is fart.
  • se find-mismatched-diacritics shows many hits. These words have been checked and are correct.
  • All 5200 footnotes have been converted into endnotes.
  • The footnotes used quotes instead of italics. These have been changed.
  • The translations added by the PG transcriber have been removed.
  • I don't recommend running se modernize-spelling -n on this poem since it uses forced rhyme (mainly changing the normal spellings of words), eye rhyme, and Middle English words. For example, "Soudan" should not be changed to "Sudan" since it means Sultan. The tool wants to make a lot of these changes.
  • I didn't tag words as Middle English. The line between Modern English and Middle English is very blurry. It gets harder when there appears to be archaic meanings of words that we usually understand to mean something completely different. For example, wood = mad, furious, fierce vs. wood = mad, crazy (like wud)  vs. wood = logs vs. wood = forest. Not all Middle English words were given a footnote.


Emma

Alex Cabal

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May 1, 2023, 2:20:22 AM5/1/23
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Great work Emma, I don't have much to say about the production. Very
nice work on all of the endnotes, and your use of <dfn>. All of that
must have taken forever!

Can you flesh out the long description? You mention that it's an
important work - but why? I think there's a lot to say on that topic.

I also think it would be helpful to talk a little about differences in
the text across editions. Someone looking at our edition will quickly
notice that it differs significantly from other popular editions. But
why? This will also be helpful in heading off comments from the peanut
gallery in the future.

This is a long description that deserves to be detailed and
comprehensive I think - there's a ton to say about this extremely
important work.

On 4/28/23 5:53 PM, Emma Sweeney wrote:
> The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer is ready for review.
>
> repository link:
> https://github.com/EmmaSweeney/geoffrey-chaucer_the-canterbury-tales
> <https://github.com/EmmaSweeney/geoffrey-chaucer_the-canterbury-tales>
> page scans:
> https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021>
>
> Notes:
>
> * There are a lot of accent marks! These are important for meter,
> forced rhyme, and eye rhyme.
> * I think this is the first book I've read involving farts... Fun
> fact: the Middle English word for fart... is fart.
> * se find-mismatched-diacritics shows many hits. These words have been
> checked and are correct.
> * All 5200 footnotes have been converted into endnotes.
> * The footnotes used quotes instead of italics. These have been changed.
> * The translations added by the PG transcriber have been removed.
> * I don't recommend running _se modernize-spelling -n_ on this poem
> since it uses forced rhyme (mainly changing the normal spellings of
> words), eye rhyme, and Middle English words. For example, "Soudan"
> should not be changed to "Sudan" since it means Sultan. The tool
> wants to make a lot of these changes.
> * I didn't tag words as Middle English. The line between Modern
> English and Middle English is very blurry. It gets harder when there
> appears to be archaic meanings of words that we usually understand
> to mean something completely different. For example, wood = mad,
> furious, fierce vs. wood = mad, crazy (like wud
> <https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/wud>)  vs. wood = logs
> vs. wood = forest. Not all Middle English words were given a footnote.
>
>
>
> Emma
> On Saturday, November 12, 2022 at 1:18:02 PM UTC-5 Alex Cabal wrote:
>
> Looks good, thanks!
>
> On 11/11/22 2:01 PM, Emma Sweeney wrote:
> > I found a painting for the cover. The first story is The Knight's
> Tale.
> >
> > canterybury-tales-1.jpg
> > Source link
> >
> <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg>>
> > PD proof (p. 32)
> >
> <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover>>
> https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021> <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021>>
> >
> >
> > Emma
> >
> > --
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Emma Sweeney

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May 1, 2023, 3:50:15 AM5/1/23
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OK, I've expanded the long description. Let me know if it needs some more changes!

Emma

Alex Cabal

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May 1, 2023, 5:22:23 PM5/1/23
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Very good, I've released it. Thanks!
> https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021> <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021>>
> <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg> <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hans_Thoma_-_Einsamer_Ritt_(1889).jpg>>>
> > > PD proof (p. 32)
> > >
> >
> <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover> <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Hans_Thoma/1A4tAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22Hans+Thoma%22&printsec=frontcover>>>
> https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021> <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021>> <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021> <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021 <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hwhr9v&view=1up&seq=13&skin=2021>>>
> > >
> > >
> > > Emma
> > >
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> > >
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Robin Whittleton

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May 2, 2023, 1:53:44 AM5/2/23
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Congratulations Emma! This was on my to-do list for years but I could never bring myself to start it.

> On 1 May 2023, at 23:22, Alex Cabal <al...@standardebooks.org> wrote:
>
> Very good, I've released it. Thanks!
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to standardebook...@googlegroups.com.
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Vince

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May 2, 2023, 7:47:01 PM5/2/23
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Yes, hear, hear! It never made my to-do list, but only because I looked at a couple of years ago and ran away as quickly as I could. What an impressive feat, Emma!

David Grigg

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May 2, 2023, 8:28:20 PM5/2/23
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My congratulations, too. I'm in awe of some of these massive projects you've all done.
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