Geoffrey Chaucer 
The Selected Canterbury Tales: A New Verse Translation 

‘A truly remarkable achievement.’ —Barry Unsworth

In the tradition of Seamus Heaney’s
Beowulf and Marie Borroff’s
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Sheila Fisher’s
The Selected Canterbury Tales is a vivid, lively, and readable translation of the most famous work of England’s premier medieval poet. Preserving Chaucer’s rhyme and meter, Fisher makes these tales accessible to a contemporary ear while inviting readers to the Middle English original on facing pages. Her informative introduction highlights Chaucer’s artistic originality in his memorable portrayals of surprisingly modern women and men from across the spectrum of medieval society.

About the author

Sheila Fisher is Professor of English at Trinity College (Hartford). She is the author of Chaucer’s Poetic Alchemy: A Study of Value and Its Transformation in The Canterbury Tales, and the editor (with Janet E. Halley) of Seeking the Woman in Late Medieval and Renaissance Writings: Essays in Feminist Contextual Criticism, as well as essays on the Gawain-poet, Julian of Norwich, and Margery Kempe.