Lines 1 to 49: the proem

Book ii begins with a proem added by Chaucer to his source. The narrating voice calls for the wind to help him make a metaphorical sea voyage away from Troilus’s suffering in Book i. The ship of his literary abilities has been navigating the stormy sea of his turbulent subject matter (namely the severity of Troilus’s sorrow in love). His vessel has found this ocean such hard going that the narrating first-person feels he can hardly steer (this admission being testament to how affected he is by Troilus’s suffering). Yet (because Pandarus has offered Troilus a way out of his despair) he now feels that the weather of his metaphorical journey has begun to improve and that the calends of hope are beginning. Calends are the first day of each new month (hence calendar), so here meaning the first days of a new emotion. The narrating voice next calls on Clio, the Muse of history, for assistance. From this point in the poem onwards, he hopes she will help him to compose his verse successfully. He claims he does not need to employ any other artistic know-how beyond the accuracy of a historian here (because, as he goes on to explain, his task is a limited one). To every lover who might read or hear his poem, he offers the excuse that he is not inspired by personal feelings or experiences to compose his poem (as is Boccaccio’s narrator). Instead, he maintains that he is simply translating the story from Latin into English (in keeping with his claim to be translating the work of the famed author Lollius). Thus, as a translator, he does not deserve either praise or criticism for his poem. He asks lovers not to blame him if they find any word of his story faulty, because he claims simply to be repeating what his source says.