Two approaches of the same tale. A comparative interpretation of Troilus and Criseyde by Geoffrey Chaucer and Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare

In my thesis work I am going to deal with the two most famous interpretation of the love story of Troilus and Cressida. As my preconception is that the literary influence and the historical events of the age highly determine the nature of a work to be born, my intention is to look at the sources, which are used by the Chaucerian and Shakespearean versions. I will also examine those parts of the writers' historical backgrounds that are relevant in understanding the different points of views of the authors towards the same topic. Through the examination of the three protagonists I will prove that the significant divergences in the handling of them and in the treating of the whole plot root in the two hundred years that separated the writers' worlds. I will clearly demonstrate that the main dissimilarities between Troilus and Criseyde and Troilus and Cressida are caused by the differences of the worlds and world-concepts of the Chaucerian and Shakespearean ages.