Lines 1 to 49: the proem

Book ii begins with a proem added by Chaucer to hissource. The narrating voice calls for the wind to help him make a metaphoricalsea voyage away from Troilus’s suffering in Booki. The ship of his literary abilities has beennavigating the stormy sea of his turbulent subject matter (namely the severityof Troilus’s sorrow in love). His vessel has found this ocean such hardgoing that the narrating first-person feels he can hardly steer (this admissionbeing testament to how affected he is by Troilus’s suffering). Yet(because Pandarus has offered Troilus a way out of his despair) he now feelsthat the weather of his metaphorical journey has begun to improve and that thecalends of hope are beginning. Calends are the first day of each new month(hence calendar), so here meaning the first days of a newemotion. The narrating voice next calls on Clio, the Muse of history, forassistance. From this point in the poem onwards, he hopes she will help him tocompose his verse successfully. He claims he does not need to employ any otherartistic know-how beyond the accuracy of a historian here (because, as he goeson to explain, his task is a limited one). To every lover who might read or hearhis poem, he offers the excuse that he is not inspired by personal feelings orexperiences to compose his poem (as is Boccaccio’s narrator). Instead, hemaintains that he is simply translating the story from Latin into English (inkeeping 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 hispoem. 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.