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It tells the story of a man who has lost his love and has been suffering from insomnia for eight years. In an attempt to alleviate these symptoms, the narrator reads Ovid's Story of Ceyx and Alcyone (from Metamorphoses), retold by Chaucer. This inspires the narrator to make a pact with Morpheus and Juno, and upon doing so he falls asleep and has a dream vision .
In the dream, the narrator first engages in a hunt for a hart (a pun on heart) and, following a stray puppy, discovers a fantastical forest and the Black Knight.
The Black Knight tells the story of and praises his departed love, the White Duchess, and in doing so enables the narrator to come to terms with his own grief; the composition of the poem has a therapeutic effect.
The poem is an allegory for John of Gaunt and his deceased wife Blanche; Gaunt was Chaucer's patron at the time.
Book of the Duchess, The