The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer can be understood as a text that criticizes glossing and those who gloss. In this case, glossing a text is the comments, explanations, and interpretations one infers from reading the piece of literature and the understanding that can be taken away from it; this is different for every individual who reads the written word. I believe Chaucer wrote some of these tales as a critique of certain figures in his society. The question one should ask when reading, or being read to, is what is the meaning behind the text and where does the meaning lie. When, directly, reading a text one can determine the meaning of the author through one’s own interpretation. When one is being read to, they are being given the information in a biased form; this prevents one from being able to interpret the text for oneself and leads to the audience being glossed, as well as the text, and Chaucer criticizes the crowd’s contentedness to be glossed at and to.

Written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the fourteenth century, The Canterbury Tales is a poetic masterpiece. This work is rather unique because of its format and use of satire. The story is a framed narrative, a story within a story. The outer frame is a pilgrimage to the shine of Saint Thomas Becket, the martyred Archbishop of Canterbury. This journey is made by thirty pilgrims, including Chaucer the Pilgrim, who vary in social standing, ranging from aristocrat to peasant but excluding royalty and serfs. Chaucer often utilizes satire to draw attention to how well or how poorly suited a pilgrim is to his or her social status. The pilgrims gather at the Tabard Inn in Southwark, England, outside London. Harry Bailly, the owner of the Inn, proposes a story-telling contest among the pilgrims to keep them entertained along the pilgrimage. He offers to accompany the pilgrims at his own expense in order to judge the contest. The plan is for each of the thirty pilgrims to tell four tales, two on the ay to the shrine and two on the journey home. The individual tales comprise the inner frame. Of the proposed 120 tales, the story that is considered most entertaining and most moral will be selected as the winner. The teller of that story will receive a dinner at the Inn upon his or her return at the expense of the other pilgrims. Despite the planned 120 tales, only twenty-two full tales and two fragments exist. One completed tale, told by the Wife of Bath, epitomizes Chaucer’s uncanny ability to match each tale to its teller.

However, even he is not to be excluded from the Seven Deadly Sins, perhaps something that Chaucer was attempting to tell his readers: no one can escape from living in sin. Though the Knight is described as living in “Truth, honour, freedom and all courtesy” (Chaucer, Line 46), he is also full of pride from his previous battles and honorable meetings, some of which have the feeling of being fabricated to preserve his own self-esteem. He is known for his battles “At Alexandria,… Latvia….Russia….Granada...” (Chaucer, Lines 51, 53, 54, 56), which he has quite obviously been telling everyone about in his short time with the pilgrims. Therefore, it could be said that the Knight is prideful of these achievements, making him guilty of this deadly sin. The Knight shows that it is entirely possible to a great person at heart, but still be condemned of one of the many things considered to be a sin. Although many are great of moral stature but corrupted by sin, the same could not be said for The Summoner, who was gluttonous in all he did and a generally terrible human

Immorality and moral ambiguity are two concepts that will ruin any relationship. In Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, he specifically illustrates through his pilgrims’ stories some comical and realistic events that display immorality in the Middle Ages. There are several characters whose stories are focused on presenting the immorality within their tales. Like that of “The Miller’s Tale,” and “The Merchant’s Tale.” Chaucer utilizes these tales to display one specific immoral act, which is sexual sin or lust. Chaucer addresses the seven deadly sins in his novel; The Canterbury Tales, lust can be highlighted in two major tales “The Miller’s Tale,” and “The Merchant’s Tale” which help display key elements of the immorality in the

The Canterbury Tales, an anthology or collection of short stories was written by Geoffrey Chaucer, as he participated in the pilgrimage to Canterbury with 29 other pilgrims by his side. During their travels, each of them are responsible for telling four tales; and the pilgrim which tells the best tale will receive dinner by the group. As four stories are to be told by each of the pilgrims, each tale differs significantly as well as the themes of each. “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” and “The Knight’s Tale” do share common characteristics, by building off of the ideas of the Knight’s Code of Chivalry. Whether humorous or representing the gravity of a person’s decision, Knight’s Code of Chivalry and Art of Courtly Love can be discovered in the two

Dustin Sarracino Ms. Morris English 12- 2nd period 5 December 2016 Chaucer’s Influence Through Writing Geoffrey Chaucer wrote multiple books, but his most famous writing is the “Canterbury Tales”. In the “Canterbury Tales”, Chaucer wrote about pilgrims going on a pilgrimage to the Canterbury cathedral. The pilgrims were very diverse, ranging from monks and nuns to doctors and knights. Each pilgrim had a tale to tell while traveling to the cathedral, and through these tales, Chaucer identified multiple problems that were common during his era. Chaucer was a very harsh critic, but hid it behind comical sarcasm.

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer is a story of a contest who can tell the best tale. The rules of the contest were as follows: Each pilgrim would tell four tales for the trip to Canterbury, two on the journey there and two on the way back.. The tales will be judged by the Host for it’s entertainment and moral lessons. The winner of the contest will enjoy a meal paid for by the remaining pilgrims at the Host's Inn. “The Miller’s Tale” had fulfilled the criteria to win the contest. It was a shorter story, but it was entertaining and had a few lessons that can be learned from hearing or reading it. This story is significant because it does a great job of pointing out of some of the problems in the church during that time as well as how the morals of some people were not strong as well.

The Pardoner is another church class member that is described by Chaucer. Except, Chaucer has some strong feelings about this particular man. The pardoner sells pardons for sins, and also travels with the summoner while simultaneously singing a duet with him. This man seemed to be normal, until Chaucer describes this man as

Chaucer’s fundamental idea behind The Canterbury Tale’s was to expose the corruption in the Catholic Church. The feat was accomplished with Chaucer’s creation of characters from the same social class who opposed each other entirely which clearly expressed the basis for the work. Among the idealized were the Plowman, Parson, and Knight, while their respective counterparts were the Summoner, Friar, and Squire. Chaucer believed the true Christians were pure souls who sought out God’s word, engaged in good works, and fought for their religious beliefs which were characteristics embodied by each of the idealized pilgrims. Although thirty-two pilgrims took the esteemed journey to Canterbury Cathedral, only three were idealized (Plowman, Parson, and

Today's characters are much different than the characters in chaucer’s story The Canterbury Tales. Each adds something different to the journey but, what would it be like if there were more modern characters. They would still be important to the story but they would just have a little bit of a twist. How they dress and talk would be a big part of the story like it already is. The three characters that would add more to the pilgrimage would be Justin Bieber, Collin Kapernick, and Forrest Gump.

Following the fall of the great Roman Empire a new age was born, the age of knights in shining amour and the great kings in stone castles. Yet, it was also a chaotic time, War and plague was a disease upon Europe. Countries fought for land, resources, and above all, the attention of God. The world was young and so was the English Language. Few writers wrote in English, the language of the commoners, as French and Latin was the Language of the powerful élite. Yet one writer dared to speak against the feudal society of which he was born into. Geoffrey Chaucer served most of his life in the employment of the crown, as both a soldier and a clerk. Yet through all of these titles, Chaucer would be forever immortalized as Geoffrey Chaucer the

The Canterbury Tales are told in the passage of a Pilgrimage to Canterbury. We see that these characters all interact with one another, they all have different points of view on several topics. “The portraits [of the pilgrims] which appear in the General Prologue have a decided togetherness, that the portraits exist as parts of a unity” (Hoffman 492), Their actions and their tales should be thought about in context, who tells the tale, what is their age, what is his or her profession and how he or she interacts with other characters. They each have their own maistrie, they all have mastery over something that influences their own distinct personalities. Thus, how these personalities and maistries mesh with each other is incredibly important to further understand the tales themselves and the reasons behind why each character tells them. The tales themselves are merely parts of a bigger tale, the Canterbury Tales.

Literature is often times used by scholars as a window into the past. From describing cultural norms to affirming historical events, writing can be used for a variety of reasons. The Miller’s Tale, a story from the internationally renown The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, provides its audience with insight into the workings and views of society in 14th century England. The tale follows the mischief of a carpenter’s wife and her lovers who attempt to gain her affection. The wife, Alisoun, commits acts of adultery which drive the story to its climax, resulting in the majority of the characters, including Alisoun herself, being made fools out of themselves. The array of characters – Absolon, Alisoun, Nicholas, and John – represent four varying classes of society: the clergy, the women, the scholars, and the lower class, respectively. Chaucer’s characterization of these characters reflects their placements in the social hierarchy, providing insight into the social order and beliefs in England during the 1300s.

The Canterbury Tales was written by Geoffrey Chaucer in 1392, during the medieval period in Europe. Three important aspects, his family’s ties to the court, his schooling and working for royalty (XI), and his love for reading and learning (XII) all combined and enabled him to create his greatest work, The Canterbury Tales. Chaucer includes many different characters, pilgrims, all from very unique walks of life. Although there are not as many women included as men, their stories give some extraordinary insights on Chaucer’s views on the roles of men and women in medieval times. Christianity is the most common characteristic discussed, and clearly very important to Chaucer. The Prologue gives the reader a general over-view of each of the characters; he separates each character by his or her social class, religious life, and morality. The Prioress and The Wife of Bath tales further reveal his opinions on women 's roles and position in society. Chaucer makes it clear that men and women have very different roles and expectations; but they all either serve themselves, or others; and this is the trait that Chaucer uses to characterize a morally “good” or “bad” character, his characterization is not stipulated by social class or sex.

Geoffrey Chaucer had done many things including being a son of a merchant, page in the royal house, soldier, diplomat, and a royal clerk. Being all thing thinks he has seen quite of the world which helped him write “The Canterbury Tales” and through this piece of work he did entertains us. We consider this as a masterpiece that provides the best contemporary. He wrote a collection of stories to make a political point. He died before he was done righting all of his poems and short stories. Also Chaucer is known as the father of the English language not because he made it up it’s because he was the first person to spell it. It was the language of the lower class people who talked this language. In one of the poems he wrote called “The Canterbury Tales” there are 3 people that I think are my favorite.