The Canterbury Tales Geoffrey Chaucer

In her Prologue and Tale, the Wife of Bath attempts to undermine the current misogynistic conceptions of women. Her struggle against the denigration of women has led to many feminist interpretations of her Tale, most portraying the Wife of Bath as...

Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales introduces readers to several fascinating and dynamic characters. Perhaps the most fascinating of all is the Pardoner, whose prologue and tale are filled with irony. The Pardoner is a complex character whose...

In Geoffrey Chaucer's famous satirical poem The Canterbury Tales, the author describes a pilgrimage which commences in the town of Southwark and continues to the burial sight of Saint Thomas Becket. The pilgrims are quite an assorted lot,...

When the Miller proposes to "quite," or revenge, the Knight's tale in the Prologue to his tale (3127), he alters the host's use of the word "quite" (3119). Whereas the Host is asking the Monk to match the Knight's tale, the Miller wants to requite...

The Miller and Reeve's Tales of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, while being intricately crafted examples of the French genre fabliaux, differ significantly in both progression, resolution, as well as the tales' overall connotation and voice. While the...

Chaucer is renowned for his psychologically intricate character portrayals. The Pardoner, an irreverent character in Chaucer's framework narrative The Canterbury Tales, is an excellent example of just such a complex character. Although alcohol may...

Humour, introspection, and allegory aside, The Canterbury Tales stands alone as one of the greatest social commentaries in the history of the English language. Chaucer uses a collection of prologues and tales to explore the issues that lie at the...

The Knight, as the highest ranking member of the train of pilgrims, is chosen "whether by chance, luck, or destiny" (844) to tell the first of the Canterbury tales. When he finishes, the intoxicated Miller demands to go next, despite the Host...

Fifteenth-century England, in which Geoffrey Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales, was ruled by a Christian morality that had definite precepts regarding the ideal character and behavior of women. Modesty and chastity in both manner and speech were...

Canterbury Tales: The Power of Lust

Seven deadly sins. Eight tales. In Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer offers insight into human characteristics and actions. Of the seven deadly sins, lust remains a reoccurring characteristic in several tales....

The Wife of Bath is often considered an early feminist, but by reading her prologue and tale one can easily see that this is not true. In Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, the Wife of Bath believes that a wife ought to have authority and...

"He who influences the thoughts of his times, influences all the times that follow. He has made his impress on eternity."

--Anonymous, ThinkExist.com

Choice Verses Chance: A Boethian Reading of The Knight's Tale

For centuries, Geoffrey Chaucer's ...

Perhaps William Shakespeare is right: all the world may very well be a stage, with all the men and women being but mere players. What happens when, despite their exits and entrances, these actors play but one part? For lack of a complete character...

Based on several Chaucer scholars' analyses of the description of the Knight in the general prologue, it appears as though there are not two distinct schools of thought on the controversial character, but rather two "poles," with a significant...

Born in the year 1340, Geoffrey Chaucer's life took him through both the dredges and the peaks of medieval civilization. While serving in the retinue of Prince Lionel, Chaucer was captured by the French during the siege of Reims. Seven years after...

In "The Knight's Tale", Chaucer clearly draws on themes used by other writers, and is particularly influenced by the work of Giovanni Boccaccio. In Boccaccio's Teseida dell Nozze d'Emilia, he creates the character of Emilia, with whom the Theban...

Perhaps no medieval work of literature is as rich in the concept of games and play as Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The tales are framed by the very idea of a game, i.e. the game of telling stories while on a pilgrimage. However, the real games in...

The Middle Ages were marked by religious upheaval in Europe. Two new major world religions were coming to power: Islam and Christianity. The rapid success of Christianity led the Roman Catholic Church to become the dominant religious force in...

In The Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer uses the character traits of the clergy to exemplify the ideal character. Chaucer’s members of the clergy display ideal characteristics such as generosity, righteousness, and servitude....

There is no doubt that immoral people can spring from all walks of life, Tall, short, rich, poor and everything in between – any of these can fall victim to the vices of the human spirit. When sex and money mix, a potentially dangerous (but...

Bestselling American author Orson Scott Card once said, “Metaphors have a way of holding the most truth in the least space.” The Canterbury Tales were written over 600 years before Card made that profound statement, but clearly Chaucer would agree...

Carpenters are traditionally regarded as hard-working, rugged men with calluses on their hands and dirt beneath their fingernails. They are strong and silent; they take pride in their work and are generally self-assured. One of the main characters...

The “Clerk’s Tale” of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales can be seen as a mirror of society, where social classes have very noticeable tensions between them. This essay shall analyze the “Clerk’s Tale” by putting it in a socio-political context...

Geoffrey Chaucer’s <i>The Canterbury Tales</i> contain his trademark challenges to and reimaginings of the popular literary genres of his time. With each tale, Chaucer takes a common genre and follows its general conventions in order...