Essay about Middle Vs. Modern English in the Canterbury Tales

the Church doesn’t appreciate those who are truly dedicated to Christianity but gives the special privileges to those who have power and greed. Maybe because of the general voracious circumstance of the Church, most of the Churchmen in Chaucer’s Tale are not holy or even moral in life. They put the traditional Christian rules behind and do things that are clearly forbidden in either Bible or in St. Benedict. The monk, as an example, thinks hunting and eating are the biggest fun in life. Hunters…

correlation is how sly they both are and how they like to gossip. I am pretty positive Chaucer meant for the Old Hag to be related to the Wife of Bath for the different reasons I have explained. It is still odd how the character made it into Canterbury Tales but interesting all the same; The Wife of Bath’s story best describe whom she herself actually is. Chaucer’s portraits of the clergy and church related position show evidence of a religious system full of corruption and hypocrisy. Examine in…

focuses her tale to tell of how she believes one should go about marriage- much like a business transaction. “By accepting the reduction of female sexuality to an instrument of manipulation, control and punishment” the wife gets what she wants through withholding sex. (Aers 148). The wife’s character in The Wife of Bath ultimately argues for Chaucer’s skewed representation of love, sex and marriage as seen in the Canterbury Tales. The manifestation of Chaucer’s perceptions lie in the actual tale as well…

particularly fitting when one approaches the Canterbury Tales: Chaucer's conscious emphasis on social class, combined with a modern reader's lack of familiarity with the economic conditions of Chaucer's work, requires almost any explicator of Chaucer's work to indulge, to some degree, in Marxist criticism. In her essay "The Franklin as Dorigen," Susan Crane blends Marxist and feminist approaches to point out links between the Franklin and the heroine of his tale. The heroine of romance, she notes, "occupies…

The Miller was a very big and strong man, that , stated in The Prologue to The Canterbury Tales, “Could win the ram at any wrestling show”. He was Broad, Knotty , and Short-Shouldered. It also says he could “Heave any door off hinge and post, Or take a run and break it with his head.” The Millers’ beard was red, and very big and thick, and his nose had a wart on the end, with red hairs protruding out of it. His nostrils were black and very wide. He wore a sword and a buckler at his side,…

"holy-men" prove inconsistent is the vow of simple living. The Monk lives a rather lavish lifestyle, as Chaucer tells, "The Rule of good St. Benet or St. Maur/ As old and strict he tended to ignore;/ He let go by the things of yesterday/ And took the modern world's more spacious way." The monk enjoyed the comforts of good living, with fur-lined clothing, a fine horse, and first class meals. Likewise, the Friar enjoyed fine clothing, as Chaucer says, "Not then appearing as your cloistered scholar/ With…

the stealing, or even the greed itself. Chaucer leaves it up to the readers to make their own conclusions. The Canterbury Tales also present a number of shockingly bizarre for their time descriptions of lust and adultery. In a lot of stories old men in their sixties are shown having young wives, which was probably common in Chaucer’s times. In one example, from the Merchant’s tale, old January, unwilling to die single, decides to marry, but demands that his wife must be younger than twenty. Later…

If his tale gets away from him, then the once harmless stick will become the fire that consumes his knightly image and respect. However Harry meant it, the Knight decides that "welcome be the cut" (856), and he dives into his tale. "The soothe is this, the cut fil to the Knight; / Of which ful blithe and glad was every wight," (848). Certainly, it is most reasonable that the first to tell a tale be the Knight, since in the company's eyes he is the most respectable figure of social degree. He…

on Arcite's and Palamon's fervent love of Emelye; an example of the folly of age, rather than the wisdom that was developed in Theseus; and, of course, set up as the climax's 'fall guy'. Farce is the most obvious form of humour in the Miller's Tale, but I think irony is the most important. Chaucer plays off text against text to great ironic effect, both inter and extra-textually. In fact, the carpenter is a perfect ironic antidote to the Miller's advice of the Prologue. We read there that the…

Hodges, featured in April 1995 edition of The Chaucer Review, Hodges examines the reasons behind Chaucer's decisions on the clothing of his Knight. After examining the introduction of the Knight's character in the General Prologue of the Canterbury Tales, Ms. Hodges said that Chaucer intended his Knight to be the one true to life portrait of a knight of the 14th century-an every knight of sorts. She also concluded that Chaucer wanted to go against the normal chivalric ideal of a knight by presenting…