The Tale of Youth

Chaucer has created many characters in the Canterbury tales that he likes and many he dislikes. He is a very critical and detailed writer about these characters. With these characters, Chaucer has created real life issues with religious figures. Chaucer’s has showed how good religious figures can be and how corrupt they can be as well.

The two tales, told by the Wife of Bath and the Clerk in The Canterbury Tales, have parallel plots. “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” begins with a

Throughout the Canterbury Tales, various characters are introduced and tell a tale, each of which tells a different story. All of the tales are unique and address different issues. “The Miller’s Tale” is the second of the many stories and varies from all of the rest. As seen from the “General Prologue,” Chaucer clearly depicts the Miller as a crude, slobbish man who will say anything. This reputation is held true as the Miller drunkenly tells a story full of adultery and bickering. Despite the scandalous nature of “The Miller’s Tale,” the story also displays some of Chaucer’s prominent beliefs. As “The Miller’s Prologue” and “The Miller’s Tale” are told, it becomes evident that Chaucer is challenging the common roles and behaviors of women, and he is also questioning the effectiveness of social class.

The prologues that link the various Canterbury Tales shift effortlessly from ponderous drama to light comedy. The lamentable tale of Griselde gives way to the Host's complaint about his shrewish wife. This prologue

By analyzing “The Canterbury Tales”, one can conclude that Chaucer did see the merits of the church, but by no means regarded it in a wholly positive light. Whereas some of the clergy are viewed as devout and God-fearing, others are viewed as con- men and charlatans. One can even venture to say that Chaucer was using this story as somewhat of a criticism of the church, showing the flaws of its leaders and the greed that permeated it at the time.

In terms of literary quality, Chaucer went great lengths to give all elements a bit of attention. The work is primarily about a knight who is pardoned from a rape on the condition that he acquires the answer to one of life’s

In Geoffrey Chaucer’s poem, The Knight’s Tale, the author encapsulates chivalrous characteristics in his telling of a battle for love. In its fundamental form, chivalry idealizes a knight’s conduct, both on and off the battlefield (Gregory-Abbott). Chaucer employs this “heroic code [of] bravery, loyalty, and service to one's lord” to illustrate the idillic knight throughout the narrative (Rossignol). Chaucer’s poem, The Knight’s Tale, exhibits the ideals of chivalry in the form of two knights, desperately in love with the same woman, and a wise Duke who embodies the voice of reason. Each knight upholds honor through compassion, troths, and heroism on the battlefield, despite their afflictions with each other.

In Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, a group of travelers set out on a religious expedition called a pilgrimage. In the prologue of the story, Chaucer gives an eloquent description of each of the 30 characters taking part in this pilgrimage. With each description, a clear and present tone of Chaucer’s attitude of the character becomes apparent. The Yeoman, a character in the book, has a tone of mockery and sarcasm directed to him.

In The Canterbury Tales the author, Geoffrey Chaucer, introduces twenty-nine characters who are taking a pilgrimage to Canterbury. He uses direct and indirect characterization in order to describe the characters’ personalities, as well as to portray the characters either critically or favorably. Chaucer successfully demonstrates his criticism of the Miller and Pardoner’s immoral, deceiving personalities through descriptions of their physical characteristics and actions in “The General Prologue”; he further displays their personalities in the individual prologues and tales. Chaucer views the Pardoner critically, which is shown by Chaucer’s numerous insults throughout “The General Prologue”.

Geoffrey Chaucer has written many works of literature, most notably The Canterbury Tales in which he describes many unique characters in the General Prologue and then goes into greater detail with individual prologues and tales. Each tale has some subliminal message about the values which that character stands for. In the end Chaucer intends for us to mock these characters based on the evidence brought forth by their respective tales. Two tales that have very powerful messages are The Wife of Bath Tale and The Pardoner’s Tale.

Geoffery Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales is a collection of twenty four satirical stories which reflect the faults of medieval society. A reoccurring topic throughout the work is the idea of church corruption. Chaucer conveys the corruption in the character analysis of the Monk and the Friar, and in some of the key elements of “The Summoner’s Tale”.

In The Canterbury Tales, the poet-pilgrim stories written by Geoffrey Chaucer, tells a touching commentary of religious and political tales. We believe that Chaucer is the narrator of every character’s tale while traveling on the journey to the shrine of Saint Thomas a Becket. The characters on this journey were of various lifestyles. Their reasons for their pilgrimage and their expectations vary as each tale is told. Two characters that can relate and then be the opposite of each other were the Parson and the Pardoner.

In Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain, she writes about her experiences during the first World War. The story gives an in-depth perception of the hardships that she encountered and how they led to her strong ambition as well as views on war. Many of these hardships, especially the losses of her loved ones drove her ambition and contributed greatly to her success. Another important aspect of Testament of Youth is how strongly against war Brittain became due to the tremendous injustice and high mortality rates that stemmed from the war. The effects of the war itself was a direct cause of the ambition and pacifist view that Brittain had which she then used to move forward and find success in her days to come.

The Medieval Period in history brought along scores of fables about everything from knights engaging in courtly love to corruption in the Catholic Church. The Canterbury Tales written by Geoffrey Chaucer expertly encapsulates many of the great motifs of the era. The Tales are a series of stories and descriptions of characters of all social classes that were composed in the late 1300’s. Chaucer utilizes a multitude of literary techniques to convey his personal views of people, and ultimately, what they represent in society. The author uses such devices when depicting two morally contrasting characters, the Parson and the Summoner, that are documented in the Prologue.

So we may dismiss him without ceremony, and imagine ourselves face to face with Chaucer; his is the all-pervading geniality and sly elvish humour of this sparkling tale” (Pearsall 39). Personally, I find this position to be almost as far-fetched as that of Broes. We have seen, quite consistently, throughout the various tales that Chaucer plays an intricate, even slightly devilish, game of hide and seek with the reader. No single character can be said to represent Chaucer, just as Chaucer never completely enters the psyche of his creations. In fact, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. Of course, it is curious that we know so little about the Nun’s Priest. However, perhaps we might conjecture that this vagueness is a deliberate strategy. In other words, because we know so little about the Nun’s Priest, our ability to enter into the realm of the tale is unclouded by our preconceptions, or misconceptions, of this pilgrim. Too often, we have a tendency to judge the tale based on our liking or disliking of the particular pilgrim whose portrait remains indelibly printed on our impressionable minds. By withholding the portrait, Chaucer affords us a chance to really read the tale. Indeed, if we are to speculate at all, then we might be tempted to identify with this anonymous “Sir John” who is seemingly mocked, albeit gently, even by Chaucer: “And right anon his tale hath he attamed,/And thus he seyde unto us everichon,/This sweete preest, this goodly