What Is The Importance Of The Pardoner's Speech In The Canterbury Tales

This is expected to produce an outburst of laughter and the Pardoner is played like an expert comedian. He builds up the semantics line by line to keep his audience amused. He does this at the expense of the clergy as he ridicules them, making a mockery of priests by preaching their immorality and not taking their authority seriously. Chaucer

In the late 1300s Geoffrey Chaucer began wrote The Canterbury Tales, a story which follows the religious journey of twenty-nine people, who represent many aspects of Medieval society, to the Canterbury Cathedral in southeast England. While on the pilgrimage the host of the tavern, where all the pilgrims meet, suggests that the pilgrims each tell a story for the group’s entertainment. Chaucer intended for all the voyagers to tell two stories, but he unfortunately died before he could finish the book and only got to write one story apiece. However, the goal of the storytelling contest is to tell the most moral story possible, and the one who wins receives a free meal, which the rest of the pilgrims will pay for. Although some of the other stories have good moral messages, “The Pardoner’s Tale” and “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” are on different ends of the moral spectrum. “The Pardoner’s Tale” focuses on a pardoner who preaches against greed. While “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” exemplifies what all women want in their relationships: power. Although both “The Pardoner’s Tale” and “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” demonstrate the value of the opinion of elders, the stories differ in their moral values and their storyteller’s values.

A dishonest clergyman could easily prey on the insecurities of the population in order to profit from the sale of false relics. The Pardoner, similarly, is only “fixed on what [he stands] to win” (PP 75). Perhaps this suggests that the corrupted character has little else on his mind, wishing only to cheat the devout and turn a greedy profit; he thinks of nothing but of his personal gain. He “won’t do any labor with [his] hands,” but his greedy heart intends to live the life of the most well-to-do (PP 114). The Pardoner’s sermons, preaching the ills of avarice, condemn the sin of which he is guiltiest.

The Miller's Tale" is the story of a carpenter, his lovely wife, and the two clerks (students) who are eager to get her into bed. The carpenter, John, lives in Oxford with his much younger wife, Alisoun, who is something of a local beauty. To make a bit of extra money, John rents out a room in his house to a poor but clever scholar named Nicholas, who has taken a liking to Alisoun. Another scholar in the town, Absolon the parish clerk, also has his eye on Alisoun.

He begins by telling people that “the love of money is the root of all evil” (Chaucer) then tries to convince them to give him their money in order for him to forgive their sins. His intelligence is also shown when he talks about the stories he tells in order to get people's money, "when I preach in churches, I strive for a resounding voice, and I ring it out as round as a bell, for I know by heart all that I say. My theme is and always was one and the same: Radix malorum est cupiditas” (Chaucer). The Pardoner's

Hypocrisy is a common attribute attributed to many of Chaucer’s religious characters in The Canterbury Tales. They are greedy, drunks, and people without a moral code. In The Pardoner’s Tale this theme is exemplified. The Pardoner is greedy and drunk. Matthew 19:24 (ESV) says, “Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” Despite this, the Pardoner’s only goal is to scam as many people as he can with his “pardoning” of sins. The Pardoner would pretend to have objects blessed by the Vatican and sell them to people as an indulgence for future sins. It is doubtful that any of his objects had even been to Rome. Therefore, when the Pardoner starts his tale, it is one full of hypocrisy and deceit. Arguably, Chaucer’s grievance was not specific to the Pardoner. Rather, Chaucer used this character to make a wider point about the corruption of religion during the fourteenth century.

The Pardoner is a renaissance figure that wanders the lands in hopes of bringing forgiveness to those in need. This Pardoner is a bad pardoner among the other pardoners. The tale that he tells is a moral one that is suppose to bring about the desire from people to ask for forgiveness. Instead the Pardoner uses this tale as a way of contracting money from his fellow pilgrims. The Pardoner is a person that is suppose to practice what he preaches. What that person does affects those that look up to that person. The Pardoner must be able to tell of tales that bring about hope. The way in which that might happen is through example. If the pardoner is unable to produce a tale that convinces the audience of

The pardoner is a man who preaches and pardons of a person's sins “for greed of gain”, and he openly admits his “covetousness” in “The Pardoner's Tale”(Lines: 2 & 11). This man is a hypocrite and he just does not care. In the “Prologue Tale” the narrator says, “by his flatteries and prevarication” he is able to convince and con people for his own greed and satisfaction(Line:175). Also, in “The Pardoner’s Tale” he is only about one thing and that is to assemble money. He will go as low as to take money from “the poorest lad or the poorest village widow, though she had a string of starving children, all agape” just to fill his pockets (Line:27-29).

Plain and simple, the Pardoner is a self-centered, greedy human being whose motive is to take from the poor and personally benefit from their contributions. What the Pardoner does is travel from town to town giving pardons, which forgives people of their sins and allows them to enter the Kingdom of God. Though this seems like an honest trade, he adds a sickening twist to it. The Pardoner shares, “I preach for nothing but the greed of gain and use the same old text, as old as brass, and thus I preach against the very nice. I make my living out of avarice.”

The pardoner does whatever it takes to get money from is listeners, which includes lying, and tricking them into buying “relics” in bottles. He sells these bottles claiming them to be some kind of miracle cure, “Where there is a pox or scab or other sore/all animals that water at that well/are cured at once…And it’s a cure for jealousy as well…” (260). He is never going to see these people again so he says whatever it takes to get their money. “That tricks been worth a hundred marks a year/since I became a pardoner, never fear” (260), he tells the people whatever they want to hear in order for them to buy into his scheme, he has no real care for the people or his job. He refers to his life as a game, because he travels to

Throughout “The Pardoner’s Tale”, the main character teaches about greed, gambling, desecration, and drinking, but in the beginning he admits to committing these sins himself. One of the portrayals of hypocrisy, in the

The Pardoner use deceit and lies to pray on the poor and innocent, his characterization represents the churches misuse of its vast power. Chaucer fortifies this idea when he describes the Pardoner as “And thus I preach against the very vice/I make my

The life of King Tutankhamun Was very short and underwhelming. However, King Tutankhamun set a record for Egypt's youngest pharaoh. In his power he did make a few changes that af effected egypt as of today. The life of Pharaoh Tutankhamun was one of great interest to our world from his early life, to his time in power, and his death/ burial.

“That trick’s been worth a hundred marks a year/ Since I became a Pardoner, never fear…And tell a hundred lying mockeries more”(242). The epilogue of “The Pardoner’s Tale” provides a final view of the teller, who is not concerned with truth or morality. Is there any good at all in the Pardoner? Even though the Pardoner provides his services because of his greed, he knows intuitively that all those around him require spiritual and moral guidance. He is able to turn the villagers he dupes away from their greedy ways by telling them a story of death and destruction.

Chaucer’s Pardoner is a highly untrustworthy character. He sings a ballad with the Summoner and is already undermining the already challenged virtue of his profession as one who works for the Church. He presents himself as someone who is unclear with their gender and sexual orientation and challenging social norms. The Pardoner carries with him on the pilgrimage the tools of his trade. Within his case is a freshly signed papal indulgences and a sack of false relics, including a brass cross filled with stones to make it seem as heavy as gold and a glass jar full of pig’s bones that he passes off as saints’ relics. Visiting relics on pilgrimage had become a tourist industry and the Pardoner wants to gain money from religion in any way he can.