This is the first of a series of posts on Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales (ca. 1390s).
PLOT/THEME/STYLE
Plot: the opening of this frame narrative is pretty simple. Thirty-one pilgrims meet in an inn on their way to Canterbury, the destination of a religious pilgrimage to visit St. Thomas A Becket’s grave. The narrator, himself a pilgrim, describes each of the pilgrims and explains the story contest the pilgrims will have on their journey.
It’s become clear to me that plot involves character, so it’s worth mentioning here that rather than getting a lot of plot, we get lots of character description. The narrator promises to describe how he told them apart, what social class they belonged to, and what kind of clothes they each wore. He follows through on this promise. We get proper names for some characters (the limitour is Huberd!), and we get some sense of how much each of these characters need spiritual regeneration.
Theme: The poem is set in spring, a time of natural renewal, and the constant meaning underneath the poem’s lines is spiritual renewal. From the descriptions we get of numerous characters, these pilgrims need some serious renewal.
Style: Chaucer’s tone is ironic. His narrator constantly gives you two and two and expects you to get four. His details are pointed. He wants us to see his characters’ faults, and by making his narrator a character in the tale, he gives the entire poem at a remove. In fact, he creates a frame narrative–a collection of stories contained by some unified principle–so that the major way we find out about each character is through their own storytelling. This General Prologue, then, is the longest character analysis we get of the narrator since the rest of the poem will be in the voices of the other pilgrims. I’d call the narrator’s style outwardly generously and subtly critical.
INTERPRETATION: Historical/Mythical/Rhetorical
Historical Criticism: Here are at least three important contexts for the work.
Religious Context: The poem was written in a Roman Catholic culture and represents the best and worst of that culture. On the one hand, the pilgrims are going on a spiritual pilgrimage to commemorate an honorable Bishop, Thomas a Becket, who was martyred because he called out the king’s corruption. On the other hand, many pilgrims who are connected with the church are entirely worldly. You can see why the Luther et al thought ecclesiastical reform was necessary.
Biographical Context: Chaucer was a government bureaucrat whose poetry was not his means of livelihood. Chaucer was so adept at governmental service that he managed to survive the reign of three kings before his death in 1399.
Cultural Context: The poem hints at the power of the Archbishop to heal people who are sick. In the late 14th Century, such sickness was not hypothetical. Earlier that century, the Black Plague had wiped out a significant portion of the European population. In the plague’s aftermath, there was social upheaval (The Peasants’ Revolt of the 1380s) and general unrest. The pilgrims represent a cross section of English nobility, clergy, and common-folk, and their common mortality lurks underneath their pilgrimage and individual tales.
Mythical Criticism: The prologue features two myths (stories) that loom large in Western Literature and the Bible to which that literature is indebted: the renewal myth and the quest myth. In the first, the poem connects spiritual rebirth with the cycle of the seasons. The first eighteen lines make this particular myth clear. In the second, the spiritual quest has as its intended result spiritual enlightenment. The journey to Canterbury matches the journey of the Christian on the road to heaven. Thomas Foster argues that the end of all quests is self-knowledge. I would argue here that the point of these pilgrimage/quests is the reader’s knowledge. Does the Wife of Bath learn anything about herself? Maybe. Do we learn something about ourselves? Certainly.
Each of the characters is mythical in that Chaucer is appealing to conventional types that are less historical than they are imaginative generalizations. I could have written a lengthy historical commentary on each of the 31 pilgrims. I could just as easily provide a lengthy post that details the literary conventions which these characters fulfill. The knight, friar, wife of Bath, and pardoner all fulfill larger cultural requirements: from a combination of physical courage and rhetorical courtesy to a flamboyant transgression of spiritual fidelity.
Chaucer’s poem had a significant impact on English literature. Chaucer not only receives his myths; he passes them on.
Rhetorical Criticism: The first eighteen lines are an unbroken sentence. They lines are florid and allusive in a way that’s out of keeping with the rest of the prologue.
Once we get to the character descriptions, we see Chaucer’s brilliant characterization and his way of hinting at faults without being hypercritical. Here’s a telling passage from the Prioress’s description
142 But for to speken of hire conscience,
But to speak of her moral sense,
143 She was so charitable and so pitous
She was so charitable and so compassionate
144 She wolde wepe, if that she saugh a mous
She would weep, if she saw a mouse
145 Kaught in a trappe, if it were deed or bledde.
Caught in a trap, if it were dead or bled.
146 Of smale houndes hadde she that she fedde
She had some small hounds that she fed
147 With rosted flessh, or milk and wastel-breed.
With roasted meat, or milk and fine white bread.
148 But soore wepte she if oon of hem were deed,
But sorely she wept if one of them were dead,
149 Or if men smoot it with a yerde smerte;
Or if someone smote it smartly with a stick;
150 And al was conscience and tendre herte.
And all was feeling and tender heart.
A Prioress is a kind of super-nun, and she’s the first member of the church we encounter. We expect glowing reviews of her charity and love for her neighbors. Instead, we’re told that she cries any time a mouse gets hurt (144) and that she makes sure to feed her dogs the best food she can (146-147). We’re left to decide if her “conscience and tendre herte” are authentic or misdirected.
Conclusion: This is a significant literary work built on a culture’s need for Christian spiritual renewal. The poem rewards close reading and though its language is difficult, it repays that hard work. I look forward to rereading and writing about the poem’s most popular tales over the coming weeks.
Experiments in Criticism 