Chaucer s The Canterbury Tales - 1306 Words

In Geoffrey Chaucer s The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer uses the climax of The Wife of Bath s Prologue to illustrate how through the influence of the church, the figure of the wife, was seen either as week or evil. Chaucer makes this point by using religious terms and imagery, like sister and smite, and the symbol of the lion. After establishing this point, he then shows how damaging this idea can be, by showing how hollow and disturbing the relationship between the wife and her husband becomes, when the husband is in the submissive role, through the use of homonyms and objective language. Chaucer quickly get s into the religious imagery in order to begin the shift of power between the Wife of Bath and her husband. Less than 10 lines in, Chaucer has the Wife of Bath compare her husband to a lion â€Å"And he up stirte as dooth a wood leoun, And with his fest he smoot me on the heed.† (Line 794-95) In the Bible, lions can both be good and evil. On one hand, they are frequently used as a simile for God. In Hosea 11:10, the roar of the lion is used to covey the power and righteousness of the word of God, â€Å"They shall go after the Lord; he will roar like a lion; when he roars, his children shall come trembling from the west;†. Yet, there are also several examples of the lion as an evil creature, in 1 Peter 5:8, the lion is compared to the devil, â€Å"Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.† Both examples liken aShow MoreRelatedChaucer s The Canterbury Tales1064 Words    |  5 PagesGeoffrey Chaucer, The Author of the Canterbury Tales, is known as the Father of English Literature and is one of the greatest English Poets of the Middle Ages. Chaucer was a soldier, a diplomat, a civil servant, and a courtier, enabling him to experience different aspects of each social ranking, which he demonstrated through his poetry. The Canterbury Tales, his most famous work, is a collection of short stories within a frame story, making for an interesting and memorable narrative about 29 pilgrimsRead MoreChaucer s The Canterbury Tales906 Words   |  4 PagesIn the general prologue to Geoffrey Chaucer’s, The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer reveals his dissatisfaction of the distribution of power and how that power was maintained in the Medieval England estate system, through the use of his physical description of each of the pilgrims and by the personality of specific members of each caste. To portray these characters and the flaws that they represent in actual me dieval society, Chaucer heavily relies on the use of irony to describe many of the travelers inRead MoreAn Analysis Of Chaucer s The Canterbury Tales 2650 Words   |  11 Pagesof Chaucer’s Miller in The Canterbury Tales In the prologue to The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer introduces the Miller as a crude, rude, loud character who cheats his customers. The tale, which the Miller later narrates, is appropriate because the Miller’s tale clearly reflects this individual’s unrefined personality by telling a typical, filthy tavern story. The Canterbury Tales, written by Geoffrey Chaucer, is a story that details thirty pilgrims, including Chaucer, traveling on a religiousRead MoreChaucer s The Canterbury Tales1634 Words   |  7 PagesIn The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer uses ambiguities when describing the pilgrims in the General Prologue. The Pardoner is a preacher described as a clean-shaven, feminine male who has stringy blonde hair with a high-pitched voice. More specifically, he is a greedy man who fools and flatters others to get money by doing Christ’s holy work and pardoning them of their evil greed and sin, yet, he is the epitome of greed (GP 688-91). everyone is virtuous, rather selfish, and can show throughRead MoreGeoffrey Chaucer s The Canterbury Tales1781 Words   |  8 Pagesrelationship and were wholly looked down upon. During these women s lifetimes, sovereignty was sought after but never fully achieved. Women were looked at as a way to please the man and someone to carry his child when time came. In modern time, the extremist who don t support equality among women and men are known as misogynists or anti-feminists. On the side of the spectrum, those who do support equality are known as feminists. Geoffrey Chaucer, who is by some considered a proto-feminist writer, is oneRead MoreThe Friar s Tale Of Geoffrey Chaucer s Canterbury Tales Essay1508 Words   |  7 PagesWalker Mr. Abel British Lit/comp. 7 November 2016 The Friar’s Tale Many pilgrims in Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales held a religious position. Some of these people’s personal ideas have caused debates and criticism over Chaucer’s opinion of the Catholic Church. Critics have discussed the ideas that were presented both subtly and openly. Two of the pilgrims and their tales will be discussed: the Prioress and the Pardoner. Both of these tales offer points of criticism in the Catholic Church. The PrioressRead MoreWilliam Chaucer s The Canterbury Tales942 Words   |  4 Pages Period 03 The Character Description For the past few English classes, we have been reading The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. Chaucer lived from 1342-1400, around the time of the Hundred Years’ War. He fought in this battle, was captured and then ransomed with money contributed by the English king, King Edward himself. After his military campaign, Chaucer became a court official. This required him to travel to countries such as France, Spain and Italy. In these placesRead MoreChaucer s Canterbury Tales And The Wife Of Bath s Tale1167 Words   |  5 Pagesimprove a part of society in a moral basis. The reason it targets a part of society is because didactic literature has an audience of origin that the moral applies to. For example, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales: â€Å"The Wife of Bath s Prologue† and â€Å"The Wife of Bath s Tale† , which is written by Geoffrey Chaucer, takes place during the late 5th and early 6th century during King Arthur’s reign of Great Britain. During this era, society was structured in a totally different manner than the society anotherRead MoreAnalysis Of Geoffrey Chaucer s Canterbury Tales Essay1670 Words   |  7 Pagesthemselves. This first exploit of trust can be found within Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. While the whole entire work exposes corruptions within the Catholic Church during Chaucer’s time, the breaking of trust is actually demonstrated within the Pardoner’s Prologue and Tale. At the end of the Pardoner’s tale, he offers the pilgrimage relics, for a fee of course. However, at the prologue of the Pardoner’s tale, the Pardoner himself has explained how the Catholic Church and other fellow pardonersRead MoreAnalysis Of Geoffrey Chaucer s The Canterbury Tales 1697 Words   |  7 Pages Geoffrey Chaucer Thinking of Geoffrey Chaucer one may only consider him as the author of The Canterbury Tales but like most authors they are not only their best works. Unfortunately for most late poets and authors their history isn’t much known, it is usually not documented in general. Yet fortunately for Chaucer he has worked for people who do get their history written about which makes his past a little more well known than other poets of his time. So of course with this there are biographies