pilgrims.
The tales are presented as contributions to a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims travelling from London to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket. Chaucer’s plan was to write two stories for each of the pilgrims, telling their tales both on the way there and on the return journey.
Who was Chaucer’s main audience?
Chaucer’s original audience was a courtly one, and would have included women as well as men of the upper social classes. Yet even before his death in 1400, Chaucer’s audience had begun to include members of the rising literate, middle and merchant classes.
What was Chaucer’s inspiration for The Canterbury Tales?
From the 1370s on, Italian poetry became the overriding influence for Chaucer’s work. Obviously familiar with the writings of Dante and Petrarch, Boccaccio especially was a major source.
Why did Chaucer choose to write The Canterbury Tales in English?
As an upper-class, well-educated person himself, Chaucer would have been able to write in various languages, but he chose to write The Canterbury Tales in the vernacular of his country that more people would understand and connect to.
Definition. The Canterbury Tales (written c. 1388-1400 CE) is a medieval literary work by the poet Geoffrey Chaucer (l. c. 1343-1400 CE) comprised of 24 tales related to a number of literary genres and touching on subjects ranging from fate to God’s will to love, marriage, pride, and death.
Who does Chaucer admire the most?
In his story titled “The Canterbury Tales” Chaucer seems to truly admire some of the pilgrims while displaying disdain and sarcasm towards the others. The pilgrims that he most seems to admire are the Knight, the Oxford Clerk and the Parson.
What did Chaucer write about?
Written at the end of his life, The Canterbury Tales is Geoffrey Chaucer’s best-known work. It is a collection of 24 stories told by a group of 30 pilgrims who travel from Southwark to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Thomas Beckett.
What is the message of The Canterbury Tales?
One of the main lessons throughout all of the tales and main story is that honor and honesty is valued. In stories like the Physician’s Tale, we see that the lying Appius who lusts after a young girl, is eventually caught for his lies and thrown in jail where he kills himself.
What does Canterbury symbolize?
Canterbury is the symbol of the celestial city: the and of life. The journey of the pilgrims becomes the allegory of the course of the human life.
What is the purpose and message of the Prologue to The Canterbury Tales?
The General Prologue is the first part of The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. It introduces the frame story, in which a group of pilgrims travelling to the shrine of Thomas Becket in Canterbury agree to take part in a storytelling competition, and describes the pilgrims themselves.
Why did Chaucer chose pilgrims to tell stories?
Why do you think Chaucer chose pilgrims to tell the stories? A pilgrimage would be the only time that people of these different social classeswould have the opportunity to interact. A pilgrimage would be the only time that people of these different social classes would have the opportunity to interact .
Who is the most moral character in The Canterbury Tales?
Match
- Geoffrey Chaucer. The British author of The Canterbury Tales.
- The Knight. a true, perfect knight; most respected, most moral; going to thank the saints for protecting him during battle.
- The Host, Harry Bailey.
- The Summoner.
- The Manciple.
- The Franklin.
- The Pardoner.
- The Nun’s Priest.
Who is the most ideal character in The Canterbury Tales?
Based on Chaucer’s analysis of each character, the most ideal characters in, The Canterbury Tales are the Knight from the ruling class, the Oxford Cleric from the middle class, and the Plowman from the peasant class; however, each social group also has a character who falls short of the ideal as established by the
What is your most loved tale in the Canterbury?
Perhaps the most famous – and best-loved – of all of the tales in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, ‘The Miller’s Tale‘ is told as a comic corrective following the sonorous seriousness of the Knight’s tale.
What themes did Geoffrey Chaucer write?
Class, lies, and religion are prominent themes in Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, a fifteenth-century English poem considered one of the most important books in English literature.
What is Chaucer’s style of writing?
Moreover, like much of Shakespeare’s work, Chaucer’s frame narrative is written in iambic pentameter, an unpretentious, conversational meter with alternate stresses.
What religion is The Canterbury Tales?
Written during a tumultuous period of Christianity, The Canterbury Tales provides a window into the debasement of Christianity under the Catholic Church during Chaucer’s time. But on the balance, Chaucer is also mindful of the fact that there are still individuals who practice what they preach.
Why is it called Canterbury?
Canterbury as a city has it’s origins in the Roman settlement of Durovernum Cantiacorum, established in the first century AD after the Roman invasion of 43 AD. The name was taken from the Cantiaci tribe that inhabited the area at the time of the Roman invasion. The name of the county of Kent also derives from them.
Why is Canterbury named Canterbury?
The name was decided at the first meeting od the Canterbury Association of which Dr John Bird Sumner, archbishop of Canterbury, was elected president. The minutes of the Association meeting record that it was decided ‘to call it Canterbury after our ecclesiastical mother‘.
The Pardoner bases his tale on the consequences of greed and deception. Due to the fact that society often judges people on their status, they strive to become wealthy . Their overall concern with gaining wealth leads to greed. People put morals and values aside to achieve a position of power.
The Canterbury Tales as a Satire
The Canterbury Tales is a satire, which is a genre of literature that uses humor—sometimes gentle, sometimes vicious—to ridicule foolish or corrupt people or parts of society.