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Positive Marxist Lens In Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

433 Words2 Pages

As a child, some stories teach that people are not always number one. With passion and hard work, you can achieve anything over any odds. This is called a positive marxist lens. In most cases, people call this an upset or underdog scenario. In the Canterbury tales a positive Marxist lens in used through Reeve's tale, Shipman's tale, and Prioress tale. Within the Reeve's tale, the college students, John and Alan get revenge on Simpkin Miller for stealing. The students get revenge by, “When what was in the crock had been drunk up, To bed went daughter too, and thereupon To bed went Alan and to bed went John”(Chaucer, p. 114). Both Alan and John slept with the Miller's daughter. Alan told the Miller this and the Miller got mad. John then hits …show more content…

The wife asks the monk, Sir John for money to buy nice things. “ Could you contrive to lend A hundred francs? Just a week or two? I have to buy some cattle to renew A farm of ours with animal and stores” (Chaucer, p.164). The wife get what she wants and is no longer neglected. Sir John asked the merchant for a hundred francs for the church and gave it to the wife in return for sex. This is a positive marxist because it show that the wife is no longer being neglected in life. In the Prioress tale, a little boy named Hugh who was a jew sang a song called o Alma Redemptoris. The jewish child made fun of him for this. “... fair and sweet. Where he now is, God grant we all may meet!” The jewish children murdered Hugh and threw him in the sewer. The song in sung until the seed was on his tongue. He then ascends to Heaven. This is a psositive marxist because he if made fun of my his community, but still sing the song for his belief. Also, this is positive because he ascends to Heaven In the Canterbury tales a positive marxist lens in used through the Reeve's tale, Shipman's tale, and Prioress tale. An underdog is always in a tough situation. In these tales, each underdog had to overcome or succeed over the topdog. A victory for the underdog always makes a good story. As you can see, in the Canterbury tales a positive marxist was applied through Chaucer's

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