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The Aurthian legends of chivalry and courtly love are archaic. Chivalric code includes being a courageous knight that is willing to sacrifice himself for his king; to be strong during all battles and have integrity in all situations. Courtly love refers to an unattainable love between a knight and a married woman. Although polite and courteous, the knight may only win a kiss from the lady in the end. With that, satire is used today as a way to make fun of these outdated themes.
[attention getter]. Geoffrey Chaucer, in his novel The Canterbury Tales, deals with many tales of medieval life and morals. The writing follows a large group of pilgrims who have all been challenged to tell their best tale, one that teaches a valuable lesson, on the journey to Canterbury. Two of the stories told, “The Pardoner’s Tale” and “The Wife of Bath’s Tale”, make their points in very notable ways. The Pardoner tells a story of three men who come to pay for indulging in the sin of greed, while the Wife of Bath recounts a story of questionable morality involving a knight struggling for redemption after breaking his code of honor.
Each tale reveals moral lessons that attempt to prevent the reader from performing the same mistakes as the character. “The Pardoner’s Tale” and “The Reeve’s Tale” possess similar themes, distinct differences arise in the topics presented in each passage. “The Pardoner’s Tale” and “The Reeve’s Tale” illustrates how greed corrupts men, how sin leads to more sin, and how revenge drives men to undertake foolish feats. The differences between Chaucer’s tales allows for a humorous yet insightful
With each tale, there are different events that occur in order to reach the main topic of these tales. Within the Knight’s Tale, the Wife of Bath’s Tale, and the Pardoner's Tale, Chaucer does a phenomenal job in having these tales represent the societal problems of his era. Geoffrey Chaucer uses the Knight’s Tale to explains how love can corrupt the trust between two cousins. The knight is telling the story of Palamon and Arcita, two prisoners of wars that are locked up in a prison in the city of Athens. One day, the two look outside the prison window and see a fair young lady called, Emily.
Keeping in mind that they were pilgrims, abiding to what their religion preaches, Chaucer wants us to think about the significance of being a man or a woman in society and to what extent masculinity and femininity is subjective. We wonder whether the question of masculinity and femininity stops only at the physical aspects, more precisely, sex or whether during Chaucer’s time, one’s behaviour and courage or strength gives a clear portrayal of their gender. By representing the pardoner as an ambiguous person, Chaucer wisely decides to play with the audience. He does not really care, and neither
Hollywood has a long and infamous reputation for taking books of historical merit and adapting them in a way that is popular among the mass public. Directors from Hollywood are guilty of pleasing the audience so that the historical accuracy becomes another victim of the American Movie Market. While the movie “A Knight’s Tale” gives movie watchers what they want in terms of comedy and romance, it ignores the change from medieval dialogue to modern dialogue, the dress of women, and social norms of the time period to give the audience a biased view of history. Although “A Knight’s Tale” does not give the audience an exact year that the event happen based on historical context it would be safe to assume the plot took place in the later part of the 14th century, or towards the first half of the Hundred Year War between England and France. (Badders)
Chaucer’s gift, The Canterbury Tales continues to give and the reader can derive different ideas and responses, and details for each creative character within the brilliantly raveled and thought out tale. One of Chaucer’s characters The Pardoner possibly holds the most detail and material in his appearance and actions which the reader can easily extract from and respond too which possibly holds importance as they tell the reader certain things about the character. The author’s illustration of The Pardoner begins with the description of his hair from behind as a yellow wax like color, falling in “driblets” behind his back, “Thinly they fell, like rat-tails, on by one” (21). He rode on his mount with his wallet before him and a pillow case crammed with relics such as, The Virgin’s veil, bones of saints, and pieces of The Holy Cross, all tricks and no truth in their supposed identity. This deceiver made more than a parson would from the poor and innocent who fell prey to the con, and “made monkeys of the priest and congregation” (22).
“The Wife of Bath’s Tale” begins with an unequivocal incident of sexual assault, yet how that assault and the question of consent are interpreted are complicated in light of Suzanne Edwards’ essay, “The Rhetoric of Rape.” Edwards’ essay provides a new historicist lens to provide a context in which the reader can perhaps reconcile the problematic nature of sexual assault that Chaucer inserts into the “loathly lady” narrative. The rhetoric employed by the law in regards to rape complicates Chaucer’s knight’s crime by creating an atmosphere of ambiguity that raises more questions than answers. The disconnect that occurs between the rapist and his victim seems quite abominable on the part of Chaucer and his narrator in that it is quickly forgiven
In Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales: The Prologue, a group of thirty people go on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Thomas Becket. Throughout the passage, he uses carefully chosen language to describe each of the pilgrims and give them all a unique character. Being one of the most noble and highest-ranking members of the pilgrims, it is only fitting that the author decides to introduce the Knight first. Geoffrey Chaucer uses an allusion to the chivalric code, a description of his clothing, and a comparison with another pilgrim to characterize the Knight.
Chaucer uses the “Prologue” knight to provide social commentary on the good in humanity. The Prologue knight “loved chivalry / Truth, honour, freedom and all courtesy / Full worthy was he in his sovereign’s war / Of mortal battles he had fought fifteen”
“The Miller’s Tale” and “The Reeve’s Tale,” two of the many stories in Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, portray many similarities on the views of love, marriage, and immorality. Both “The Miller’s Tale” and “The Reeve’s Tale” portray what love truly means to the Miller and the Reeve. Chaucer’s two tales also exemplify the unfaithfulness of the wives to their vows of marriage. Additionally, the stories share corresponding similarities in the many instances of dishonesty and immoral features of the male characters.
Geoffrey Chaucer’s satirical collection of stories called The Canterbury Tales, develops an insight of his criticism for the Catholic Church members during the medieval period. During the time period, the Catholic Church could be considered as the head of the society. The church held power over education, politics, economy, as well as the everyday lives of the citizens. Fear of excommunication kept the people from arguing with the ideas of the church. Some members of the church used this power to influence others to follow the rules of Catholicism; however there was a growing number of church members who were corrupt.
In The Knight’s Tale of Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, a knight tells the tale of two knights who fight for the woman they love. The knight who tells the story exhibits characteristics such as chivalry, honor, and nobility, which is reflected throughout the story he tells. The Knight’s Tale is a story about two knights who fall in love with the same woman. Chivalry, in the knight’s sense, is a display of qualities such as courage, honor, courtesy, and justice.
Reality in the Sarcasm (A Discussion on Chaucer 's usage of Satire to Meet His Agenda.) Geoffrey Chaucer was known as the father of the English Language. During Chaucer 's time in the late 1300’s, he had many issues with the state of how people lived. He used his writing to criticize the societal issues he noticed during his time.
In the story, “The Wife of Bath,” Chaucer handles satire to critique class and nobility. Alike today, class and nobility still haunt us. Being that, we still see it in high school, it obviously hasn 't gone away. Chaucer brings forth the issue by sending the Knight on a journey of a lifetime. When he arrives back, he still doesn 't have the answer that he was sent to find.