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8 - The Canterbury Tales

personal drama or experiments in poetic variety?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2006

Piero Boitani
Affiliation:
Università degli Studi di Roma 'La Sapienza', Italy
Jill Mann
Affiliation:
University of Notre Dame, Indiana
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Summary

Readers sometimes neglect what is most extraordinary about the Canterbury Tales: its dazzling variety of stories and styles. Although story collections were a recognized literary form long before Chaucer (and were especially popular in the late Middle Ages, as shown by Boccaccio's Decameron and the Confessio Amantis of Chaucer's contemporary John Gower), no other example of the genre contains the radical literary individuality of the Canterbury Tales nor creates such complex relationships among its different parts. Chaucer himself had earlier used the form in the unfinished Legend of Good Women, but the Legend is a disappointment to some Chaucerians, largely because its stories of suffering women are so alike in approach and content. Uniformity also mars for many modern readers a story-collection within the Canterbury Tales: the several tragedies of the Monk are finally halted by the Knight because he says they are too pessimistic, though, as the Host suggests, their real fault may be their sleep-inducing monotony. But monotony is the last word one would use to describe the Canterbury Tales as a whole. The work is energized by unexpected juxtapositions of styles and subject-matter, so that, for example, a long romance of ancient heroism comes before a short, witty tale of local lust and an account of alchemical swindlers follows a story about ancient martyrdom.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2004

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  • The Canterbury Tales
  • Edited by Piero Boitani, Università degli Studi di Roma 'La Sapienza', Italy, Jill Mann, University of Notre Dame, Indiana
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer
  • Online publication: 28 May 2006
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521815568.008
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  • The Canterbury Tales
  • Edited by Piero Boitani, Università degli Studi di Roma 'La Sapienza', Italy, Jill Mann, University of Notre Dame, Indiana
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer
  • Online publication: 28 May 2006
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521815568.008
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The Canterbury Tales
  • Edited by Piero Boitani, Università degli Studi di Roma 'La Sapienza', Italy, Jill Mann, University of Notre Dame, Indiana
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Chaucer
  • Online publication: 28 May 2006
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521815568.008
Available formats
×