Readable Chaucer

Chaucer's original Canterbury Tale's written in Middle English was rather difficult a read. The Penguin Classic version of Canterbury tales was the perfect supplement for my class book text. This modern English translation allows for very easy reading of the satirical and cleverly written tales.

The sheer brilliance of this work can be surprising even after you've already read it.

"Brilliant" is the right word for Chaucer, I think. Not "magnificent" - it sounds too authoritative, and authority was one thing Chaucer had little regard for. I mean this not in the sense that he devoted himself to passionately tearing down authority - simply that his ultimate motivation was to parody, sometimes to satirize, and just generally to poke fun. The mood of the work as a whole is one of a game, interspersed with various asides from both Chaucer and his various characters beseeching the readers not to take what they say too seriously and to maintain a general spirit of fun.^M

Reverent irreverence and unforgettable characters

In the General Prologue of The Canterbury Tales, the descriptions of religious characters resemble some of Boccaccio's characters, in the sense that a pious title and appearance does not make a pious person. The characters with holy occupations run the full spectrum of good and evil. The Prioress and the Monk are benign characters, with mostly harmless vices and tendencies. The Prioress attempts to be dainty and "to counterfeit a courtly kind of grace" (6). The Monk is described as a "fat and personable priest" who enjoys hunting and eating to the scholarly life in cloister (8). ^M