Medieval England and Geoffrey Chaucer

NORMANS CHANGED LIFE IN ENGLAND Normans were descendants of Scandinavian. They retained their Scandinavian vitality and love of adventure. They acquired some French manners and culture and had learned the French language. They had order and a great administrative ability. Normas also brought the feudal system.

WHAT WAS FEUDALISM? It was a political and social system common in the Middle Ages. It was based upon the relationship of lord to vassal. Each group owing service to the smaller group above and indirectly to the king at the top. KING NOBLESY AND THE CLERGY LESSER NOBLES PEASANTS

Romantic stories reached England The tone of the literature began to be more cheerful It introduced a new device: rhyme There were three languages in England: Latin, English and French The English language was made into that amazingly rich and flexible instrument HOW THE COMING OF THE NORMAN AFFECTED LITERATURE

Geoffrey Chaucer William Langland The author of Sir Gawain and the Green Kinght THREE MEDIEVAL POETS

GEOFFREY CHAUCER He was born in London between 1340 – He became page in household of Prince Lionel. He was sent several times on important diplomatic mission to France and Italy. He was made controller of the customs in the Port of London. He was a Justice of the Peace. He was a student and poet. He died on October 25, 1400, and was buried at Westminster Abbey.

GEOFFREY CHUCER’S LITERARY PRODUCTION MAJOR WORKS  The Canterbury Tales  The Book of the Duchess  The House of Fame  Parliament of Fowls SHORT POEMS  Truth  The Former Age.  The Complaint of Venus

BY GEOFFREY CHAUCER

PLOT OF THE CANTERBURY TALES At the Tabard Inn, the narrator joins a company of 29 pilgrims. The pilgrims, like the narrartor, are travelling to the shrine of the martyr Saint Thomas Becket in Canterbury.

The narrator gives a description of 27 of these pilgrims, including for example: Perfect and genteel man who loved truth, freedom and honor. The most socially prominent person on the journey; the battles he fought were all religious wars of some nature. Rich and powerful rising middle class; well-dressed. No one would tell he was deeply in debt. Student at Oxford; extremely thin on a thin horse; he wears worn clothes; and he is one of the most admired people in the group of pilgrims.

The host suggest that the group ride together and entertain one another with stories. He decides that each pilgrim will tell two stories on the way to Canterbury and two on the way back. And the man who told his story best was to be given a expensive dinner by the other pilgrims.

PRINCIPAL THEME He provides the reader with a picture of a disorganized Christian society in a state of decline and obsolescence He draws an ironic portrait of the Prioress and presents satiric portraitures of the Monk, the Friar, the Summoner, and the Pardoner The description of an ideal Parson in turn serves to indicate the sins of the average priest in the fourteenth century His ironic praise of the Prioress’s affectations, classical beauty, and attachment to worldly concerns only serves to highlight her inappropriateness as the head of a religious convent His praise of the Monk’s delight in the finer things of life and passion for hunting is aimed at eliciting the reader’s disapproval as they go against his monastic vow of poverty Chaucer’s critique of the church of medieval England