1. Geoffrey Chaucer

2. Geoffrey Chaucer Often called the “Father of English Poetry”
He made English respectable
Ordinary people in Chaucer’s England spoke the Anglo-Norman combination known as Middle English—a language that became the ancestor to Modern English
At the time, literature, science, religion, and policy was writing in Latin and French

3. Geoffrey Chaucer
Not fashionable for serious poets to write in English because people thought that the English language could not convey the nuances and complexities of serious literature
He was composed the vernacular of the time
Vernacular—the everyday language spoken in London

4. Geoffrey Chaucer Chaucer lent respectability to the English language
He was a government official who served under three kings
He was like a prominent adviser to the United States president

5. Chaucer’s Influence
Chaucer traveled to Italy where he was influenced by the poems of Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio
Connection between Boccaccio’s Decameron and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales
Both include a framing device where the characters tell their stories and are based on similar plots

6. The Canterbury Tales
Religious pilgrimage during which each traveler tells a story
Pilgrimage—religious journey made to a shrine or holy place
Pilgrims are from a cross section of stations or stages of life
Travel on horseback to the shrine of Sir Thomas Becket at Canterbury

7. The Canterbury Tales Starts with a General Prologue
Establishes time of year for pilgrimage
The journey of the pilgrimage
Narrator meets 29 other pilgrims at an inn on their journey to Becket’s shrine
Innkeeper suggests that the pilgrims tell tales on the journey to pass the time
Prologue concise picture of a nation representing all walks of life at that time