Chaucer and Medieval Estates SatireThis book is an attempt to discover the origins and significance of the General Prologue-to the Canterbury Tales. The interest of such an inquiry is many-sided. On the one hand, it throws light on the question of whether `life' or 'literature' was Chaucer's model in this work, on the relationship between Chaucer's twenty-odd pilgrims and the structure of medieval society, and on the role of their `estate' in determining the elements of which Chaucer composes their portraits. On the other hand, it makes suggestions about the ways in which Chaucer convinces us of the individuality of his pilgrims, about the nature of his irony, and the kind of moral standards implicit in the Prologue. This book suggests that Chaucer is ironically substituting for the traditional moral view of social structure a vision of a world where morality becomes as specialised to the individual as his work-life. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
The Estates Content and Social Stereotypes | 7 |
The AntiClerical Tradition in Estates Satire | 17 |
Estates Ideals | 55 |
3552 | 67 |
4 | 75 |
Chivalry and AntiFeminism | 106 |
Beauty and the Beast | 128 |
Scientific Portraits | 145 |
Common terms and phrases
Ancrene Wisse Canterbury Canterbury Tales character characteristics Chaucer Chaucer's portrait Chessbook Chevalerie clergy clerical Clerk curteisie Decameron described descriptio English estates literature estates satire estates writers Étienne de Fougères example fourteenth century Franklin friars Gautier de Coincy Geoffroi de Charny Gilles li Muisis gluttony Gower Guiot de Provins Handlyng Synne ibid ideal individual John Gower Knight Lamentations Langland Latin literary Livre des Manières lord Map Poems Matheolus medieval merchants Mirour de l'Omme Monde Monk Monk's moral narrator Owst Pardoner Pardoner's passage peasant Piers Plowman pilgrims Ploughman priests Prioress professional Prologue Pulp Reeve reference Renart le Contrefait role Roman de Carité Roman de Fauvel Rutebeuf satirists says secular seems sense Sergeant Sermones nulli parcentes Simonie social Sothsegger Squire stereotype suggest Summoner's ther thirteenth century Totum regit saeculum tradition Walter of Châtillon women