Canterbury tales

CANTERBURY TALES

PLOT

The story talks about a group of 30 people who are on a piigrimage from London to Canterbury. The main event is the initiative of Harry Bailley: he suggest that everyone shouid teli two stories and he best one wouid be the winner of a prize.

STRUCTURE

The poem is composed by a prologue, which gave an introduction of the pilgrimage, and the 24 tales. Canterbury is the symbol achievement of God peace, London the metaphor for terrestriai city:

the journey becomes, in this way, the allegory of the course of the human iife.

CHARACTERS

Chaucer represented ali his feudal society by the description of his characters. The main feature is that he exaits the personality of everybody he describes, expressing what they wore and what they thought to give them an identification in the group. Opposing with the rules of the correct procedure in literature, he placed the Knight as the first personage in the description of his characters. The name he give to each pilgrim express the social condition they come from.

REALISM AND ALLEGORY

He used reaiism, in the medievai sense, in this poem: that is to say that many events are exaggerated. The pilgrimage is the symbol of the life: the path to Canterbury is the way to God, the journey represent all human troubles, we can say that is the assembly of all experiences we can uve.

CHAUCER THE NARRATOR

The tales are characterized by the comments of the author. Chaucer is a piigrim who reports ali the stories. So the reader can agree with the author or judge alone the reai fact.

CHAUCER'S VERSE

The poem has a regular rhythm given by the rhyme.