Lecture Notes:
Last time we talked about the situation in the Middle Ages and Chaucer.
Middle Ages------>from 12th century until 14th century.
Latin was the official language which was spoken by the church and clerics.
French was the other official language.
meaning of cleric: A cleric (Ancient Greek - klērikos), clergyman (pl. clergymen), or churchman (pl. churchmen) is a member of the clergy of a religion, especially one who is a priest,
preacher, or other religious professional. It is often used to refer to the religious leadership in Islam, where the term "priest" is not accurate and where terms such as "Alim" are not widely
understood in the English-speaking world.
The learned people were preferring Latin and French.
Chaucer preferred Middle English.
In Canterbury Tales, you have a lot of irony and satire. Mixture of serious tales and entertaining fabliaux.
You have different strategies of characterization.Some of the characters are characterized by way of temperament.
Medieval psychology is referring to psychology or biology.
Chaucer makes use of that in the Canterbury Tales.
He uses multiple ways of characterizing people.
Franklin is a character from the Canterbury Tales. He is an epicurean. Epikur is a Greek Philosopher. He knows how to enjoy the food, life, women, etc. So does Franklin.
physionomie: you describe the appearance of people. Ugly appearance referring to the ugly soul.
There is a summoner in the Canterbury tales who calls people to the church. Summoner is an ugly man. It means he has an ugly soul.
Satire of the estate: Merchants always cheat.
The wife of Bath: She has gap in her front teeth. She was born under Venus and Mars.
Venus: Goddess of Love Mars: God of War.
women's satire and saint's legends are the two extreme examples of characterization.
Amour Courtois is a convention, not a realistic description of a reality. Knight falls in love with an aristocratic lady. She is usually married, but he declares his love to her. She sends
her to a journey. He comes back from the journey after 20 or 30 years. He wins the lady's favour. He gets her handkerchief.
Chaucer grew up with Amour Courtois culture. He made use of this in his stories. He uses it in a superficial way and makes its irony. On the one hand we have bourgeois values and on the other
hand we have aristocratic values.
Miller's tale is one of the most famous tales in the Canterbury Tales.
Descriptio:If you are in the world of Amour courtois, a lady is described from head to food. Technical term used for that is "descriptio". He describes Alison. However, he does not describe her
in its usual order. He makes irony or satire of it, because he begins to describe her from her middle.
The Miller's Tale is Chaucer's best fabliau from the Canterbury Tales.
There is also Franklin's Tale.
In Miller's Tale, young woman Alison is married to old carpenter. The old lover who has a young wife. Of course the young wife will put horns on his head. This is the constellation in his tale.
Constellation means:an arrangement of parts or elements. The story is arranged according to this fact.
Young lover is Nicholas. He is a student.
Alison is compared to a weasel. An animal like comparison.
Line 139. The concentration is on her middle. Description is a very lovely one. She is full of liveliness and full of other things. She is being described. Chaucer starts from her middle while
describing her.She starts from the hips. By doing this, he is channeling the interest of the readers to her unfaithfulness.
According to the Amour Courtois the knight tells: If you don't love me , then I will at once die.
Nicholas is saying this, but he puts his hands on her body which a knight would not do.
Another lover of Alison (Alisoun) is Absalom.
Chaucer inserted Noah's tale in the Miller's Tale. By doing this he inserted one fabliau into the other fabliau. Miller's Tale is already a fabliau, and at those times Noah's Tale was a very
famous fabliau. Nicholas tells Alison's husband - Carpenter- that the flood will come over the city and he should do some preparations. Chaucer refers to Noah's tale here.
The climaxes in the tale:
1. Climax:Alison and Nicholas went to the bedroom.
2. Climax: Misskiss. Absalom kisses Alison's arse.
To combine two Fabliaux in such a way, Chaucer creates in fact 4 climaxes.
3. Climax: Absolom brands Nicholas' arse.
4. Carpenter cuts the rope and falls down, and breaks his arm.
A typical comedy is involved.However, this is a type of comedy in French fabliau.
The other tales are:
The Franklin's Tale
The Parson's Tale
The Knight's Tale
Below you will find the names of the all tales from the internet.
In a way Chaucer made the Middle English language.There is nobody besides him that has the same source of capability.
From internet:On an April day, a group of 29 pilgrims meet in Tabard Inn, just outside London, and set out on a pilgrimage from London to Canterbury to pay their respects to the tomb of Saint
Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral. The group is described in detail, with characters from all classes, upper and lower, represented. Religious characters, such as a prioress, monk and a
Pardoner, travel alongside a shipman, miller, carpenter, reeve, squire, yeoman and a knight, among others. Harry Bailey, the innkeeper, joins the pilgrims and suggests a game where they all tell
stories to each other along the way. The pilgrims agree to tell four stories each, two on the way to Canterbury, and two on the way back. The person who tells the best story, as determined by the
host, will have his supper paid for by the rest of the group. The tale-telling begins with the knight and proceeds as the pilgrims near Canterbury, each person telling a story that reflects their
social position, and some telling stories which are intended to make fun of others in the group. No winner is chosen by the host in the end, and only a few of the pilgrims have told their tales
by the time the story ends because Chaucer died before he could finish it. He may have intended to write 124 tales but died having only completed 22. Two more tales were started, but never
finished. With typical medieval piety, Chaucer ends the work with a retraction apologizing for anything in the stories which may have been inappropriate. Click here
TALES IN THE CANTERBURY TALES:
CT-The Knight and his Tale (Entries 353-75)
CT-The Miller and his Tale (Entries 376-88)
CT-The Reeve and his Tale (Entries 389-99)
CT-The Cook and his Tale (Entry 400)
CT-The Man of Law and his Tale (Entries 401-18)
CT-The Wife of Bath and her Tale (Entries 419-54)
CT-The Friar and his Tale (Entries 455-64)
CT-The Summoner and his Tale (Entries 465-74)
CT-The Clerk and his Tale (Entries 475-97)
CT-The Merchant and his Tale (Entries 498-523)
CT-The Squire and his Tale (Entries 524-31)
CT-The Franklin and his Tale (Entries 532-55)
CT-The Physician and his Tale (Entries 556-69)
CT-The Pardoner and his Tale (Entries 570-91)
CT-The Shipman and his Tale (Entries 592-600)
CT-The Prioress and her Tale (Entries 601-11)
CT-The Tale of Sir Thopas (Entries 612-17)
CT-The Tale of Melibee (Entries 618-24)
CT-The Monk and his Tale (Entries 625-31)
CT-The Nun's Priest and his Tale (Entries 632-51)
CT-The Second Nun and her Tale (Entries 652-59)
CT-The Canon's Yeoman and his Tale (Entries 660-65)
CT-The Manciple and his Tale (Entries 666-73)
CT-The Parson and his Tale (Entries (674-83)
CT-The Retraction (Entries 684-88)
Click here
The Beginning of British Drama:
The first phenomenon which we can call drama came out of the Catholic Church.
The beginnings of the drama can be traced back to the 10th century.
Sources: Liturgy of the Catholic Church.
folkloric customs : christian/pagan origin
carnivalesque feast of fools.....
This is the End of the Lecture. Now I will jot down the notes taken during the tutorial:
20 March 2009 Tutorial Notes:
Chaucer uses different types of characterization techniques:
1) By way of temperament: This is a medieval theory. Everyone has four types of liquid in his body which are choler,blood,phlegm,bile.
If you have much choler than blood, then you become easily angry.
blood: hot-blooded, a lot of energy.
phlegmatic:slow, too relax, laid-back.
bile:melancholic
2)philosophy: characterizing in terms of philosophy goes back to classical ages.Ancient Greek.
Franklin is an epicurean. Epikur is a famous Greek philosopher. He knows how to have pleasure from women, food, etc. So does Franklin.
3)Physiognomy: You judge the person's character from his outer appearance. Judging inner values from outer appearance. The Summoner is an ugly man. So his soul is also ugly.
4)Profession: Stereotypes. We may have certain stereotypes about teachers, etc. In the Canterbury Tales: Merchants always cheat. This is called satire of the estate.
5)Astrology: The Wife of the Bath was born under Venus and Mars.
6)Realism: The cook is one of the characters in the Canterbury tales and he has an open wound on his hand. Even this is described realistically in the Canterbury Tales.
7)animals: Alison is compared to the weasel. You cannot trust a weasel. It is a small mouse-like animal. It runs very fast and cheats you. So does Alison.
Literary conventions in the Canterbury Tales:
Descriptio: When you try to describe someone in the medieval literature, you begin to describe her from head to toe. However, he begins to describe her from the middle. By doing this, he not only
makes fun with Carpenter, but also makes fun with the descriptio convention.
Amour Courtois: Courtly Love. in German it is Minne. It started in southern France.
In the Miller's Tale: descriptio was subverted.
Secondly Amour Courtois was subverted. Normally, the lady should be passive,but she is not. Instead of her handkerchief, she offers her bottom.
Chaucer takes idealistic conventions and turns them into realistic.
Between Alison and Absalom: Subversion of courtly love.
Normally the lovers plays music under the windows, but the lady does not give him a kiss. In the tale Alison calls him to give a kiss. Moreover she offers him her arse.
amour: 1) love your next like yourself= caritas 2) sexual love=cupidata
In the Prioress's Tale, the Nun's forehead doesn't suit her small mouth. Out of proportion. So her life is out of proportion too. Physiognonmic characterization.
Literary Conventions:
1) Chaucer uses 7 different ways of characterization .
2) He subverts amour courtois in a realistic way.
Roots of English Drama:
1)Easter Trope/Liturgy(Catholic Church)
Priests acted out from the Bible passages in the church for about ten minutes to attract attention.The people did not know to read Latin. That is also why they acted out from the biblical
passages. Latin root.
2)Folkloric roots: in the pub,in the woods,carnivals, feast of folks. Middle English Root.
All English Drama goes back to these two roots.
In the Miller's Tale: Nicholas is Alison's lover. However, Absalom is the other lover of her. Old carpenter is Alison's husband. Nicholas cheats carpenter. He tells the Carpenter that the flood
will come over the city.He wants Carpenter to build wooden cabinets to hang the roof and in which to sleep if the flood comes in the evening. Carpenter has a thick had, and he believes Nicholas.
He starts to build the cabinets. Late in the evening he finishes his job and hangs three of them on the roof. Meanwhile he is very exhausted because of working a lot. Nicholas, Alison and
Carpenter enters their wooden cabinets and poor Carpenter begins to sleep as he is very tired. Nicholas and Alison gets out of their shelter and go into the bedroom to make love. In the
meantime, they hear Absalom playing an instrument under the windows. Absalom is the other lover of Alison. Of course they get angry. Carpenter might wake up because of the noise that Absalom
makes. Alison opens the window and tells him that she will give him a kiss if he accepts to go. Absalom puts a ladder to the window and climbs up. However, in the dark Alison turns her back and
offers him her bottom. Absalom kisses her bottom, but he feels something hairy. He tells himself that a lady's face cannot be hairy. He understands what Alison did, but he does not say anything
and goes away. after a short time he comes back again singing, and this time Nicholas tells Alison that he will offer his bottom. However, Absalom comes this time to take revenge with a
blacksmith. He climbs up the ladder, and Nicholas turns his back to Absalom to offer his arse to be kissed. Absalom burns his arse with the blacksmith, and Nicholas shouts because of the terrible
pain of his aching arse. Water water water...
Poor carpenter hears his voice and he thinks that Nicholas saw the flood coming, and he cuts his cabinet's rope which binds him to the roof. He fells down and breaks his arm.
THE END.
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