Middle English Period and Chaucer 2

• The Middle English period took place during the 14th and 15th centuries.

History

• The three estates consisted of the King/clergy, nobles, and commoners.
• Social mobility increased, allowing people to change estates.
• The First Estate included the King, who ruled everything, and the clergy, who were the King's right hand.
• The Second Estate consisted of nobles who were exempt from taxes and military service.
• The Third Estate comprised 90% of the population, who were taxed and required to perform military service.
• Chaucer, the son of a wine merchant (Third Estate), served as an attendant at court and held administrative posts, exemplifying social mobility.

The Canterbury Tales – Chaucer (ca 1386-1400)

• Multiple manuscripts and early printed books exist, but none are from Chaucer's time.
• The tales are in different orders and remain unfinished.
• They contain many French loan words.
• The tales blend genres like romances, fables, fabliaux, and estates satire, exposing corruption across social classes.
• Not all tales share the same genre.
• Characters in the General Prologue exclude the highest (king, nobles) and lowest (ill, poor, beggars) extremes of society.
• Commoners, such as merchants and lower church orders, are most represented.
• All social classes and estates are represented.
• Chaucer drew inspiration from classical models such as Giovanni Boccaccio’s Decamerone, using the frame narrative.

Stylistic and Narrative Features

• Uses iambic pentameter, consisting of an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable, with five stresses per line.
• Employs rhyming couplets, a standard English verse form.
• Uses a frame narrative.
• Features a prominent, intradiegetic narrator who is a character in the story.
• Uses irony in praise and neutral descriptions potentially to convey criticism.
• The characters meet in Southwark, where the narrator speaks with everyone and provides personal impressions.
• The characters depart and tell their stories.
• The higher clergy is the most criticized class, including the Prioress and Friar, for their luxury and showiness.
• There is a more positive view of the lower church orders.
• The nobility and upper middle class (Bourgeoisie) such as the Knight and Wife of Bath receive the most text.
• Merchants are portrayed more neutrally, with minor faults compared to higher classes.
• Commoners are also criticized but receive shorter, more neutral descriptions.
• Merchants and commoners are criticized the least.