Introduction to

Instructor: Angela Bailey

Medieval Period1066-1485

The Norman Conquest of England

Stand-still in English literature

Medieval HierarchyFeudal system:Nobility: barons, knightsFreemen: emerging middle class

(merchants, guildsmen)Peasants or serfs

Clergy

The Roman Catholic Church

(people shared a common faith)

Pope, archbishops, bishops,

priests, nuns, and monks.

Medieval Hierarchy (cont)

Saint Thomas à BecketArchbishop of Canterbury

Feud with Henry II

“Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?”

Miracles that led to a great pilgrimage to Canterbury

Pilgrimage to CanterburyPilgrimage:

a journey, especially a long one, made to some sacred place as an act of religious devotion

Canterbury: a city in E Kent, in SE England: cathedral; early ecclesiastical center of England.

Geoffrey ChaucerC. 1343-1400Known as “the

father of English literature”

Middle classVassal to the kingStarted a “re-

birth” of English literature

Geoffrey ChaucerBorn in the reign of Edward III

his work has a quality of universality that is only matched and exceeded by Shakespeare

Chose to write in the Mercian dialect (not French of the court or Latin of the university & church). This dialect became the English dialect spoken today.

Father was a successful wine merchant (the middle class was new)

Geoffrey ChaucerBorn a commoner, but through his intellect and

astute judgments of human character, he moved freely among the aristocracy, so he knew the world from many aspects.

He became a court page at 12 and read romances to the ladies at court; married a lady-in-waiting to the queen

Took part in at least two military campaigns

Court poet of the later Middle Ages in Western Europe

Geoffrey ChaucerHe traveled widely, was a substantial citizen,

well-educated, widely read.

He was a diplomat in Italy. Met or read forerunners of the Italian Renaissance (Dante, Petrach, Boccaccio) and spoke French, Italian, Latin fluently.

He held many public offices; throughout his public life he came into contact with most of the important men of London as well as with many of the great men of the continent

Geoffrey ChaucerHis work did not

reach people through printed books but was recited and circulated in manuscript copies

He was the first poet buried in Westminster Abbey

Literary DevicesFrame tale: Narrative technique whereby

a main story is composed, at least in part, for the purpose of organizing a set of shorter stories, each of which is a story within a story.

RomanceStories of adventure about knights

and chivalry

Courtly love:Celebrates the love of a knight, usually

for a married woman. Thus, it is often adulterous and secretive.

Knights are so madly in love with these women that it consumes their thoughts.

Knights try to do many great deeds in hopes of winning their love.

FabliauxAudience: middle class men

Risqué tales that usually satirize women and clergy

Lots of obscenity; people act like animals as opposed to chivalric romancejealous husband who loses sexual

possession of his wife wife who outsmarts her husbandcorrupt members of the church

Heroic Couplet

Pioneered by Chaucer

Poems constructed from a sequence of rhyming pairs of iambic pentameter lines

Characterization

the act of describing the character or qualities of someone or something

the way a writer makes a person in a story, book, play, movie, or television show seem like a real person

The PrologueThe story begins in April.

Set up: a group of people from all walks of Medieval life are setting out on a pilgrimage to Canterbury.

The travelers have stopped at a tavern outside of London.

There is a challenge set out on who can tell the best story along the journey.

Meet the Pilgrims:

The Wife of Bath The Knight

The Miller

The Summoner

The Shipman

The Monk

The Prioress The Yeoman

The Wife of Bath’s Tale

• Frame story