Chaucer, Geoffrey - Life and The Canterbury Tales

vita e influenze di geoffrey chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer was born around 1343 in London, he was the son of a rich wine merchant. He grew up in close contact with the royal family and during his life he traveled a lot visiting France, Germany and Italy: here he became interested in Italian literature (Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio) where he got inspired especially by Boccaccio and his "Decameron".
Back in town, he was appointed to the office of Controller in the port of London. He also became a member of parliament. He died in 1400.

He is regarded as the father of English literature. He is one of the first English poets to be known by name and his language became the basis of Modern English. In his masterpiece he was able to give a portrait of the society of the time.

His works are divided into three periods: the French (poems modelled on French romance style), the Italian and the English (Canterbury tales).

canterbury tales e il suo stile

The Canterbury Tales is set in spring and tells the story of thirty people who are going on pilgrimage. They’re traveling to Canterbury to the shrine of Thomas Becket. They meet at the tabard in London. The pilgrims tell two stories each while going and two coming back.

As it concerne to the style, The Canterbury Tales is a long narrative poem. It is written in rhyming couplets made up of iambic pentameters in lines with ten syllables. There is a prologue to each story, an introduction. The point of departure, London is very human while the destination, Canterbury, is holy.

The new factor in the Canterbury Tales is individualisation: the character has reactions and is in movement.

The pilgrimage is set in the calendar of seasons as well as in that of religion.

And bathed every veyne in swich licour

Of which vertu engendred is the flour;

Inspired hath in every holt and heeth

Tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne

Hath in the ram his halve cours yronne,

That slepen al the nyght with open ye

(so priketh hem nature in hir corages);

And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes,

To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;

And specially from every shires ende

That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke.

(

Has pierced the drought of March to the root,

And bathed every vein (of the plants) in such liquid

By which power the flower is created;

In every wood and field has breathed life into

The tender new leaves, and the young sun

Has run half its course in Aries,

Those that sleep all the night with open eyes

(So Nature incites them in their hearts),

And professional pilgrims to seek foreign shores,

To distant shrines, known in various lands;

And specially from every shire's end

To seek the

Who helped them when they were sick).

metafore e temi nel prologo

In the opening lines springtime is defined in terms of rebirth. It is a spiritual journey. It is a key metaphor for life from the religious sphere. He did not describe the high aristocracy and the peasants and didn’t follow the social hierarchy of presentation. He mixed male and female characters.