DRAMA, FILM, LITETRATURE1

1. DRAMA, FILM, LITETRATURE1 week2

2. Chaucer: the major events in Chaucer’s times • 14th century witnessed great upheavals. • These include the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, which led to greater social unrest and greater awareness of the differences between birth and wealth. • Another area of concern is religious unrest. Lollardy arose in the late 14th century, a homegrown English heresy that emphasized lay learning and preaching. • Church abuses and high taxes caused further disagreement with the religious establishment and its representatives. • The Black Death that ravaged Europe in the middle of the century contributed to both of these issues as well

3. Another concern specific to literature of early time periods is patronage • . Patronage defines the relationship between a wealthy, influential person and an artist, which is essentially an exchange of talent for protection. • In the Middle Ages, this exchange financially supported many artists, as there was no other market for their works. • Patrons commissioned works, often to commemorate special occasions or individuals. • Artists often worked on pieces with particular patrons in mind even without explicit commissions. Literary patronage tended to be even more directed, since patrons often commissioned works to further ideologies and disseminate them

4. Essays concerning the history and context of Chaucer’s time would require background research on the topic to begin with. • For instance, to investigate the effect of patronage on Chaucer’s works, you would first need to learn about his patron, and then examine the work in question for evidence of particular ideologies. • The Book of the Duchess was commissioned by John of Gaunt to commemorate the death of his wife, Blanche of Lancaster. • How is Blanche portrayed in the poem? Is this realistic? Idealized? How are the relationships of real life mirrored by the poem? Or are they? Why commemorate her in this manne

5. Chronology: Chaucer’s times • Roman de la Rose by Guillaume de Lorris, continued by Jean de Meun • 1309 Pope Clement V moves papal capital to Avignon • 1321 Death of Dante Alighieri 1327 Edward III (aged 14) crowned 1335–41 • Boccaccio, Filostrato, Teseida 1337 Edward lays claim to French crown; beginning of Hundred Years War 1337 Birth of Froissart c.1340 Birth of Chaucer • 1342–3 Petrarch begins Canzoniere 1343–4 • English knights take part in siege of Algeciras (Gen. Prol. 56–7) 1

6. Chaucer: chronology • Victory over French at Crecy; victory over Scots at ´ Neville’s Cross 1348–9 Black Death 1349–52 Boccaccio, Decameron 1356 Victory over French at Poitiers; J • John II of France taken captive 1357 C • Chaucer in service of Countess of Ulster 1359–60 • Chaucer taken prisoner in Normandy; ransomed by Edward III 1360 Peace of Bretigny leaves Edward in control of one-third of France 1361 Black Death reappears 1361–5 Pierre de Lusignan (Peter of Cyprus; Monk’s Tale 2391–8) takes ‘Satalye’ (Adalia), Alexandria, and ‘Lyeys’ (Ayas) (Gen. Prol. 51, 57–9) 1365/6 Chaucer marries Philippa, daughter of Paon de Roet xii chronology 1367 • Black Prince defeats mercenary army under Bernard de Guesclin at Najera, Spain, gains throne for Pedro the Cruel (Monk’s Tale 2375–90)

7. Chaucer’s chronology • 1372–3 Chaucer visits Genoa and Florence 1374 Death of Petrarch • 1374 Chaucer appointed Controller of Customs in London 1375 Death of Boccaccio 1376 Good Parliament condemns waste and profiteering by high government officials • 1377 Rye and Hastings burned by French • 1377 Death of Edward III; succeeded by Richard II 1377 Chaucer travels to France for negotiations toward marriage of Richard to Princess Marie of France 1378 Chaucer visits Lombardy; appoints John Gower as attorney in his absence 1378 Great Schism in Papacy; Urban VI at Rome (recognized by England); Clement VII at Avignon (recognized by France)

8. Chaucer’s chronology • 1378–80 House of Fame and Anelida and Arcite c. • 1380–2 Parliament of Fowls • 1380–6 Gower, VoxClamantis • 1380s First version of Lollard Bible • 1381 Peasants’ Revolt (Nun’s Priest’s Tale 3394) 1382 Wycliffe’s teachings condemned by Blackfriars Synod c.1382–6 Boece and Troilus and Criseyde 1 • 385 Death of Bernabo Visconti of Milan ( ` Monk’s Tale 2399–406) c.1385–7 Legend of Good Women • 1385–7 Thomas Usk, Testament of Love 1386 Chaucer a Member of Parliament for Kent

9. Chronology of Chaucer’s life: final years • 1387 Death of Philippa Chaucer • 1387 Chaucer begins Canterbury Tales • 1388 Chaucer’s annuity transferred to John Scalby, perhaps at instigation of Merciless Parliament • 1388 Merciless Parliament; Appellants gain impeachment of officials close to Richard

10. Chaucer’s career and his social standing • Chaucer himself was a member of this middle social grouping, his place within it secured by various forms of what might be called ‘civil service • His father, John Chaucer, was not only a prosperous London vintner, but had himself served Edward III • Chaucer’s own career began in 1357 with his appointment to the household of Elizabeth, Countess of Ulster, and her husband Prince Lionel. • In 1367, soon after his marriage, he is listed as valettusto King Edward III, and by 1368 he is listed among esquiers of the royal household. • While remaining an esquire and never entering the inner circle of chamber-knights, he nevertheless continued in respected service of one sort or another until the end of his life.

11. Philosophy and ideas (source: Sauer Michelle, • Fortune and fate were major concerns of Chaucer’s, as indicated by his translation of the Consolation of Philosophy. • This work, as well as other medieval treatises, addressed the fickleness of fortune and fate. • Events, no matter how awful, were typically viewed as part of a divine plan, though humans have the free will to choose their own actions. • Divine will cannot be changed, but individual choices can be influences. • Fortune was also seen as fickle in that an individual may enjoy success one day and great tragedy the next. There is no warning or reason for the turn of the wheel. • In Chaucer’s works, characters are frequently depicted as being subject to the whims of fate, fortune, and chance.

12. Form and genres • Form and Genre Chaucer wrote in a great many forms and genres, although the vast majority of his works are poetry, not prose. • The most common forms he wrote include fabliaux, romance, and dream visions. Fabliau (pl. fabliaux) is a type of bawdy, comic story that was particularly popular in northern France during the 13th century. • They are often mirrors of or counterparts to courtly romances and reflect less aristocratic versions of the events. However, their situational details are often just as exaggerated, with impious clerics, cuckolded husbands, and insatiable women. Many feature a love triangle involving a young wife, an old husband, and a young, virile lover. The tales rely on bodily humor and irreverence and often are crudely sexual.

13. Chaucer: form and genres • While they rarely have a moral as such, they do offer “fabliau justice,” in which characters receive their due punishment. • Romances, on the other hand, represent the upper classes. They usually feature a hero who undertakes a quest or journey, during which he 53 may discover his true identity or find a bride. • No matter the outcome, the ordeal tests his chivalric prowess. • Many of the protagonists engage in fights with wondrous beings and encounter supernatural creatures or magic. S • omeromances also feature a courtly love triangle, which involves a lady, her husband, and a lover knight. Romances are as concerned with manners and chivalry as fabliaux are with farting and sex. • Breton lais are related to romances, though they are shorter, always involve the supernatural, and are set in Brittany or Celtic lands

14. Chaucer: dream vision literature • Dream vision poems were extremely popular in the late Middle Ages, their heyday being the late 14th through the early 16th centuries. • Dream visions are, as their name implies, poems about visions received in dreams. • The most common form has a troubled narrator who falls asleep near running water or in a garden. • He or she then has a dream in which a problem is resolved or at least suggestions are given regarding a resolution. The dreamer then awakens and writes the poem. • It was common in late medieval dream visions for the narrator to meet a figure of authority while wandering in an allegorical or symbolic landscape.

15. The second part of Chaucer’s career • He shifted from the precincts of the household to the post of controller of customs in London, assisted both by preferment from Edward III and by a timely annuity to him and to his wife from John of Gaunt. Posts and assignments continued after the accession of Richard II in 1377. • The latter 1380s marked a period of comparative withdrawal from London activity, possibly tactical in nature since it roughly coincided with the years 1386–9 in which Richard II was severely challenged by an aristocratic coalition. • Richard reasserted his royal prerogatives in 1389, and Chaucer soon after received his next royal appointment as clerk of the king’s 3 paulstrohm works. • He continued in various capacities – though none of greater lustre – through the 1390s. When Henry IV supplanted Richard II in 1399, a year before Chaucer’s death, he confirmed Richard’s annuities and added a grant of his own.

16. Chaucer’ s language • Chaucer wrote in the London dialect of Middle English • Middle English was spoken from the time of the Norman Conquest (A.D. 1066) until the early 16th century. • Old English, spoken by the Anglo-Saxon population, was a heavily inflected language. • When the Normans invaded and conquered England in the 11th century, they brought with them their feudal culture and their French language. • The Germanic roots of English are obscured by the French (and to some degree Latin) overlay. • For some time, also, French was the language spoken by the aristocracy and the court. • English only gradually became the accepted language for education, court proceedings, and political endeavors.

17. The list of characters: Chaucerian narrator • The most common character that appears throughout Chaucer’s works is the Chaucerian narrator. • who this narrator is changes depending on the work in question. The overall narrator of The Canterbury Tales, for instance, Chaucer the pilgrim, is naïve and trusting, whereas Chaucer the poet is cynical and realistic. • The narrator in Book of the Duchess is suffering from melancholy and is arguably in love with one ofthecharacters in the poem. • The Troilus and Criseyde narrator is sympathetic toward Troilus, neutral toward Pandarus, and harsh to Criseyde.

19. Essay topics on Chaucerian narrator • For an essay on the Chaucerian narrator, you might consider comparing the narrators in related works. For instance, how does the narrator in the Book of the Duchess compare to the narrator in another dream vision such as the Legend of Good Women?

20. Canterbury tales: setting • The setting is in spring along the road to Canterbury Cathedral in Canterbury, Kent, which is south of London. • A group of people meet along the way as they travel toward Canterbury to visit the shrine of • St. Thomas à Becket, a local saint and martyr. • Canterbury Cathedral was a popular pilgrimage destination, and spring was one of the busiesttimesof travel. • The group of people—the pilgrims—who end up traveling together have little in common other than their shared destination

21. Canterbury tales: themes • Themes • Chaucer spends a great deal of time on love and lust in The Canterbury • We see love of all types— a) courtly, b)chivalrous, c)adulterous, d)young, e) wretched, and f) unrequited. Lust, without benefit of love, is also present in • a number of tales. • The pilgrims and their characters are lusty people who enjoy having sexual relations or at least discussing and referring to them.

22. The theme of quiting • Quiting,” meaning “payback” or “revenge,” is another theme of The • Canterbury Tales. • Though most obviously established by the Reeve, who tells his vicious tale in order to get back at the Miller, there are numerousotherinstances of “quiting” throughout the collection. • The theme of “quiting” is alluded to by the host in the General Prologue, when heestablishesthe structure of the tales.

23. A essay on love in Chaucer’ Canterbury Tales • Love: How is love defined in a given tale? Is “true love” different from courtly love? • Question 1: Is love different from lust? Is there love in marriage? • An essay about love would first seek to distinguish which type of love was being examined and define itaccordingto medieval standards. • Next, the characters’ words and actions, especially their interactions, would need to becarefullyanalyzed in order to determine potential individual motivations. • Question 2: Do they act out of love? Out of lust? In fear of one or both?

24. Philosophy and ideas: an essay on Fortune • Fortune: How does Chaucer represent the workings of fortune within the tales? In the General Prologue? • Free will is the idea that humans choose their own destiny, independent of supernatural forces or divine influence. • How does the concept of fortune interact with free will? • Such an essay would first define fortune (and free will, if including a discussion of that notion) • and then choose a text to examine

25. Philosophy and ideas: an essay on Chaucer’s religion • There are numerous fruitful topics to pursue involving religious connections within the tales. • Perhaps the biggest one involves Chaucer’s own orthodoxy. • Does he uphold the accepted principles of the medieval Christian Church? • Does he challenge them? How? When? Why?

26. Philosophy and ideas: an essay on Chaucer’s treatment of confession • In addition to contextualizing the background of medieval Christianity, the writer would want to focus on one aspect of the tales—an individual character or tale or a recurring element, such as confession. • For instance, the writer might pursue an essay on how Chaucer presents confession within The Canterbury Tales

27. An essay on pilgrimage in The Canterbury tales • Pilgrimage: • Question 1: Are the pilgrims all “on” the same pilgrimage? In other words, do they share a common goal or have individual, intermediary ends in mind? • Question 2: How do these goals change? Are they spiritual or secular in nature

28. . Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales repeatedly tackles questions of marriage, especially fidelity and “maistre,” or control. • Typical medieval marriages were arranged among the upper classes, for the less affluent marriage was less dependent on social pressures and the protection or attainment of status. • Chaucer writes about a wide variety of motivations for marriage (love, sex, money, social standing) but also covers various “types” of marriages, • including successful and unsuccessful ones.

29. The list of characters • The Knight is the first pilgrim to be described and the first to relate a tale. “Chance” is the reason given, but Chaucer reserves the honored position for the Knight because the chivalrous figure carried the most authority in medieval society and served both secular and religious ideals. This particular knight is idealized;?

30. List of characters: The Squire • The Squire, the curly-headed son of the Knight and a youthful version of him, has plenty of zeal but lacks the discipline he will need. T • he narrator refers to him as a “lad of fire”; he is so preoccupied with his lady-love that “he slept as little as a nightingale.” Traveling as a servant to both the Knight and the Squire is the green and brown Yeoman. • After decking him out with woodsman’s clothes and a hunter’s bow, the narrator appears to be playing the naïf here when he states the obvious: “He was a proper forester, I guess.” • The Yeoman’s longbow was a new weapon in Chaucer’s lifetime..

31. List of characters: The Prioress • The Prioress is the first of Chaucer’s religious figures and the first to be identified as an individual (she has her own name): her personality is marked by its striking contradictions. She must have caught the narrator’s attention early; he observed her long enough to notice her oddly perfect table manners: “. . . not a morsel from her lips did she let fall.” “Over-refined” describes the Prioress: she “[strains] to counterfeit a courtly kind of grace . . . [one that is] fitting to her place.” Her affections appear unbalanced: she swoons over an injured mouse but not apparently for poor people. Her spoiled little dogs also get more of her devotion than God. The leftovers from a convent kitchen

32. List of characters: The Prioress (II) • The inscription in her bright golden brooch—Amor vincitomnia, Love conquers all—brings into question the kind of love—sacred or profane, of God or of man—she is keeping close to her heart..

33. List of characters: The monk • The Monk, second of the religious figures, is an odd man who has rejected the monastic life: “[The text that scorns] a monk out of his cloister . . . was a text he held not worth an oyster.” Not only is he not a humble figure associated with the ascetic life of prayer, fasting, and service, this monk is impressively robust, like his horses, and adamant in his resistance to St. Augustine’s instruction that monks perform some field labor. The monk’s idea of manual labor consists of riding his horses to the hunt and eating heartily afterwards. The narrator is nonetheless quite taken with this “manly” monk; he even uses the monk’s own words to defend him: “Why should he study till his head went round poring over books in cloisters?” Where the Prioress had pretensions to piety, the monk has none, and Chaucer has his narrator make this unsubtle observation: “He was a prelate fit for exhibition.”

34. List of characters: Friar • Another religious figure more worldly than pious is the Friar. Unlike the Prioress whose worldliness is relatively harmless or the monk whose enthusiasm for worldly pleasures causes no deprivation to others, the Friar’s self-justifying story about his various behaviors reveals a corrupt figure at heart. Friars were noncloistered monks. These wandering mendicants took vows of service through holy poverty which many violated, some egregiously. Chaucer’s friar exemplifies the institutional corruption that marked the Church of the Middle Ages. The narrator is taken in by the Friar; he calls him a “noble pillar to his Order,” but each action ascribed to him violates the sacred duties entrusted to him. Friars were expected to serve the “least among us,” in particular the lepers and other outcasts this friar energetically avoids, preferring to cavort with barmaids. : “

35. List of characters: merchant • The nameless Merchant serves an essential but narrow purpose in society—trade and commerce. • He is “worthy” in the sense that he takes responsibility for a high-stakes venture: battling 26 pirates and capricious weather at sea to bring needed goods to his clients. • His deceit is not of himself but of others about himself. • Actually in debt, he must appear successful to keep his enterprise going. A motley-dressed anonymous merchant on a pilgrimage could be running away from his creditors, but Chaucer does not know or speculate..”

36. List of characters: Clerk • “Clerk” in Chaucer’s time referred to someone associated with the ecclesiastical or intellectual life. Chaucer’s Clerk, an Oxford student, is an austere intellectual; he lives without physical comfort. He is nearly as emaciated as his horse, and his threadbare clothes are more like those the Friar and other servants of God should be arrayed in but are not. The Clerk has no idle speech, no pleasantries—“He never spoke a word more than was need.”. Unlike the Merchant or the Friar, he has a remarkable disregard for making money. He also possesses no phoniness or hypocrisy, no self-deception or selfseeking ways. He is cheerful: “And gladly would he learn, and gladly teach

37. List of characters: Chaucer’s Man of law • Chaucer’s Man of Law is disconcertingly similar to the contemporary cynical image of the lawyer. The narrator’s conjecture that the Lawyer is not as busy as he likes to appear to be, nor as rich, is an amusing bit of satire about the legal profession. the Merchant and the Friar, the Lawyer is skilled at concealing his self-promoting motives.

38. List of characters: The Haberdasher, Carpenter, Weavery, Dyer, and Tapestrymaker • The Haberdasher, Carpenter, Weaver, Dyer, and Tapestrymakerare tradesmen belonging to the same guild, an institution similar to a modern trade union. • Chaucer’s attention to their finely detailed apparel suggests their skill and prosperity as well as their aspirations to occupy a higher social class. • Their wives’ pretentious behaviors match these aspirations. • They wear showy robes and answer to “Madam,” as if they were royalty. • The satire and revulsion of this scene are experienced wholly by the reader, while the narrator continues merrily on his way

39. List of characters: The Seaman. • The Seaman behaves like a pirate, but may simply be a merchant mariner who could turn into a rogue without qualms. This skillful scoundrel sails right by us without eliciting any judgment from the narrator. Why a nonbelieving doctor would join a religious pilgrimage is unclear. But in his colorful attire, advertising his affluence and success

40. List of characters: The Doctor • Doctor is exceptionally knowledgeable about medicine and healing— no one alive knows more—and, like contemporary doctors, reveres Hippocrates. The doctor impresses the narrator who must rely on the latter’s testimony for evidence of his medical successes. Medieval medicine combined the patient’s selfreported symptoms with his or her planetary signs to diagnose and treat afflictions. Human health was maintained by a balance of the four elements and humours—earth, air, water, fire; black bile, yellow bile, blood, phlegm.

41. List of characters: The Wife of Bath • The flamboyant, formidable, and gap-toothed Wife of Bath is in a class by herself. The image of the short, stout, and ruddy Chaucer traveling along with this larger-than-life lady is one of the most memorable in the Canterbury Tales. Known internationally for her superior weaving, she is undoubtedly wearing some of her own handiwork. Details of manner and dress identify her as a member of the rising middle class. Strong-willed, she has outlived five husbands and under Church law she would have been entitled to five separate inheritances, making her a rare figure for medieval audiences: an independent woman with the sufficient means to travel alone.

42. List of characters: The Parson • Meeting the Parson, good pilgrim and the first honest practitioner of his sacred duties, reminds us of human decency as well. • Humble and holy, the Parson, in Christian imagery, is a hovering shepherd, devoted to each sheep no matter how inconveniently it has strayed from the flock. • In integrity, the Parson is kin to the Knight; the only hint of imperfect behavior is his quickness to rebuke anyone who has gone astray. T • he Parson stands at the opposite end of the ethical spectrum from the Friar, Pardoner, and Summoner, but in contrast to these miscreants, he has no identifying details. • He functions more as an ideal, reminding readers, and the other pilgrims, of their manifold failings.

43. List of characters: the Plowman • The Plowman, an honest and hardworking laborer. His is the lowliest work; twice the narrator portrays him hauling manure. This loyal peasant farmer belongs with the blessed meek whom Jesus, in the Beatitudes, says will inherit the earth. Chaucer has framed here an ideal of medieval order and community.

44. The Miller • Fit company for the Miller is the band of crooks that follows, each one with his own scam. The Manciple buys provisions for an organization of lawyers. He pays less for the goods than he gets in reimbursement and pockets the difference. The narrator seems more amused than shocked by the Manciple’s cleverness in outwitting his employers.

45. A Reeve • A reeve serves the lord of an estate. He implements and accounts for the lord’s management of his lands and serfs. Chaucer’s Reeve is another petty crook, an embezzler of sorts, getting as much profit out of the work done by serfs but reporting a lower yield to the lord and keeping the difference. Although he has a spiffy horse and a nice home, the Reeve’s dress and demeanor suggest a life devoid of meaning or pleasure. The Reeve is so shameless that he lends money to the lord whom he has stolen it from.

46. Summoner • Chaucer’s Summonerrepels everyone with his incurable pimply skin disease and garlic breath, and, of course, no one wants to be the object of his attention. Even children flee from him. The Summoner’s attempts to overcome his social isolation by playing the clown, wearing odd objects on his head, and pretending to speak Latin are in vain. His only contact with others involves fear and bribery. Fear of false accusation tempts others to offer him bribes, and he, in turn, bribes the real wrong-doers in exchange for not hauling them off to court. “A man’s soul is in his purse” is the narrator’s comment.

47. List of characters: Pardoner • Traveling with the Summoner is the Pardoner. They are an odd pair: both lonely, both strikingly unattractive, singing a song ironically titled, “Come hither, love, come home!” • Contemporary audiences might find reason to feel some compassion for these grotesque men—but the narrator expresses none of the pity he did for the Wife of Bath’s deafness. • But what redeeming quality does either possess? The Pardoner’s bulging eyeballs and waxlike hair, hanging in big hanks down his back until it thins into “rat-tails,” are offputting. • The narrator notices sexual confusion in the Pardoner.

48. List of characters: Pardoner (II) • He has no body hair and is compared to a “gelding or a mare,” suggesting either impotence, or—like the absurd cake his companion brandishes as a shield—utter uselessness, perhaps even, allegorically, the ultimate impotency of evil. Understanding the gravity of the Pardoner’s transgressions requires some knowledge of the medieval Church’s practice of selling relics and pardoning sins. Relics were objects associated with a particular saint and were believed to bear some of the saint’s miraculous healing powers.

49. List of characters: Harry Bailly • Both narrator and host hold distinctive positions on the pilgrimage. Harry Baillyis the perfect character to play the role Chaucer has cleverly created in order to make two important additions to his work possible. Only such a gregarious tavern host could plausibly transform a religious pilgrimage into a secular storytelling contest—a diversion from the sacred to the mundane—a temptation the most earnest of people chronically succumb to.

50. The Knight’s Tale • Knight’s Tale As the tales begin, the pilgrims join Chaucer by becoming both author and character. The Knight leads off, assuming his proper role as protector of persons and upholder of ideals. • The Knight’s tale, an elegant chivalric romance set in ancient Athens, touches on all the great universal themes of human existence. • Love, conflict, and loss dominate this tale; death begins and ends it. Theseus, duke of Athens, returning from conquering the Amazons accompanied by his new bride Queen Hippolita and her sister Emily, is confronted by a group of women in black mourning dress. • Grasping onto his horse’s bridle, the women tell their terrible story of how Creon, the new ruler of Thebes following Oedipus, has denied burial to their slain husbands and brothers. • Theseus takes pity on them and changes his course.