Chaucer Key Quotes Flashcards
(19 cards)
Conventions of Courtly Romance
heightened language
descripto
nobles - knights + ladies
love as religious force
locus amoenus
classical alllusions
love outseide of marriage
women elevated + unattainable
descripto
chivalry + chastity
C11th French genre, intended for the entertainment of nobility
Lanuage of Courtly Romance
gentil
noble
governaunce
beringe
Examples of Courtly Romance
Romance of the Rose
French allegorical poem - woman (+ virginity) represented as rose bud in walled garden. Chaucer translated.
Allegorical Age is denied enterance to the garden
Contriversial for senusal lang
Knight’s Tale
Emeleye = elevated + beautiful + chaste
Palamon + Arcite = knights who risk lives
Garden + classical gods
De Troyes - Lancelot the Knight of the Cart
Love = capitalised religious force
Unattainable married woman
Pain + suffering in love
Scenes of Courtly Romance in the Tale
Januarie chooses May - descripto
The Wedding Feast + classical allusions
Damyan’s love
May’s love
The Garden + classical allusions
Januarie’s Song of Solomon
love triangle in general, language of CR to describe characters
Basically all of these things are undermined w/ anti-feminism or fabliau
Conventions of Fabliaux Tales
puns/paranomasia
vivid detail (oft sexual or grim)
attitudes contrary to nobles + the church
critical of women + clergy
obscene subject matter
senex amans + mal marie in general
lower + middle-class characers
more recognisable settings
ending with a re-establishment of conventioanl sexual morality
C12th French literary genre
Examples of fabliaux
**The Miller’s Tale **
Interrupts Knight
all ends in chaos
The lover’s ruse relies on astrological prediction + Biblical rhetoric - Chaucer plays around with genre
Boccaccio’s 7th Day 9th T - Decameron
Pear Tree Fabliau
wealthy old nasty husband fooled by tree having ‘magical’ sex powers
Scenes of Fabliau in the Tale
Sexual overtones to Januarie’s decisions
Wedding Feast + Night
Other sexual occurances w/ Jan
May returns Damyan’s feelings
Locus amoenus undermined by sexual intent + specific gods + Song of Solomon
The pear tree + having sex in it
Senex amans - Jan not realising, garden, wedding night
Miraculous conception parodies
Uses of obscene language and puns/double-entendre
Examples of Anti-Feminist Literature
The Goodman of Paris
Treatise from elderly Parisian merchant to young wife entreating her to behave like his loyal dog who will stay by him even if hit
Advice on improving conduct
**Miroir de Mariage - Deschamps **
Chaucer’s contemporary
List of ploys women use to decive + get what they want
Everything in marriage turning to torment for the men
Golden Book of Marraige - Theophrastus
vitriolic treatise on wicked wives
Conventions of Anti-Feminist Literature
Stereotype
Listing ‘vices’
Sympathy for the husband of mal marie + senex amans - cuckolds + sexual frustration
Miraculous conception parodies
Anti-Feminism in the Merchant’s Tale
Merchant’s narrative voice + the intentions of the tale
Januarie’s attitudes towards women
Religious attitudes + allegory
Justinus’ narrative voice
May’s deceptive nature
Pluto’s narrative voice
miraculous conception parody
Host’s narrative voice
Reactions against Anti-Feminism in the Tale
Undermining the Merchant’s view
Sympathy afforded May + highlighting her plight
Ambiguous nature of the Tale
Proserpina’s narrative voice
Reactions against Anti-Feminism
Wife of Bath’s Tale
Ambiguous
Highlights harm of anti-feminist literature
Questions attitudes of the church
Openly sexual
Christine de Pizan - Letter to Cupid
Questions the incompatibility of ant-feminist rhetoric + courtly romance tales
Historical Merchants + Chaucer
Growing class becoming wealthy
Met with suspicion by nobles
Not defined by conventional markers of wealth (eg land)
Needed nobles for their custom
——
Chaucer’s father = successful wine merchant
Chaucer grew up in mercantile Ldn district
Worked in as a controller of imports - would have seen a lot of corrupt merchants
Class
Chaucer = protected under the order of the king - in a good position to make comemnt
Changing post black-death - middle class growing stronger
Chaucer’s audience thought primarily noble - can’t make too much offence
Experienced in court life + taken on diplomatic missions, but also occupant of diverse Ldn.
Chaucer = concerned w/ how people of diff classes behave + each character is a ‘type’ of person whose job + class inform tale - diff to Decameron, who are all noble
Noble marraiges - political purpose, loveless
Religious attitudes about Women
Equal before God, but on earth, decendants of Eve - weaker sex + would lead men into sin
Mary = biologically impossible, mother of the redeemer
St Paul - preached that wives should be submissive to husbands
St Jerome - translated Bible into Latin, adamant virginity = superior, and it is unfortunate that you cannot try out a wife before marriage
Religious attitudes about Sex
For procreation
St Paul - marraige debt
chastity = ideal
no sex on Sundays + other religious dates (of which were many) or when woman = ‘impure’ - menstruation, after childbirth
Fornicators could be harshly punished
Death + the Soul
Death = part of daily life - afterlife = v important
good works + sacraments + avoiding sin = heaven
hell = eternal punishment for sin
heaven = eternal life in paradise
purgatory = for moderately bad sinners for period of purification
7 DS
Pride
Covetousness
Lust
Envy
Gluttony
Wrath
Sloth
Often depicted as branches on a tree
Marraige
Holy Sacrament
Much better than burning for lust (St Paul)
Noble marriages = political generally
Age gaps common esp in other countries in Europe (eg Italy), which Chaucer visited
Bedding cereomy = traditional for nobles + thought to increase fertility
