Merchant's Tale Critical Quotes Flashcards
(21 cards)
Donaldson - tone of the tale (quote)
‘things sound very grim indeed, although…they are somehow very funny’
Donaldson - juxtaposition and contrast in the tale (quote)
‘The juxtaposition of beautiful and ugly is not static but dynamic, for the ugly constantly casts its shadow over the beautiful or, conversely, the seemingly beautiful ultimately reveals itself to be as ugly.’
Donaldson - the Merchant’s cynicism (quote)
‘To read this tale without being disturbed by the force and truth of the Merchant’s hatred seems to me impossible.’
Cooper - narrative voice and irony
Cooper emphasizes that The Merchant’s Tale is steeped in ironic tension. The Merchant narrator presents his ‘art’ as if it were separate from his own experience, but the tale is saturated with misogynistic bitterness that colours the narrative. Chaucer allows this irony to unfold by giving the Merchant enough rhetorical freedom to damn marriage under the guise of defending it.
Cooper - genre and tone
Though formally a fabliau - a comic tale of sexual trickery - Cooper argues that Chaucer subverts the genre. He blends fabliau crudity with courtly romance and homily, creating a tale that refuses to settle into a single mode. The grotesque and the lyrical exist side-by-side, generating dissonance.
Cooper - thematic focus on self-delusion and fantasy
The tale is about male fantasy and self-deception. January’s belief that marriage is a ‘paradis terrestre’ is immediately undercut by his own actions and May’s betrayal. Even when presented with truth (Justinus’s warnings or his literal sight being restored), January clings to illusion. This is not a satire of women but of male blindness - moral, erotic and spiritual.
Cooper - May and female agency
May is not a simple victim or deceiver; she plays along with the systems of male fantasy while manipulating them. Her character is formed through paradox - romanticized and objectified by January, but also cunning and independent in action. Her gesture of tearing up Damian’s letter in the privy encapsulates the tale’s crude wit and complex treatment of feminine agency.
Cooper - Myth, allegory and the parodic use of source material
Pluto and Proserpina, the gods of the underworld, parody the roles of divine figures in traditional allegory. Rather than delivering moral clarity, they bicker like a married couple.
Cooper - the moral of the tale (quote)
‘The last 100 lines make it clear there is no moral high ground at all’
Cooper - May’s adultery (quote)
‘May’s adultery, by contrast, is given a personal motivation: she is unfaithful not, or not only, because that is the nature of wives, but because of the nature of her husband.’
Cooper - on gardens (quote)
‘In The Roman [de la Rose - a source for TMT], the garden is the idealized place of courtly ‘mirth’ and the elaborate rituals of courtship…in The Merchant’s Tale, the garden exists solely for sex.’
Cooper - Damyan (quote)
‘Damian…is a man of action, not words; his only speech consists of two lines whispered to May to request her silence’
Kittredge - Chaucer’s beliefs about marriage
Kittredge insists the cynicism is the Merchant’s, not Chaucer’s, with the tale being shaped by the Merchant’s personal experience of three months of marriage (bitterly regretting marrying)
Kittredge - the tale’s gendered satire (quote)
‘The satire is aimed at January rather than at May. That egotistical old dotard is less excusable than his young wife, and meets with less mercy at the Merchant’s hands.’
Pearsall - January’s grotesque yet pitiable portrayal (quote)
‘January is not just a stock senex amans…He creates out of his fantasy an object upon whom his lust can descend…with thicke brustles of his berde unsofte…He was al coltissh, ful of rageyre.’
Pearsall - the merchant (quote)
‘is himself a distorting mirror’
Benson - May (quote)
‘The first two speeches given by May (the only times we hear her before the dialogue at the end) condemn her not only because they contradict one another, but also because they juxtapose the fabliau world to nobler values.’
Benson - January and his blindness (quote)
‘the pitiless account of January’s slack skin and lean neck as he crows over his sorry performance is like a moral X-ray that forces our condemnation.’
Benson - May and Damian
‘The description of May and Damyan’s arboreal coupling in a tree is anything but romantic and brutally gives the lie to all their courtly posturing.’
Benson - morale purpose of the tale (quote)
‘its purpose would seem to be clear: an unrelenting exposure of spiritual corruption
Pearsall - mock-encomium of marriage (quote)
‘The matter of the encomium is orthodox, but there is an intermittent counter-current of irony which occasionally breaks the surface…in open sarcasms or in venomous asides.’
