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February 6
THE FRANKLIN’S TALE AND THE SQUIRE’S TALE
by Karyen Wong
After collecting the quiz, Professor Sutherland introduced
our T.A., Amy Airhart, as the guest lecturer for The Franklin’s
Tale. Amy started off with some of the problematic issues surrounding
tale, including the Franklin’s interruption at the end of
The Squire’s Tale. The interchange between the two characters
and the Host highlights the Franklin’s preoccupation with
class and the inability to achieve a greater status without virtue.
In the Prologue, the Franklin credits his story to
the lays of the "Britouns". After the Norman Conquest
of 1066, the Bretons, originally from northwestern France, wrote
their lays in the Anglo-Norman tongue. Lays are songs with a strict
meter and form that can take on a range of topics, including moral
and political issues. One of the most well-known writers of these
lays is Marie de France, who lived during the mid 12th century to
the early 13th century. Like Chaucer, she was well-read and learned;
she also had a similar understanding of "autoritee", proclaiming
in the epilogue to her lays to be the author, thus sharing Chaucer’s
sense of his own creative influence on known tales.
The Franklin’s Tale opens with the typical "fine amour"
scenario of the perfect knight courting the perfect lady. However,
the lady wants equality in their
marriage, not one based on her mastery over him. Because of this
egalitarian
mindset, The Franklin’s Tale, along with The Merchant’s
Tale, which depicts a wife’s patience, and The Wife of Bath’s
Tale, which represents a wife’s independence, forms a trio
of tales known as the "Marriage Group" within The Canterbury
Tales.
It isn’t until lines 808 and 815 that the knight
and lady are actually named;
Amy points this out to emphasize that so far, these two characters
have been the archetypes of courtly love. She also stresses that
the importance of archetypes runs throughout the tale. Continuing
with the story, Dorigen laments the knight’s leaving, a scene
we have become familiar with as part of the "fine amour"
tradition seen also in The Knight’s Tale, The Merchant’s
Tale and Troilus and Criseyde. When Dorigen contemplates the unreasonableness
of the "grisly feendly rokkes blake" (line 868), her position
directly opposes that of Boethius’ in The Consolation of Philosophy,
Book III, meter 9, where he talks of God’s reason in everything
that happens; in questioning the sense of the rocks, Dorigen disputes
ultimate faith in God’s purpose.
From the rocks, Dorigen moves into the garden. In
medieval terms, the garden
is a "locus amoenus", a perfect enclosure or a place of
pleasure. However, it can also take on the connotation of a prison,
as it does in The Knight’s Tale for Emily, in The Merchant’s
Tale for May, and in this scene, for Dorigen, who is bound here
to an impossible promise. In the garden, we are also first introduced
to Aurelius, literally meaning "golden", and fittingly
so because he represents the perfect youth. He enters singing lays,
which immediately immerses him into the tale because it echoes the
Franklin’s reference to lays in the prologue. Aurelius’s
perfection parallels that of Arveragus’s, thus linking the
two characters together. Similarly, Aurelius’s caution in
approaching Dorigen about his love, "nevere dorste he tellen
hire his grevaunce" (line 941), mirrors Arveragus’s initial
meekness, "that wel unnethes dorste this knyght, for drede,
telle hire his wo" (line 736-737).
Beginning from the garden scene, several problematic
points emerge. Why does
Dorigen make the stipulation that if Aurelius can clear the coast
of the rocks, she will love him over any other man (line 993-997)?
It seems as if this is a game for Dorigen, that "in pley"
(line 988), she has given Aurelius an unattainable hope. Even if
he were to fulfill his part of the deal, she would not be able to
keep her side of the promise because she is bound to her husband,
Arveragus. The stipulation itself is also paradoxical in that Dorigen
wants the rocks removed so Arveragus can sail home, not so Aurelius
can win her love. Also, whereas Dorigen first prays to a Christian
God when thinking about the rocks, Aurelius asks a classical god,
Apollo, to assist him in his task; an immediate dichotomy arises
between religions.
After imploring Apollo and his sister, Lucina, to
help him, Aurelius faints and lays in sickness for more than two
years, a symptom of the unfulfilled lover familiar to us through
Troilus and Criseyde. Aurelius’s brother comes to his aid
by suggesting magical means to achieve Aurelius’s task. Curiously,
the brother never gets named, even though a heavy importance has
been given to the meaning of names and its relation to the characters.
By emphasizing that the magic he is referring to is natural magic,
that is, close to science, particularly astronomy, the brother dispels
all evil connotations related to black magic or necromancy. But
when Aurelius agrees to pursue this magical course, and the two
encounter a clerk to help them, they are really looking for an illusion
to cover up the rocks, not an actual removal, as Dorigen requested.
The clerk also asks for 1000 pounds to perform his magic, which
equals roughly $2200, a large sum in today’s terms, not to
mention during the Middle Ages. As Chaucer describes the magical
process involved in covering the rocks, it is intentionally made
incomprehensible to the reader.
Again, the emphasis on illusion, "but thurgh
his magik, for a wyke or tweye, it
semed that alle the rokkes were aweye" (line 1295-1296), draws
attention to the later paradox of Aurelius expecting Dorigen to
fulfill her literal promise despite his having only given her a
façade of performing his part. In lines 1163-1164, the brother
foreshadows that Dorigen will not be able to fulfill her promise;
indeed, she cannot possibly carryout the bargain without bringing
dishonor to herself. Therefore, after mentioning many famous women
who have chosen death over dishonor, Dorigen decides to commit suicide.
However, Amy wonders at her sincerity because it takes her two days
to deliberate this decision, just in time for Arveragus to come
home and dissuade her. Arveragus’s speech in lines 1472 to
1486 and his resolve to help his lady keep her promise highlight
the importance of maintaining honor and one’s "trouthe",
in keeping with their gentile class. Dorigen then must go back to
the garden to tell Aurelius because that was where she was first
confined by her promise. On the way over, she meets up with Aurelius,
who, overcome with their "gentillesse", releases her from
the bargain. Though Dorigen has kept her honor, Aurelius still owes
the magician 1000 pounds. When he goes to the clerk to tell him
he that he intends to keep his "trouthe" (line 1577),
the magician, now turned into a philosopher, also disengages Aurelius
from having to pay him. As Amy points out before reading lines 1607
to 1612, in which the philosopher sums up the positive effect of
all the characters’ "gentil" acts, the tale plays
out like the VW Beetle commercial, where various people pass on
a good deed and a smile.
The story ends with no epilogue, except for an interjection
in the Franklin’s
voice in the last four lines, where he poses the same question that
Amy asks the
class: which of these characters is most noble? Amy explores the
possibility
that none of them were really noble because everything was an illusion,
either of class, words or words versus deeds. All the characters
have multiple roles and false sides; nothing is sure or stable in
the story, so therefore the reader must decide what is important
and what is just for show. The Franklin refers to the "colours
of rethoryk" in line 724 and that he will forgo these rhetorical
ornaments to tell his story. Yet, many aspects of his tale, as well
as the characters in it, are multisided. The illusion of class can
be found in the epilogue of the Squire’s Tale, where the Franklin
speaks of his son. Though the Franklin believes his son is not gentile
because he would rather speak with a servant than a person of his
class, in the Franklin’s tale, class doesn’t matter:
both the knight and the squire are noble. Just as Dorigen plays
multiple roles, one in which she is false to her husband and Aurelius
and the other in which she is honorable, so are Arveragus and Aurelius
complex in that they are doubles of each other, seen in their descriptions.
The only reason why Arveragus gets Dorigen is because of timing;
the two characters are virtually the same. Finally, the magic used
to give the appearance of covering the rocks reinforces the idea
of multiplicity and illusion.
While discussing the noble qualities of each of the
main characters in the tale, some people argued for the husband
because he started the chain of noble acts, some for the clerk /
philosopher because he sticks to his agreement with Aurelius but
ends up forfeiting the money in favor of honor, and some for the
brother, who was only looking out for Aurelius. Amy points out the
faults of the husband, reminding us of the fine amour tradition,
where the lover must keep trying to win over his lady, not leave
to seek honor like Arveragus does in the story. Professor Sutherland
also highlights Arveragus’s attitude in his speech
before and after he bursts into tears, showing the shift from the
importance of keeping Dorigen’s honor to maintaining his reputation.
Amy then mentions that in all the bargains of love, marriage and
magic, the only one that is what it is from start to finish is the
one between the clerk and Aurelius. Arveragus says that he will
always be by Dorigen’s side, yet he leaves to go to England,
while Dorigen makes promises to both her husband and Aurelius. At
the same time, Aurelius says that he fulfilled his end of the bargain,
but really hadn’t because he did it through the illusion of
magic. At the end of the story, the philosopher comes to the conclusion
that money and class don’t matter, only actions in determining
nobility.
We then listened to a presentation by Caitlin (see
mini reports below) on class and the rise of the franklin’s
position. After the break, Mike made an announcement about the opportunity
for third year students to participate in an exchange program at
MIT. Kirk then gave a report on science and inventions in the Middle
Ages. Professor Sutherland added that though Chaucer does make constant
references to science in his stories, he does not seem to be interested
in the magical or the unexplainable despite the popularity of the
two with many other medieval writers.
In response to a comment about how The Squire’s
Tale seems to drop off inexplicably, Professor Sutherland explained
that the story was one of Chaucer’s fragments. She then compared
the Squire to his father, the Knight, through references drawn from
the General Prologue and their respective tales. Whereas The Knight’s
Tale is underscored by a philosophical, stoic attitude towards life
and characterized by its structure, maturity, emphasis on values
and the reining in of passion by wisdom, The Squire’s Tale
lacks cohesion and deals with love. This is in keeping with the
Squire’s description in the General Prologue (line 79-117),
which gives the reader a sense of his worship of love and his desire
to stand in a lady’s grace.
The tale immediately opens into the exotic landscape
of Tartarye. The Christian world was particularly attracted to this
location because of the potential for it to be an ally to the West.
In The Man of Law’s Tale, the Muslims are presented in a barbaric
light; however, in The Squire’s Tale, Genghis Kahn, the ruler
of Tartarye, is described as noble and a good king who rightly followed
his own religion (line 16). Here, Professor Sutherland reminds us
of the complexity of the Middle Ages, as seen in the contrast between
these two different treatments of the idea of the exotic. Picking
up on this paradox, Sir John Mandeville's book (The Travels
of Sir John Mandeville), written in the 1350’s –
1360’s about his journey to Jerusalem, gives us a reasonably
accurate depiction of the Muslims through his medieval mindset.
It also gives us evidence that the people of the Middle Ages knew
the world was not flat and that they probably derived this idea
from the Greeks. Professor Sutherland then showed us a 14th century
map (Lambeth. c. 1300) and told us that in spite of the invention
of the magnetic compass, maps were oriented towards the East, Paradise,
and that Jerusalem was the holy center. There was also an obsession
with roundness as a representation of perfection. To contrast with
this sacred and idealized depiction of the world, she then held
up a detailed map of England made fifty years later (Gouph, 1350-60),
which accurately showed the towns and coastline of the area.
Also during the Middle Ages, the East was seen as
a place of magical invention, where science was so advanced that
it bordered on the magical. Though the idea of the brass horse in
The Squire’s Tale is taken from old tales, it also demonstrates
this preconception that the Muslims were so far advanced in areas
of metal, philosophy and medicine. Given by the King of India and
Arabia, the ring, as a symbol of natural life, and the sword, as
an instrument of healing, also demonstrate the West’s presumption
of the East’s achievements. This orientalism, the way in which
the West projects the darker parts of people onto others by characterizing
the East as a feminine, wealthy, mysterious and strange, goes back
a long way and shows up in parts of The Squire’s Tale.
Professor Sutherland also mentions that the there is too much of
the storyteller in the tale and that the Squire often loses his
way in telling his story. For example, in line 355, he says that
he will not tell us about the dreams of the people, but in stating
so, he seems to take the story too far. The Squire also goes into
certain details but doesn’t resolve them, as in the case of
the healing sword that is never seen in action or with Canacee in
line 471, who waits for the bird to fall into her lap, but ends
up picking the bird off the ground when it actually falls. But the
tale also criticizes common people and the tendency to view novelty
as dangerous. This is best seen with the brass horse and how the
people crowd around it to discuss its possible threats.
Furthermore, the Squire often intrudes on the narration,
inappropriately bringing up his modesty, as seen in line 401, interrupting
the flow of the story and basically doing what shouldn’t be
done in a telling a story. He also draws attention to Canacee’s
walking towards the garden, showing a rather primitive understanding
of storytelling, as well as a clumsy way of moving the story to
Canacee and the bird in the tree.
The weirdness of the bird in the garden scene with
Canacee reveals many important themes and ideas. The way in which
the bird pecks at herself in misery highlights the motif of women
hurting themselves over love. Also, in line 105, the Squire says
that he will not use the knight’s high style of language,
but rather the common tongue, which parallels Canacee’s ability
to understand the language of animals by using her ring. However,
the bird does not sound very bird-like; instead, her language is
extreme and involves a lot of screaming. An instance of this over-the-top
rhetoric comes in at line 515, where the bird compares the male
falcon to a corpse. She causes further confusion for the reader
in calling the falcon a tiger "ful of doublnesse" (line
543) and a serpent, while also emphasizing the bizarre idea of a
bird with the ability to be treacherous in the first place. Her
story of deception provides a strong contrast to The Franklin’s
story, which stresses the importance of keeping a promise.
So what is Chaucer achieving by having the Squire tell this tale?
Is the Squire just an immature storyteller with no experience in
love? There does not seem to be much of a point in his using excessive
language to share a story with no solid bearing, as seen in how
he leaves Canacee in the garden and irrationally moves on to the
king’s son. One possibility can be found in the Franklin’s
interruption at the end of the tale (line 674), where he gently
commends the Squire’s ability "considerynge thy yowthe".
Another perspective of the strangeness of The Squire’s Tale
can be taken from Chaucer’s aversion to stories of incest.
As he does in The Man of Law’s Tale, Chaucer breaks off the
story just as he mentions the incestuous detail of Canacee being
won by her brother (line 667-670).
Another problematic issue, involving the reading of texts, arises
in line 607 with a reference to Boethius and The Consolation
of Philosophy, Book III, meter 2. The bird’s statement
of men always wanting to pursue what is new does not correspond
to reference from The Consolation of Philosophy, where
Boethius says that nature keeps creatures on a natural course. So
where is the falcon in that story? Does the bird’s reference
taken from Boethius prove that the falcon runs off because he wants
the latest novelty? Boethius does compare the confines of fine amour
to a cage, so in this sense, the reference could be applied to the
falcon’s story. Still, the bird seems to have read The
Consolation of Philosophy literally, explaining spiritual return
through animals. Chaucer probably stresses this problem of reading
in order to show the importance of looking at context when finding
a mention of another text within a text.
While Chaucer was one of the greatest writers of English
during his time, there were also other people who wrote just as
well during the Middle Ages, including John Gower. His story of
Canacee and her brother, how they grew up together and innocently
fell in love, ending with Canacee’s ultimate suicide reveals
Gower’s unapologetic treatment of the story of incest as opposed
to Chaucer’s more sensitive approach in The Squire’s
Tale. Class ended with Professor Sutherland's reading a section
from the story of Canacee in Gower's Confessio Amanti.
TO TOP
February 13
by Kirk Middleton
Unusual to the Canterbury Tales, the Wife
of Bath’s Prologue is considerably longer than that of the
tale itself. In the prologue, the Wife preaches, appealing to her
audience, doing an oral performance in which she takes her audience
into account. We see that while the Merchant can’t talk of
his own marriage, the Wife is more than happy to speak of hers,
holding nothing back. In this regard, she is clearly seen as a sexual
being, standing apart from all other characters on the pilgrimage.
On line 1685 of the Merchant’s tale, Justinus
warns against marriage. Here we have one tale addressing the character
in another. However, some would argue that she proves Justinus correct,
providing numerous reasons why marriage is a horrible idea.
From the General Prologue, it is clear that the Wife
goes on many pilgrimages, problematic for married women. She’s
an extravagant dresser with a wandering way and gap teeth, codeword
for a heightened sexuality (GP 467).
Like La Vielle from the Romance of the Rose, the
Wife is giving a dramatic monologue we are to maneuver around and
think about. The reader (us) make the monologue a dialogue. As the
first word of the prologue indicates, this is a book of ‘experience’.
Using scriptural examples, thanking God and referring to the wedding
at Cana of Galilee which suggests we are to only marry once, she
sets up a problem, addressing an opposing viewpoint and suggesting
more marriages is allowable. Solomon had many wives, so why the
double-standard? (although he was Jewish) Never mind that in Genesis
it says to be fruitful and multiply, but never stipulates how many
marriages are allowed. Her problem as we learn, is with who she’s
married to, not the four who came before him. Using the scriptures
provides the Wife with greater authority, as she takes snippets
of gloses, using them against each other, in a manner, ‘deglossing’.
The Prologue can be broken up into five parts:
(1) sermon on experience (1-192), interrupted by the Pardoner
(2) address to wise wives (193-378), talking to old men also, diminishes
them with rhetoric
(3) addresses lordings, rhetorical address (379-450)
(4) fourth husband, not good, he was a reveler (451-502)
(5) fifth husband (503-end)
From 528-542 she speaks on gossip, telling her husbands
most intimate secrets. From 545-563, she discusses the social lives
of women and the fears of men. 563-585 addresses women as manipulators
and plotters (a fear I’d say!). 586-626 is about her fourth
husband’s death (RIP), where she cries a little, but likes
the clerk a lot. Then she begins to fall for Jenkin, and at twenty
years her junior I can see why. From 691-710 the male presentation
of women in writings is challenged. Jenkin gives examples of women
who kill their husbands from 720-787. In this regard, Chaucer is
able to discuss horrible stories without being chastised by critics,
instead only referencing them. Her love with Jenkin is seen as her
finest, despite its masochistic nature. A particularly violent exchange
occurs where Jenkins deafens her after she knocks him into fire.
In discussing the body, the Wife asks why her genitals
were made how they are. She glosses her body, and her body is then
seen as her experience. She says to use it as an instrument, do
what you can with it, wanting to be ‘multigrain bread’.
She states how she can make her husband her slave with her body,
at which point the Pardoner breaks in attempting to silence her.
The second half of class involved a very lively discussion
in which two groups argued either that the tale and prologue were
Chaucer’s wish or the Wife’s wish. I quite enjoyed it.
TO TOP
February 20
READING WEEK
February 27
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