Communal Vs. Individual Morality in Chaucer's the Canterbury Tales

The article examines Chaucer's use of the various literary genres to provide a broader view of individualism and its place in society. In doing so, Chaucer challenges the Medieval view of communal morality and puts the focus on the individual.

Communal versus Individual Morality in Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

Chaucer's England was a nation in the midst of social excitement. Although Medievalism was a dominant influence in the everyday life the Englishman, the Renaissance had assumed definite form and the nation stood at the threshold of the modern world. The primary force that Chaucer and his fellow countrymen stood face to face with was the medieval belief that the community, not the individual, was the great ideal. As Chaucer walks the line between two contending world views, we find that though he is a Renaissance man, he provides a broader view of individualism and places it within the context of its effect on society. The tale-tellers are clearly individuals, but they bring their assorted experience to an integrated text that forces them to interact. In this respect, The Canterbury Tales is somewhat a work of philosophy rather than literature, especially since the tales are largely adapted from previously existing, traditionally established works. Chaucer's brilliance, it seems, was not in saying something new but in creating something new by providing another context from which to view the individual's contribution to society. This is apparent among the characters as they each become enlightened (or bored) by each other, but the invitation to a broadened perspective is also extended to the audience.

Understanding the audience for which Chaucer wrote his tales is important to their understanding. Chaucer moved in what we would call "high society" and was well educated; therefore, his audience would have been a sophisticated one. As was the custom of the time, Chaucer would have read his tales aloud to his audience; thus, we can assume his listeners would have had knowledge of French, Latin and English. They would also have been familiar with the types of stories and tales that Chaucer's work imitated. Therefore, Chaucer could have easily utilized various types of classical allusions, satire, and irony, all of which would have been understood by his audience.

Though all of these tales fall into different genres, they share some commonalties. In addition to their primary commonality (all of the tale-tellers are making a pilgrimage), Chaucer also provides continuity by writing most of the tales in narrative verse, either in rhymed couplets or in stanzas of seven lines. The poetry remains relatively uniform: the literary genres, on the other hand, are diverse and borrowed from a wide variety of traditional sources.

The first literary form is that of courtly romance, a form which is used in "Knight's Tale." This particular tale borrowed heavily from Boccaccio's Teseida and Boethius's Consolation of Philosophy (Kolve and Olson 271). For the people of the Middle Ages the courtly romance was "principally a form of entertainment" (Cuddon 802). The medieval romance was understood to be a work of fiction by both the writer and his audience. It was a convenient form in that it allowed the author to treat his material with considerable freedom, delineating characters according to his own point of view and changing events to suit his purpose. This particular aspect of the "Knight's Tale" is evident in the way characters conveniently come across each other at pivotal moments. For example, when after several years of separation Palamon finds Arcite alone in the garden, the narrator explains, "For al day meeteth men at unset stevene"(2.666) and when Theseus happens upon the cousins' dual, it is chalked up to "destiny":

The destinee, ministre general,
That executeth in the world over al
.................
So strong it is that, though the world hath sworn
The contrarie of a thing by ye or nay,
Yet somtyme it shal fallen on a day
That falleth nat eft withinne a thousand yere. (2.805-806, 808-811)

Using the genre of the courtly romance also allowed the knight (and Chaucer) to offer his audience lengthy descriptions and to incorporate the use of magic, supernatural events and wonders beyond human experience. Of most importance, however, is the fact that as this imaginary, ideal world developed, the audience developed with it. The audience had no direct experience with this world nor did it resemble the society it purported to portray; nevertheless, it was accepted by them as normal (for us, an equivalent example might be the modern day western). This interesting mix of Greek culture and medieval chivalry allows the components of magic and epic while still appealing to contemporary ideals.

The "Knight's Tale" is a story of ideal love, in which the emphasis is on chivalry. Though some sections of this tale may seem tedious to the modern reader, the reader must notice how the story succinctly fits the character of the Knight. He chooses a tale filled with battle, adventure, honor, love and other knights, and the story focuses on the rules of honor and proper conduct. These desired characteristics, along with the purity of the love each knight feels for Emelye, ennobles the character/narrator.

It is also characteristic of a courtly romance that the Knight describes the richness of the banquet and the rituals, the "Heigh labour and ful greet apparaillinge"(4.2055), connected with the funeral. Chaucer understood that that type of magnificence would appeal to a man of distinction, such as the Knight. He thrives especially on codes of behavior, ritual, and chivalry, all which form the elements of knighthood. Three of these characteristics?courtesy, courage in battle, and funerary ritual?are immediately evident in Theseus when he takes pity on the widows who wish to retrieve their husbands' bodies for proper burial:

With herte pitous, whan he herde hem speke.
Him thoughte that his herte wolde breke
................................................
And hem comforteth in ful good entente;
And swoor his ooth, as he was trewe knight,
He wolde doon so ferforthly his might
Upon the tyraunt Creon hem to wreke (1.95-96,100-103)

The second literary form is that of the miracle play (a familiar genre in Medieval literature), which can be found in the "Prioress's Tale." Interestingly, the story reads much like a hagiography, displaying the elements of purity, devotion, and martyrdom. This tale begins with the Prioress extolling the praises of the Virgin Mary, "for she hirself is honour, and the rote/ Of bountee, next to hir sone, and soules bote" (31-32). The prologue is therefore a hymn of praise.

The tale begins in a small Christian town in Asia that was shared by a small Jewish community. At the far end of the main street, passing through a ghetto, there was a school for the Christian children. One of the pupils was a small child who had not yet learned to read and was only beginning to understand his Latin prayers. While at school he heard the older children singing Alma redemptoris. Day by day he would get a little closer to these children so that he could listen more carefully and try to ascertain the meaning of what they were singing. It was not long before he had the first part memorized but because it was Latin he was not yet able to interpret its meaning. He begged an older boy to tell him what the song meant and the older boy said:

This song, I have herd seye,
Was maked of our blisful Lady free,
Hire to salue, and eek hire for to preye. (97-99)

The child was overjoyed when he realized that the song was a tribute to the Virgin Mary and decided to learn it in its entirety so that on Christmas day he would pay homage to Christ's mother.

In his excitement the little boy would skip along the Jewish Street singing his song. Satan could not allow this innocent child to so boldly worship the Virgin so he whispered to the Jews that this child was a disgrace and totally ignored Jewish Law. The Jews conspired to murder the little boy. The child's mother waited all night for her son to return from school. When she went looking for him she was told that her son was last seen on in the Jewish part of the community. Though the Jewish people denied any knowledge of her son, Jesus guided her to the place her son had been killed and to the "wardrobe. . . / Where as these Jewes purgen hir entraille"(138-139) where his body had been cast.As the widow neared the place, the child's voice broke forth in song O Alma redemptoris mater. The Christian people were astonished! The Provost of the city, upon seeing the dead child, ordered that all Jews by drawn by wild horses then hanged.

The child was taken the abbey, singing all the time, and as the burial mass drew near, he told the abbot that Christ had commanded him to sing until his time for burial and that, at the same moment, the Virgin Mary laid a grain upon his tongue.

Wherfore I singe, and singe moot certeyn,
In honour of that blissful mayden free,
Till fro my tounge of taken is the greyn. (229-231)

The abbot took away the grain and the child "yaf up the goost ful softely"(238).

Again Chaucer adequately adapts the Prioress's character and position because she is a nun whose order relies on the patronage of the Virgin Mary. This is why her hymn acts as a preview to the tale, which concerns the same type of hymn of praise sung for the Virgin.

This story also employs the strong anti-Semitic sentiment of the Middle Ages, a hatred that was frequently expressed in the form of religious passion. These passions were put into story form and periodically called upon and passed along as being true. In this tale, as in so many others, Chaucer puts most of the emphasis on the human aspects of the tale rather than the supernatural. The poet maintains a careful balance within this tale by paying equal attention to the glory of the Virgin Mary and the wickedness of the Jews, which sets up a splendid contrast of good versus evil, which then in turn stresses the importance of morality from a communal and individual context.

The third is the beast fable, which is evident in the "Nun's Priest's Tale," ?a tale derived partly from Aesop's Fables and tales of Reynard the Fox (Kolve and Olson 428). The beast epic is "an allegorical tale, often, but by no means always, long, in which animals are characters and in which the style is pseudo-epic" (Cuddon 84). Chaucer sets up this tale when the Knight interrupts the Monk, crying that his tales of woe are too much to bear. The Knight asks the Monk to tell him a tale about a poor man who defeats poverty and rises to good fortune. The Host concurs with the Monk and asks him to tell a more light-hearted tale before he falls asleep from boredom: "I preye yow hertely telle us somewhat elles/... I sholde er this han fallen doun for slepe"(27, 31). All are ready for a happy tale. The Monk declines and the Host then turns to the Nun's Priest and calls for a tale.

Though animal stories have been a part of humankind's literature since the beginning of time, this tale is one of the best because Chaucer humanizes the rooster: both the rooster and the man share the characteristic of vanity. This is immediately evident in the description of the rooster's knowledge and appearance:

By nature knew he ech ascencioun
Of the equinoxial in thilke toun:
For whan degrees fiftene were ascended,
Thanne crew he, that it mighte nat ben amended.
His comb was redder than the fyn coral,
...........................................
His bile was blak, and as the jeet it shoon;
Lyk asur were his legges and his toon;
His nayles whytter than the lilie flour,
And lyk the burned gold was his colour.(89-93, 95-98)

Chaucer's antagonist, "a col-fox ful of sly iniquitee"(449), practices obvious flattery?the preeminent sign of a villain. The ease with which the fox convinces the rooster to sing highlights his already apparent vanity.

Chaucer's animals discuss with great scholarship the plausibility of dreams?ideas attributed to Macrobius and Geoffrey of Vinsauf (Kolve and Olson 428). The poet leads us through child-like, dream stages while developing the characters of the Fox, Pertelote, and Chaunticleer to suffer all the quirks of human nature. It is important to note that though these characters are complex, Chaucer never lets us forget that they are no more than a fox, a hen and a cock, otherwise the fun that the poet offers us would be lost. It must also be remembered that as the Priest tells his story of Chaunticleer and his seven hens, the storyteller is in a similar situation because he is the confessor to a group of nuns.

The "Nun's Priest's Tale" is filled with many ironies with the barnyard animals mirroring specifically human aspects; Pertelote even refers to Chaunticleer's beard. Yet despite this, they are merely animals, and as such, Chaucer uses these animals to show the absurdity of human aspirations. It is also important to note the mock-heroic tone. The tale has many classical allusions, with discussion about divine foreknowledge, and displays a high moral tone. But again we can find Chaucer's attempt to show the absurdity of human aspirations because for the poet to offer a discussion of divine knowledge in the context of barnyard chickens is the best of comic irony: a foolish rooster that is caught by a fox is used as proof of divine foreknowledge!

The primary reason Chaucer goes to great lengths to give his characters life is that the individual genres demand that the characters be human. "The 'individual' aspect is therefore vital to the frame of the tales" (Mann 471). Of critical importance, however, is that the readers not mistake The Canterbury Tales as a series of simple poems that tend to grow more complex. Chaucer's work is not that trivial. The tales are dialectic in nature and so modify and at times contradict each other, exploring various religious themes by emphasizing their differences and implications of each difference. Of interesting note is that Chaucer employs an argument as the stimulus for each tale. The overall effect of Chaucer's method is for the reader to make relative Chaucer's proposed values with our own and in so doing, the reader comes to a clearer understanding of himself.

Though all the characters that Chaucer offers the reader are interesting, none is more so than the narrator himself. The narrator "acts as a representative for the rest of society in its relation to each estate" (Mann 475). In his role, he teaches that society sets limits as to how far its citizens may proceed past the professional personae to know the truth and the application of truth to professional behavior. In Chaucer's world, society is a world of experts in which the individual is irrelevant, a view which stresses the Middle Age ideology that morality is a communal effort while at the same times compels the audience to question their individual path to salvation. The narrator, by placing each pilgrim as society's expert and allowing him to present his own values in his own way, reverses the Middle Age ideology of community versus the individual by making the issue one of individual versus community.


Works Cited

Chaucer, Geoffry. The Canterbury Tales. Kolve V.A. and Olson, Glending, eds. New York: W.W. Norton, 1989.

Cuddon, J.A. Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. London: Penguin, 1991.

Kolve, V.A & Olson, Glending, eds. The Canturbury Tales by Chaucer. New York: W.W. Norton,1989.

Mann, Jill. "Characterization and Moral Judgement in the General Prologue Portraits." The Canterbury Tales, Kolve V.A. & Olson, G., eds., 471-483.

Rose Reigle is a professor of Literature, Composition, and Rhetoric, and other humanities courses at several U.S. colleges and universities. She is the author of Poetry for Women of the 21st Century as well as several articles on resources for ELL students and online learning. She has received certificates of recognition for her online work at Florida Community College and Kaiser University. She lives in Yelm, Washington, with her family.
www.rreigle.net
http://www.reiglepoetrywomen.com/