When Geoffrey Chaucer foremost started composing the Canterbury Tales sometime in the late 1300s, he touched upon several impressions that were non yet thought of by anyone else. In many ways, he pioneered the construct of feminism and challenged the common misunderstandings of spiritual philosophies of the Middle Ages most imposingly in his Canterbury Tales – something that a few others dared to make. The Wife of Bath ‘s Tale and The Summoner ‘s Tale are, non merely in that manner, really much interlaced, but they are besides parallel to one another in several other ways, more so than being alone in other ways.
First and first, it can non get away the reader ‘s notice that in both narratives, Chaucer is concerned with faith. That is the chief subject that both narratives are centered upon. Sing as Christianity was the credo reigning and prevalent in medieval times, one can deduce that Chaucer has set it up against the human experience, the holy holiness of matrimony and the powers each individual has in a matrimonial brotherhood in The Wife of Bath ‘s Tale. He allows for those of import constructs to respond with one another on the pages of his manuscript and it is intriguing to watch how all the criterions are redefined in the mock society he creates in this narrative. Boldly, Alisoun – the Wife of Bath – uses faith to warrant her picks and her manner of life. Ironically nevertheless, she relies on Judaic figures such as King Solomon, Abraham, and Jacob – who have all had several married womans – even though she is on a Christian pilgrim’s journey ( p 103, L 35, 55, 56 ) . The fact that she uses illustrations of work forces to feed her alibi makes her even more profane and dare. She says in L 52 that it is “ Better to be wedded than to fire ” and that shows that faith is unfastened for reading as one sees tantrum, doing it a really porous system of belief in Chaucer ‘s eyes. Furthermore, Alisoun openly talks about virginity ; that she wishes to go forth it to the chaste but she condones her surplus of libido because it does non state anyplace in any spiritual text that it is out ( p 105, L 138-142 ) . In a manner, Chaucer may be Alisoun, and he created her – a fictional character – to be able to voice an sentiment he would non hold otherwise expressed: that the current spiritual idea of the clip was disappointing to him and since Prophetss and male monarchs were polygamous, so the monogamous instructions of Christianity do non hold to be abided by everyone. It besides signifies that Chaucer has a feministic position on the patriarchal society of the clip. Both the prologue of the narrative and the narrative itself serve to repeat Chaucer ‘s belief that adult females should be independent and self-fulfilled – be it in the prologue stated in a more forceful manner. That is manifested when Alisoun says she uses sexual fulfilment as a tool to acquire what she wants out of her matrimonies ( p 111, L 401-2, 405-14 ) . Therefore, Chaucer more or less, uses Alisoun to dispute the clergy ‘s false instructions. He besides aggressively contrasts the supposed pureness of spiritual religion by foregrounding the lip service and unorthodoxy of the mendicant in The Summoner ‘s Tale. Although there are no feministic positions in the latter narrative, the Summoner himself could be seen as another emblem of Chaucer ‘s voice. Angry in his response to The Friar ‘s Tale, the Summoner – or Chaucer – denounces the common blind religion in Christianity by tie ining mendicants with the Satan ‘s buttocks ( p 140, L 1694-5 ) and so once more with holding the worth of a flatus ( p 150-1, L 2129-43 ) . Upon a first feeling, Chaucer would be deemed a spiritual heretic, but really, he is simply knocking the errors and misunderstandings of the Church ‘s subsidiaries. Therefore, the single brushs that Chaucer has created in both narratives have allegorically cosmopolitan representations of phenomena people face in world.
Furthermore, both narratives allot similar vindictive runs within their characters. The Summoner tells his narrative merely to discontinue the narrative told by the Friar, and Alisoun in The Wife of Bath does non detain in revenging herself against her hubbies ( p 120, L 800-22 ) either by keep backing from them their sexual rights or by playing the portion of the injury and the dejected when she was hit by one of her hubbies. Besides, the mendicant in The Summoner ‘s Tale does more believing about gaining financially, utilizing the Church as an alibi to travel about roll uping alms or nutrient and claiming it is for the Church ‘s interest and this lip service is apparent when the mendicant ‘s servant erases the names they keep a record of and the friar keeps what the people give him in nutrient and money ( p 142, L 1755-60 ) . Similarly, Alisoun is infatuated with the societal and fiscal fringe benefits she gets from get marrieding several work forces ( P 110, L 355-6 ) . This exhibits both characters ‘ shallowness and love of secular things. Even though both narratives are practically barren of any logic and hard-core facts that could implement Chaucer ‘s statement of ill-conceived spiritual instructions – seeing as Alisoun is evidently simply an amusement to her audience, and the Summoner employs a blasphemously amusing flatus to make the lesson of his narrative – his learned and well-maintained manner that are preserved in both narratives ( if non all of them ) can non but convert the reader of the message he is seeking to convey. But at the same clip, the characters love to distend in their address and state long narratives to turn out their points: with Alisoun, she tells the narrative of the knight and hag and with the Summoner, he retells several narratives the mendicant preaches Thomas about choler ( Cyrus, the Persian and the wroth Cambyses ) . Basically, the common characteristics in both narratives are most surely non coinciding ; Chaucer has purposefully projected those similitudes – among many others – to be able to clear up his purpose of trying to rectify the things people do incorrect under the streamer of faith.
Acerate leaf to state, nevertheless, both narratives are different in many ways. Basically, the reader can merely get down to hold on at the complexness of Chaucer ‘s personality visual perception as he embodies a adult female fighting against a oppressive patriarchal society in The Wife of Bath ‘s Tale and so an angry Summoner seeking to acquire his portion of the narrative heard in The Summoner ‘s Tale. It besides can non be denied that the Summoner ‘s history is more far-fetched to the reader of the 21st century. On the other manus, Alisoun has become a really typical type of adult female these yearss and so, her stance is non difficult to understand and back up. But the beginning and development of the Summoner ‘s discord do non matter much to the common reader today. Quite in contrast to that theory, nevertheless, would be that Chaucer ‘s creative activity of Alisoun would hold been Chaucer traveling out on a limb since she was a adult female that seldom existed in his clip. But summoners and mendicants decidedly existed in copiousness. Therefore, Alisoun was more original a character than either the summoner or the mendicant. The latter two often would dispute in world but Alisoun ‘s character was puzzling and unreal. Furthermore, Alisoun ‘s narrative serves the primary intent of diverting the audience and reader likewise, and at it contains amusing alleviation here and at that place, nevertheless, the Summoner ‘s history – although including the narrative of the fart – nonetheless leaves the reader inquiring what Chaucer ‘s implicit in message could be at the really terminal. Then once more, the type of reader that Chaucer had in head for each narrative could hold varied ; for The Wife of Bath ‘s Tale, the reader that Chaucer could hold imagined would be the common conversational one, while for The Summoner ‘s Tale, Chaucer might hold envisioned a far more spiritual reader, person who would rub their encephalon after reading or listening to the foundation-shaking narrative.
Ultimately, and in concurrency, the fictional characters that Chaucer created are the marionettes of his deepest ideas, Inquisitions, beliefs and uncertainties. He was the mastermind ventriloquist of his age and no affair what one may state about him, in support or rebuttal, one can non but respect the nervus and bravery he had to compose those words. The Wife of Bath ‘s Tale and The Summoner ‘s Tale are simply two of several other narratives Chaucer has written that encompass several similar subjects emanating from a individual adult male ‘s head, yet remain per se single in many more ways than one.
