Lesson 1.7 · Unit 1 · RL.11-12.6, RL.11-12.3
Satire by description, and the teller who indicts himself
Chaucer almost never tells a reader that a pilgrim is corrupt. He describes them warmly, supplies a detail that cannot be reconciled with the warmth, and moves on. The reader does the rest, which is why the portraits have survived six hundred years.
- The estates satire is a medieval genre that reviews each social order and finds it failing its duty.
- Chaucer's method is the unreconciled detail, placed inside an admiring description.
- The narrator's approval is part of the technique, since the reader must notice what he does not.
- The Pardoner sells forged relics and admits it in his prologue in front of the company.
- His tale condemns avarice, which makes him both a hypocrite and an effective preacher.
- The Wife of Bath's prologue is twice the length of her tale, and it argues with scripture.
- She quotes authorities against themselves, which is a formal technique rather than a complaint.
- The tales answer the prologues, so reading the two together is not optional.
Where students lose marks: summarizing a portrait's conclusion instead of showing the detail that produces it. Quote the line that cannot be reconciled with the praise around it, and explain what it establishes.
The texts. Chaucer, the General Prologue and the Pardoner's Prologue, about 1387. Public domain. Middle English with glosses.
A good WIF was ther of biside BATHE,
But she was somdel deef, and that was scathe.
Of clooth-makyng she hadde swich an haunt,
She passed hem of Ypres and of Gaunt.
For I wol preche and begge in sondry landes;
I wol nat do no labour with myne handes,
Ne make baskettes, and lyve therby,
By cause I wol nat beggen ydelly.The Pardoner
Step one: gloss the first passage. Somdel deef, somewhat deaf; scathe, a pity; haunt, skill; she passed hem, she surpassed those of Ypres and Ghent, the great cloth-making cities of Flanders.
Step two: notice the narrator's tone. "A good WIF", and her deafness is "a pity". The pilgrim Chaucer approves of her and reports her skill admiringly, with no reservation stated anywhere in the portrait.
Step three: find the unreconciled detail. She surpasses the weavers of Ypres and Ghent. That is a large claim about a woman in an English provincial town, and the reader is left to decide whether it is true or whether the narrator is repeating what she told him.
Step four: state the method. Chaucer supplies praise and evidence that strains it, and declines to resolve them. The satire happens in the reader, which is why none of the portraits reads as a lecture.
Step five: turn to the Pardoner's admission. He will preach and beg rather than work, and he will not weave baskets, because he will not beg idly. He states his business model aloud to the company.
Step six: work the logic of the last line. "By cause I wol nat beggen ydelly" means he will not beg without profit. He has taken a phrase that sounds like a principle and used it to describe efficient fraud.
Step seven: state why the confession is the hard part. A concealed hypocrite is a simple target. A hypocrite who announces his method and then preaches so effectively that the tale is genuinely powerful is a much more interesting problem, and Chaucer arranges exactly that.
Step eight: state the reading rule. Take the tale and the teller together. The Pardoner's tale against avarice is excellent preaching delivered by a man who has just explained that he preaches for money, and the question the poem leaves open is whether a true sermon from a false mouth still works.
Questions 1 to 5 are recall. Questions 6 to 10 ask for reasoning.
- What is estates satire?
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A medieval genre reviewing each social order and finding it failing its duty
- What is Chaucer's main satirical technique?
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An unreconciled detail placed inside an admiring description
- What does the Pardoner sell?
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Forged relics and pardons
- What is the Pardoner's tale about?
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Avarice, which he condemns
- How does the Wife of Bath's prologue compare to her tale?
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It is roughly twice as long
- Why is the narrator's approval part of the technique?
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Because the reader has to notice what he does not. The pilgrim Chaucer calls the Wife good and her deafness a pity, with no reservation anywhere in the portrait, so any judgment in the reader's mind was produced there rather than delivered. A narrator who disapproved would do the work and leave the reader passive. The judgment has to be produced by the reader
- Analyze the claim about Ypres and Ghent.
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Those were the great cloth-making cities of Flanders, so claiming a woman from near Bath surpassed their weavers is a very large claim. The reader is left to decide whether it is true or whether the narrator is repeating what she told him about herself, and the portrait supplies no way to settle it. The detail strains the praise without contradicting it. It is either remarkable or her own boast repeated credulously
- Work the logic of "I wol nat beggen ydelly".
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It means he will not beg without profit. The Pardoner has taken a phrase shaped like a principle, refusing idleness, and used it to describe efficient fraud. The joke is grammatical: the sentence has the form of a moral commitment and the content of a business plan. A sentence shaped like a principle describing efficient fraud
- Why is the Pardoner's confession the hard part?
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A concealed hypocrite is a simple target. The Pardoner announces his method to the company and then preaches so effectively that his tale against avarice is genuinely powerful. Chaucer has arranged a case where the sermon works and the preacher is false, which is a much more interesting problem than exposure would be. He admits the fraud and then preaches effectively
- State the reading rule for Chaucer.
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Take the tale and the teller together. A tale is evidence about the person telling it, and several are aimed at rivals in the company, so separating the two discards half of what is on the page. The Pardoner's excellent sermon from a mouth he has just declared false is the clearest case, and the poem leaves open whether a true sermon from a false preacher still works. Read tale and teller together, always