The Canterbury Tales

“When in April the sweet showers fall/And pierce the drought of March to the root, and all/The veins are bathed in liquor of such power/As brings about the engendering of the flower,/When also Zephyrus with his sweet breath/Exhales an air in every grove and heath/Upon the tender shoots, and the young sun/His half-course in the sign of the Ram has run,/And the small fowl are making melody/That sleep away the night with open eye/(So nature pricks them and their heart engages)/Then people long to go on pilgrimages…” 

The famous first lines of The Canterbury Tales place the reader in a world of springing, delighted freshness. In this landscape of sweet rains and stirring birds, religious pilgrimage appears as much a part of nature as the spring itself. Even in what might seem to be purely spiritual behavior, the pilgrims of the Tales are driven by animal nature—a sly, affectionate theme that develops throughout the stories.

“He who repeats a tale after a man/Is bound to say, as nearly as he can,/Each single word, if he remembers it,/However rudely spoken or unfit,/Or else the tale he tells will be untrue,/The things pretended and the phrases new./He may not flinch although it were his brother,/He may as well say one word as another./And Christ Himself spoke broad in Holy Writ,/Yet there is no scurrility in it,/And Plato says, for those with power to read,/‘The word should be as cousin to the deed.’” 

In this tongue-in-cheek passage, Chaucer justifies recounting the pilgrim’s stories—rudeness, lewdness, and all—with examples both Biblical and classical. There’s humor here, but also a serious point. Chaucer is attempting to capture how people really are, and he’s not going to leave anything out. There’s a further hint of mischief in the phrase “if he remembers it”: Perhaps even this “accurate” portrayal will employ a touch of artistic license.

“Immediately an uproar was begun/Over this granted boon in Heaven above/As between Venus, fairest Queen of Love,/And the armipotent Mars; it did not cease,/Though Jupiter was busy making peace,/Until their father Saturn, pale and cold,/Who knew so many stratagems of old,/Searched his experience and found an art/To please the disputants on either part.” (“The Knight’s Tale,” 

After the high drama of the three would-be lovers’ visits to the gods’ temples in “The Knight’s Tale,” the Knight comically deflates the tension with this petty squabble between Venus and Mars who have promised their petitioners conflicting boons. In this vision of the world—chivalrous and romantic though it is—everyone ultimately is human—even the gods.