Poetics and literary devices in Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

Literary devices in Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales

Allusions are used in The Canterbury Tales when, as the most famous example, he speaks of the Wife of Bath and her appearance. He relates her appearance to the fact that she has been married five times and craves sex. The allusion is that she is gap toothed and that is a sign of being over sexed or craving sex.

Chaucer uses alliteration sparingly but it is still present. He uses it a whole lot less than the Gawain poet. In the General Prologue

Chaucer uses rhyming lines in verse in the original middle English text. A good example of this is on line 11- 14,

 So priketh hem Nature in hir corages;

            Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages

            And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes

            To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;

Chaucer uses a lot of alliteration to create a flow and aide in his descriptions in the General Prologue.

Chaucer writes in Iambic Pentameter sometimes as well. Opening lines:

            Whan that aprill with his shoures soote

I cannot tell or figure out if Chaucer is completely written in Iambic Pentameter. It is supposedly translated this way according to this site.

 Something I also found interesting was that Chaucer wrote this in English rather than French. This shows that he has a good understanding of languages.

This poem was an estate satire and poked fun at the 3 classes. Also, in this context, Chaucer’s writing does not condemn him to be set in any class. The way he writes and describes without class bias and only bias about the people themselves, shows that his thoughts outreach the three classes. He mocks the cultural patterns exhibited in that time period. Like with the Wife of Bath marrying more than once and not staying a window. She isn’t a typical woman because she’s actually made a wealthy life for herself.

Also, Chaucer’s subjects are real people. Some of them don’t fit into the stereotypes of the time. He speaks of the clergy being corrupt and the fact that the doctor takes people’s money and gives them sort of false treatments. “For each put money in the other’s pocket” (line 429).

There is no magic and fantasy just people. In this way, he is able to show a cross section of Medieval society.