Lowsy jogelours: art and craft in Chaucer's Canterbury tales

Abstract

The descriptive list of the pilgrims in the General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales concludes with a special group of six men, one of whom is Chaucer's own narrator. The other five - the Reeve, Miller, Summoner, Pardoner and Manciple - are quickly shown to be rogues and con men of the worst kind. The pilgrim Friar and the two alchemists who join the company later on are equally devious and dishonest. The thesis examines Chaucer's portrayals of these men, in the General Prologue's sketches and the action in the tale-links, and analyses their tales and the implications of those tales for their respective characterisations. Various similarities or shared qualities are observed between them: a tendency towards violence or ruthlessness and a prickly personal defensiveness which often manifests itself in savage vengeance-taking; a callous and hypocritical use of charm and pleasantry; a calculated assessment of the audiences for whom they usually "perform" and from whom they extract large sums of money; and a self-serving consciousness of artifice and falseness. The pilgrim narrator's association with these rascals raises interesting and important questions about Chaucer's conception of the nature and role of art and the artist or poet-performer. A close discussion of the narrator's two tales, 'Sir Thopas' and 'Melibee', and of his presence more generally in the work, reveals many of the characteristics displayed by the Canterbury rogues. A brief excursion into the realities of Chaucer's life and circumstances in fourteenth century London shows the familiarity of the poet and many of his friends and colleagues with the same kind of controlled, artful, even necessary disingenuousness, and details the considerable financial and other rewards resulting from this. The thesis goes on to look at art and artistry in general in the Canterbury series, noting such factors as the extreme self-consciousness of Chaucer's various artists and performers, the ulterior motives behind the majority of the literary, verbal or personal presentations they put forward, and the increasing awareness as the Tales proceed of the terrible consequences which can arise from a poorly calculated or overly provocative performance. Issues such as Chaucer's typically ironic approach, and his use of the dichotomy of 'ernest' and 'game' are also discussed. Finally Chaucer's closing Retraction - his dramatic rejection of the dangerously unreliable and immoral complexities of art in favour of more stringently absolute truths and values - is considered in the context of his previous fascination with and delightedly adroit use of the ambiguities and deceptions of the artist or 'maker'.