Summary:
Discusses Chaucer's prologue to The Canterbury Tales. Describes how his concept of a good man is completely arbitrary. Analyzes the three layers of medieval society which each have an idealized representative of goodness.
The Age of Chaucer was an age of unrest and decay in all the fields of life. The corruption and decay was particularly reflected in the Christian Church of that age which gave rise to many satirical writers like Chaucer, Gower and Langland. Geoffrey Chaucer who was a representative writer of the age portrayed with crisp laconic vividness the materialism and avarice of the clergy as well as the moral laxity and luxury of the laity. His 'Canterbury Tales' can be called an estates satire, in which the people belonging to the different layers of the class are satirized. As Chaucer himself belonged to the middle class and therefore he has chosen for his theme the portraits of people from the.....
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