Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

What is the course about?

This online literature course begins with the General Prologue and sets the scene for pilgrimage in the medieval world. It considers in detail the tales from the first two manuscript fragments of The Canterbury Tales (A and B1) – a work considered to be one of the greatest of English Literature. We meet the Knight, Miller, Reeve, Cook and Man of Law and explore Chaucer’s carefully crafted representations of the individuals and the society they come from.
The first manuscript fragment is the most complete of the ten fragments that make up The Canterbury Tales. Chaucer devised the frame of the pilgrimage to contain the pilgrims and their narratives and the interest of the reader is sustained not only by the marvelous stories the pilgrims share, but through their competitive interaction. Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales draws its strength and inspiration from a range of genres including fabliaux, romances, allegories, saints’ lives, animal fables, tragedies, tricks, sermons and penitential treatises. There are farcical and indecent jokes, arguments, confessions and more!

This is a live online course. You will need:
- Internet connection. The classes work best with Chrome.
- A computer with microphone and camera is best (e.g. a PC/laptop/iMac/MacBook), or a tablet/iPad/smart phone/iPhone if you don't have a computer.
- Earphones/headphones/speakers.
We will contact you with joining instructions before your course starts.

What will we cover?

We will read the General Prologue, which serves as the foundation for the whole of The Canterbury Tales. Then we will consider the individual prologues and tales belonging to five key characters – the Knight, Miller, Reeve, Cook and Man of Law.

Topics to be explored include the contexts for the tales and Chaucer’s language, verse and structure. The themes we will touch on are many and include authority and truth; religion and biblical narrative; sexuality, desire and entrapment; chivalry, courtly love, female beauty; imprisonment and fortune; geometry, cosmology and astrology; games, comic inversions, satire; anticlericalism, religious dissent; even xenophobia.

What will I achieve?
By the end of this course you should be able to...

• Read and enjoy parts of The Canterbury Tales with some informative knowledge of Middle English
• Understand Chaucer’s vision with regards to the structure and scope of The Canterbury Tales
• Discuss texts with reference to different historical and literary contexts
• Evaluate the significance of imagery and symbolism in the text and the links between tales and tellers
• Use key terminology within your discussions about literary texts.

What level is the course and do I need any particular skills?

No previous knowledge of literature is necessary. However, learners will ideally need the following skills and attributes:
• An enthusiasm for reading and discussing poetry within large and small groups
• Confidence to explore language that looks different and to persevere with linguistic challenges
• A willingness and ability to read the poem and wider criticism outside the class
• An interest in, and ability to listen to, the responses of other students about the work discussed.

How will I be taught, and will there be any work outside the class?

A variety of teaching methods will be used, including short lecture, small group work using primary and secondary text extracts, discussions. Classes will be supported with PowerPoint presentations. Work outside class is to read the relevant sections of the core text in preparation for the upcoming week. You will be directed to wider reading as the course progresses, but this is optional.

Are there any other costs? Is there anything I need to bring?

Please buy or borrow: Michael Alexander ed., Geoffrey Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales: The First Fragment (Penguin Classics, 1996) ISBN: 978-0-14-043409-5 ) is recommended.

-The tutor will provide The text of The Man of Law’s Tale as well as extracts from further texts as necessary
-Optional: The Riverside Chaucer (2008), is an enormous but comprehensive text in standard Middle English containing the whole of the work, as well as many other well known works by Chaucer. If you plan to study more Chaucer, this is the text for you! (You need not purchase both the Michael Alexander edition and The Riverside edition.)
-There are also modern translations which you may find helpful, for example David Wright’s 2011 translation in Oxford World’s Classics or Neville Coghill’s translation in Penguin Classic.
• Harvard’s Geoffrey Chaucer website is also a useful resource - https://chaucer.fas.harvard.edu/pages/text-and-translations.

When I've finished, what course can I do next?

The same tutor will be teaching HLT200 Chaucer's Love Visions in term two and HLT326 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in term three. Look for other Literary History courses on our website under History, Culture and Writing/Literature/Literary History at www.citylit.ac.uk.