week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

Number of replies: 7

The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer's final unfinished work, is a creatively inflected compendium of contemporary genres set in the framework of a tale-telling game. The telling of an individual story relates in a complex way to the character of its narrator: the relation can be smooth ('The Knight's Tale') or tensioned ('The Prioress' Tale') and the matter is further complicated by moments in which Chaucer the narrator seems to take over from the narrator proper, or rather, seems to lend that narrator his "literary expertise" - referencing other texts - and his often ironic voice.

'The Merchant's Tale' can serve as an example of such complex telling. Part of the so-called 'marriage group', it ostensibly reflects, in its disillusioned perspective, the Merchant's own negative marital experience. At the same time, there are many 'generic' voices in the tale: romance, liturgy, Ovidian allusions, fabliau.
forum:
I suggest you look at and try to analyse the interplay of romance (here specifically the 'courtly love' variety) and fabliau elements in the tale and comment on the result. Focus on the plot and the characterization.
session:
We will expand on the forum debate with a discussion of the style(s) and register(s) used in the telling of the tale.
We will discuss what the specific configuration of generic and stylistic elements says about the narrator's attitude to his subject-matter and the discourses he employs. Do you think the tale offers a critique of romance - or not?

In reply to First post

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Anastasiya Nováková -
Most obviously for me, the courtly love is represented in the Tale through its protagonists and the setting. Our main characters are the knight January, his fiancée and later a wife May, and his squire Damian. The action takes place within a courtly context. The characters also behave according to the courtly norms of value. At the same time, these same characters and their behaviour are represented in a comical way. A worthy knight is pictured as a lustful foolish old man. His young squire instead of being brave and adventurous is only interested in May and falls ill because of this, as he thinks, unrequited love. May herself agrees to cheat on her husband because she feels so sorry for a poor sick squire she is ready to do everything for him to feel better. The Tale is also full of misogynous stereotypes which, if I am not mistaken, are typical for fabliaux.
I think that this interplay of romance and fabliau might lower the 'highness' of courtly love and make it more... real?
In reply to First post

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Štěpán Rybák -
I cannot but agree with what Anastasiya mentioned. My question whilst reading the story was in which part of a Romance-genre narration would The Merchant's Tale take place. In my opinion, the tale does not really correspond with Romance in that it seems to be placed into a time-sequence that is not usually covered by traditional courtly Romance and that is the life after the main hero achieved every goal he ought to have aimed at. The setting therefore does respect the three unities of Aristotle's Poetics, it is static without the typical knightly adventurous journeys, because January has already done enough glorious deeds. The fact that the Romance-like characters are confined to a limited space provides opportunities for the already noted stereotypes. It portrays the incredibility of Romance when it is confronted with trussed everydailyness and this turns Romance into fabliau - Romance-based January despite trying to retain the idea of courtly love, is lost in an ordinary enviroment, confronted with (his own) common (and perhaps low) emotions and needs.
In reply to Štěpán Rybák

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Helena Znojemská -
An aggregate reply - when you speak of "characters behaving according to courtly norms of value" and "romance-based January" - are you talking about actual behaviour or the characters' reliance on romance pattern in representing their experience and/or finding a pretext/justification for their actions? This might be difficult to distinguish at moments - e.g. Damian's lovesickness - is it real or fake, or perceived real (by himself) but exposed as fake by the development of the plot? Basically, we are faced with tensions between plot patterns, the characters' perspective and the narrator's telling of the story - and it might be difficult to locate the "romance" squarely in any of these.
In reply to First post

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Simona Zákutná -
One of the key ways in which the romance and fabliau elements interplay in the tale is through the character of May. While she is presented as an object of desire, with her youth and beauty, she is also depicted as being sexually promiscuous and manipulative. May is not the innocent, devoted wife that January expects her to be. Instead, she is cunning and manipulative, using her beauty and charm to get what she wants. This creates a tension between the traditional notions of romance and the more bawdy, humorous elements of the fabliau. Another way in which the romance and fabliau elements interplay is through the character of January. Despite being an elderly knight, he is still depicted as being able to feel and act on feelings of desire and love. However, this desire is ultimately shown to be misguided and naive, as May is revealed to be using him for her own purposes. Overall, The Merchant's Tale blends elements of romance and fabliau to create a humorous and satirical portrayal of love, marriage, and gender roles in medieval society.
In reply to Simona Zákutná

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Helena Znojemská -
I suppose we might get a rather heated debate on who's using whom in the January - May marriage and who expects and doesn't get the romance. I wonder what others think of this.
In reply to First post

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Jiří Chytrý -
I think what is very interesting in the interplay of romance and fabliau is the presence of the supernatural: the arrival of Pluto and his wife. We have seen the power of divine providence in Romance, slowly but with precision, and one would expect they arrive to finally set things right, but here the power of the pagan god is comically impotent against the power of female cunning. His male sense of justice is subverted by his wife's sense of justice. It seems that "these unjustices" cannot be easily resolved even by the gods (actually Pluto and his wife parallel January and May in a lot of ways) and thus what we end up with is, if not the absolute aporia of divine justice in the world, then at least a profound complication of its workings: giving more emphasis to perspective and the moral ambiguities of the world, as opposed to the more simplistic, didactic view of Romance.
In reply to Jiří Chytrý

Re: week 11: The Merchant's Tale - genre, narrator and the context of the Canterbury Tales

by Helena Znojemská -
I would probably make the contrast here with the Knight's Tale and the way it works with the deities of Classical myth as a more direct counterpart/contrast - since your otherwise very apt comment would be complicated by the difference between Christian providence and either the Classical pantheon or Fate. Of course, the settlement achieved by Saturn in KT has its problems too, but there the pagan gods seem to function as a stand-in for Providence, unlike here. So in short, I agree, I just think we need to work with an intermediary step in the romance.