Abstract

In terms of its genre, the Franklin’s Tale is one of Chaucer’s most puzzling texts. It not only presents an Italian novella as a Breton lay, but splices further material from chronicles, saints’ lives and classical and patristic literature into its overall form. This paper aims to deepen the Tale’s complexity by noting the presence of a further, unremarked genre in the text, that of the fabliau. In particular, it pays close attention to the figure of the magician, arguing that this character and his tacitly rationalised sorcery are designed to evoke the rascally clercs escoliers of the French texts, whose trickery often has comparable methods and results. The wider implications of these allusions for interpreting the poem are also considered.

Highlights

  • All references to The Canterbury Tales and other works by Chaucer are taken from Benson 2008

  • As this paper will hopefully make clear, Chaucer permits several elements from the fabliau to make their way into the Tale, continuing his experiments with the form found in the Merchant‟s Tale and the first fragment

  • Locating overlaps between the Franklin‟s Tale and the fabliaux is nothing new, as a small amount of commentary has already hinted at this possibility

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Summary

Introduction

All references to The Canterbury Tales and other works by Chaucer are taken from Benson 2008. As a matter of fact J.S.P. Tatlock (1914, p.21), the first critic to consider the astrology of the Tale in detail, saw its treatment in exactly these terms, claiming that the clerk is „foretelling‟ when best to work his „feats of magic‟.

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