Chaucers The Franklins Tale from the Canterbury Tales Essay -- Chauc

Chaucers The Franklins Tale from the Canterbury TalesThe Franklins Tale, one of the many stories comprising the Canterbury Tales, is one of Chaucers most celebrated and most contradictory works. This tale delimit in medieval Brittany narrates the uncanny marriage of the knight Arveragus and his lady Dorigen. This unlikely union was based on mutual trust, love and truthfulness and knew neither the feel of the lady that was typical of courtly love, nor the domination by the husband that was expected of a traditional marriage. In the controversial scene that will be discussed here, Arveragus orders Dorigen to fertilise herself to a man to whom she had made the reckless promise of giving her love if he could accomplish an impossible deed. Critics have argued back and forth for centuries on the government issue of knowing whether this scene (and the tales outcome) showed the validity of the marriage agreement or, on the contrary, its total utopia. Indeed, how should Arveragus reaction be interpreted? Does he stay legitimate to his marriage vow by sending his wife to a forced adultery? And what does it say about the couples values and the validity of their engagement? In my opinion, Arveragus violated the marriage agreement because he valued trouthe to others and knightly honor before trouthe to his wife and to his own promise. His actions were motivated not by the mutual promise the harming couple had made to each other but by the desire to save the couples honor in the face of society and to comport by the principle of trouthe, not truthfulness. In order to answer the question of whether Arveragus violates his marriage vows by ordering his wife to Aurelius, one must first cautiously analyze said vows and determine exactly what kind of marr... ...2. Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Franklins Tale. The Canterbury Tales. Pages 337-358. Flake, Timothy H. Love, Trouthe, and the Happy Ending of the Franklins Tale. English Studies. 1996, 3. Pages 209-226.Kaske R.E. Chaucers wedding party Group. Chaucer the Love Poet. Edited by Jerome Mitchell and William Provost. University of Georgia Press, 1973. Lawler, Traugott. Delicacy vs. Truth. New Readings of Chaucers Poetry. Edited by Robert G. Benson and Susan J. Ridyard. Cambridge D.S. Brewer, 2003. Schwartz, Debora B. Backgrounds to Romance Courtly Love. gothic Literature class. California Polytechnic State University, March 2001.http//cla.calpoly.edu/dschwart/engl513/courtly/courtly.htm Severs, J. Burke. The Tales of Romance. Companion to Chaucer Studies. Edited by Beryl Rowland. Toronto New York University Press, 1968. Pages 229-246.