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A Period in the Development of the Canterbury Tales Marriage Group and of Blocks B2 and C
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 March 2021
Extract
My chief-purpose in this article is to show that, during the period in which Chaucer, in consequence of his newly conceived plan for a Marriage Group, produced some of his most independent and brilliant creative work, some of his time and thought was also devoted to the task of establishing a relation between the Marriage Group and several previously written tales, and also, one thing leading to another, to the ordering and the linking of tales, several of which never had any direct bearing on the debate on maniage. In the first section of this article I shall try to show that the Melibeus, the Nun's Priest's Tale, and the Clerk's Tale antedate the conception of a Marriage Group; that the idea of relating these tales to the debate on marriage was an afterthought on Chauser's part. In Section II we shall see that a fairly extensive ordering and linking operation, resulting in the construction of Blocks B2 and C and in the addition of new features to the character of Harry Bailly; seems to have been carried out at the same period as the work described in Section I. In Section III the bearing of my conclusions and conjectures on various problems of chronology, order of the tale blocks, etc., will be briefly considered.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1953
References
page 1142 note 1 “The Tale of (Chicago, 1941), pp. 560– 614.
page 1143 note 2 That Chaucer intended B to precede D mort (1951), 1141-67.
page 1143 note 3 B 3081-3112. On the relation of Mel to the Marriage Group I may refer to W. W. Lawrence, (New York, 1950), pp. 131-133. Here and throughout this article my references to earlier studies will be few, as the passing remarks made by many Chaucer scholars on the position of Mel, the possible cancellation of Host St., etc, have contributed little to the present study.
page 1143 note 4 That the C1T ends with E 1169 in MSS. Bo and Hk by John M. Manly and Edith Rickert [Univ. of Chicago Press, 1940], n, 243, 244, 500) is not taken here as lending any support to (he possibility that an early version may have stopped st that point. Features peculisr to the Bo1 group or to the group of MSS. do not, in the prsent writer's opinion, reflect conditions of any “early version”
page 1147 note 14 F. N. Robinson. (New York, 1932), p. 862; but cf. Tatlock, pp. 113-115. For more reference, see Robert Pratt, n. 41.
page 1147 note 15 Manly and Rickert, ii, 410–412.
page 1148 note 16 That Chaucer must have linked the Mel to Th before linking it to MkT seems s fairly afe semmptinri, for Mel im certainly not Uken from the Man of Law to make room for the not especiaUy appropriate itory of Constance bat because so suitable as contrasting piace to Thopss. The chances are that it got linked to Th almost immediately after the sequence was decided upon.
page 1148 note 17 Even those who may not believe that the Nun's Priest's Endlink was cancelled by Chaucer will admit that B 3122-38 is based on it, not the reverse; see esp. B 3135, from B 4641, suggested of course by Chauntedeer.
page 1148 note 18 Manly and Rickert, ii, 414–423; on Chaucer's cancellation of the Endlink see also iv, 517.
page 1148 note 19 In Chaucer's source it was probably (as in all known analogues) the cock and not the hen who failed to recognise the significance of the dream; see Severs, “Chaucer's Originality in the /Text's (1946), 22-41. Tint Chaucer made the hen largely responsible for the mistake of the cock might suggest that he had already the Marriage Group in mind. But if this had been the case surely the theme of women as bad counsellors would Uve basa picked up in the endlink. It was of course a most popular topic, always welcome with or without especial occasion.
page 1148 note 20 If the NPT was no longer quite fresh in his memory be may not have recalled how much space he had given there to questions other than women as advisers.
page 1152 note 23 In the Host St. and the Me-Sq Link.
page 1153 note 26 That these words of the Host express “his obvious delight in his creation” (Manly, p. 573) does not seem to me a natural interpretation.
page 1153 note 27 See Robinson, p. 851; Manly, p. 635.
page 1159 note 41 We should remember that Chaucer seems to have been active until very near the end of his life. Few writers would constantlyu keep their papers in the condition most convernient for their literary executors.