3. AUTHORITY
Dame Alice uses her obvious intelligence in defense of the carnal, but she also pulls in as many authorities on the subject as she can think of, both for her introduction and the old hag’s speech. Many of her “quotations” from learned men are loose translations indeed, or outright misunderstandings, for example when she freely translates St. Paul’s teachings on chastity. Yet, as she begins by saying, her greatest authority is her own experience.
4. CHOICE
The knight must choose between appearances and satisfaction, between a good-looking wife or a faithful one. Dame Alice too makes it clear that she has chosen her five husbands, rather than them choosing her, though she’s not particular. It all boils down to her idea of being in control of one’s own life, which she identifies as superiority in marriage.
5. KINDS OF LOVE
Of course, the most important kind is sexual, but as the example of the queen shows, there is also the noble love called pity; the love, warring or peaceful, between husband and wife; and the love that Christ (whom Dame Alice likens to a woman because he was a virgin) has for humanity. The different kinds of love are intertwined for her because they are all part of the constantly changing facets of love that make up a marriage.
^^^^^^^^^^CANTERBURY TALES: POINT OF VIEW
Dame Alice is loud and direct in supporting her point of view that sex is meant for pleasure and women are to carry the big stick in marriage. This lusty viewpoint gives us a clear idea of her attitudes and priorities.
But not everyone agrees. Later on, the Clerk gives a tale back, measure for measure, that is exactly the opposite of Dame Alice’s.
^^^^^^^^^^CANTERBURY TALES: PLOT
The Pardoner, like the Wife of Bath, begins his tale with a long introduction that shows us remarkable things about his character. He freely admits he uses the same tricks every place he goes, with the same sermon–“Love of money is the root of all evil.” He shows people his credentials, then the animal bones he passes off as holy relics, which he lies can cure sick animals, increase livestock, even cure jealousy. He makes 100 marks a year by preaching against greed, shaming people into parting with their money. But he does this only out of his own covetousness, not to help people. He won’t live in poverty, that’s for sure. Even though he knows he’s completely unscrupulous, he can still tell a moral tale.
The Pardoner sets up the pilgrims the same way he does his gullible parishioners. First he rails against drunkenness, gluttony, gambling, and swearing. Then he tells the warning tale of three young men of Flanders (Belgium) who are guilty of all these things.
While they’re drinking in a bar, a dead body goes by. It happens to be a friend of theirs. A servant boy tells them Death is the culprit who is going around killing everyone. (It’s during a plague.) The three rioters decide–drunkenly–to go find this Death and kill him.
They meet an old man who is covered except for his head. He is polite, but the three young men are rude to him. The old man wants to die, but can’t find anyone who will trade his youth for the old man’s age. Thinking he’s Death’s spy, the rioters make him tell where Death is. The man points to a large tree, saying they’ll find Death underneath it.
But what they find is eight bushes of florins (gold coins), and, delighted, decide to wait until night to move them. They send the youngest rogue into town to buy wine, and while he’s gone, the other two decide to stab the third when he returns, so they can split the gold. The youngest, meanwhile, has the same idea and poisons the wine in order to kill the other two.
Everything goes as planned–all three ending up dying. Alas, cries the Pardoner, look what comes from gluttony and pride! And he offers pardons for redemption, although he admits that Christ’s pardon is better than his.
In an epilogue to his tale, the Pardoner actually tries to palm off some of his “relics” on his fellow pilgrims, starting with the Host, whom he calls the most sinful of the group. The Host is furious, and it takes the Knight to get them to kiss and make up.
The PARDONER is his own main character, since it is in the context of his personality that the tale takes on irony. He prides himself on being a practitioner of all the sins he preaches against, and plenty others besides. No wonder he’s often seen as Chaucer’s best psychological portrait. But unlike the Wife of Bath in her introduction, he is not presenting a justification for his life-style. He’s saying how proud he is of his own deceptiveness.
Why would he disclose all his sordid tricks? Certainly they’re not something to brag about, even when you’re drunk, as he is. Some believe that years of hypocrisy have created an urge in him finally to admit his guilt; some think he wants to show off his love of money, or has stopped caring what others think; while others think he’s simply totally unaware of how much he is revealing of his inner self.
He certainly embodies the theory of evil. Remember the picture of him from the General Prologue: a thin goat’s voice, a suspiciously effeminate nature, and the assumption that a part of him is missing (he is either “gelding or mare,” eunuch or homosexual). To the medieval mind, an absent part is a clear indication of moral deprivation; the inward and the outward are connected.
Is there any good at all in the Pardoner? Think about how Chaucer treats his characters, even the nasty ones, as human, as real people. For all his faults, the Pardoner at least is honest and knows he’s damned to hell for his conniving. He is able to turn the villagers he dupes away from their greedy ways. And he tells us that when he stands in the pulpit and tells his lies, his hands and tongue go so fast that it’s a “joy” to see his “business” (line 71). You could see this as another example of his disgusting pride in himself, or as Chaucer’s way of saying that even the lowest of the low can do something good. Also, there’s a certain fascination in such an evil character. We wonder what makes him tick, and here he gives us an unusual opportunity to see behind the public mask he wears.
The THREE RIOTERS have been seen as representing three major divisions of sin–perhaps gluttony, drunkenness, and blasphemy–three of the sins the Pardoner preaches against at the start of the tale. They aren’t real characters, yet we get a clear picture of the way they carry on and live their lives. They are more stupid than evil.
The OLD MAN has been a mystery for centuries. Who is he? Death himself, the mythical Wandering Jew, merely an old man? Whoever he is, he serves the purpose of pointing the young men to the place where Death waits.
^^^^^^^^^^CANTERBURY TALES: INTRODUCTION
The Host asks the Pardoner for a joking story, but because of the kind of debauched man he is, the pilgrims are obviously afraid that he’ll tell a bawdy story that’s even worse than the Miller’s. But before the Pardoner tells a moral tale, he must get drunk, “by St. Runyan.” (This is a play on the Middle English word for “scrotum” (“runian”), in addition to being a saint’s name.
The Pardoner boasts about being able to pull the wool over the eyes of the sheep, the villagers to whom he sells pardons. In bragging, does he reveal more of himself than he intends to? He tells about the “miracle” water that can cure jealousy, even in men who know their wives have slept with two or three priests (line 43). In his tone of voice we can hear him laugh at those who, like him, are hypocrites in their religious calling. But does he mean to reveal his contempt for humanity as being as corrupt as he is? (For example, assuming that wives will cheat on their husbands, and with priests no less.) It’s unclear.
He says three times that his sole purpose is to make money for himself. He has no desire to be like the Apostles and live in poverty or by hard work. Nonetheless, he can tell a moral tale with a smooth tongue, even without being moral himself. We get the impression he doesn’t realize his own words, or care that he himself will go to hell for all the sins he warns others against. This is what gives his tale, like the Wife of Bath’s, such poignancy: he is saying more about himself than he realizes.
^^^^^^^^^^CANTERBURY TALES: THE TALE
The young revelers are described enjoying “abominable” excesses–dancing girls, drinking, gambling, and tearing Christ to pieces in curses–and laughing at each other’s sins. Just as we might be thinking that we’re all a little like that sometimes, the Pardoner lights into a long attack against those very vices.