The Canterbury Tales

The Canterbury Tales is a book of stories written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the 14th century. It is one of the first books to be written in the English language. The book is about a group of pilgrims traveling from London to Canterbury. As they travel along, each person tells a story to pass the time.

Assignment for The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

 

A) The Prologue

  1.    Place London and Canterbury in a map.

  2.    Who wrote The Canterbury Tales

  3.    The three main social groups at the time were the nobility, the clergy and the common people.    Complete the table with the pilgrims

The Nobility	The Clergy	The Common People

Why is the Knight first in the General Prologue and first to tell a tale?

3. What personal qualities does the Knight possess?  Explain the “Chivalrous Code”

4. Historical Context: explain briefly the black plague, The Hundred Years war and The Renaissance.

B)

1. Read the description of your assigned character in the Prologue.

2. Determine whether your character is a member of the nobility, the Clergy, or the Common people.

3.  Make bullet notes on the type of clothes that he/she wears and the physical description of the character. 

4. Summarize that character’s personality traits.  Some characters are directly characterized; some are indirectly characterized.

5. What famous actor/actress would you cast to play the role of your character in a movie? 

6. Write an essay explaining why you would choose this person (remember to cite examples from the text to support your opinion).  Explanations should include physical descriptions, descriptions of clothing style, and personality (use your notes from question #2 to help you with your essay).

7.      Provide a picture of your “cast member.”  You may use the Internet and print a picture or cut out a picture from a magazine or newspaper.  If you are a good artist, you may choose to draw a caricature of your actor/actress in costume. (If you have to ask what a caricature is or if it has to be a good drawing, then DO NOT draw your own picture—this is only for the artists.)

8-           Be prepare for your oral presentation

Your character is

Group 1 The Pardoner

Group 2 The Wife of Bath

Group 3 The Miller

Group 4 The Knight

A couple of suggested sites:

The Harvard site: http://www.courses.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/ .

A resource site for a college course, lots of links:

http://www.wright.edu/cola/Dept/ENG/wsuwweb/pageindxs/chaucer.htm .