Page 121 - DENG405_BRITISH_POETRY

British Poetry

Notes fact, the telling strives to arouse our displeasure at Walter’s conduct, and our sympathy for Griselde-
Chaucer, in fact, studs the narrative with deeply humanizing, sympathetic details (for example, the
way Griselde, reunited with her children, cannot bear to release them from her embrace) which
make an allegorical reading of the tale even more difficult. It is difficult to believe that this tale is
simply an allegory of man’s relationship with God, when the allegory is written with such focused,
emotional detail.
One might note too that Griselde is stripped and dressed in new clothes as her status changes from
low, to high, back to low, and eventually back to high. The idea of the woman dressed in cloth
(cloth, as we noted in the Wife of Bath’s tale, is a symbol for text) reflects the unknowability of a
woman’s heart and mind, as well as the way Griselde herself can be interpreted and reinterpreted
(as peasant and as noble wife) in precisely the way that her tale can.
Petrarch is dead and nailed in his coffin, the Clerk emphasizes at the start of the tale–and so is
Griselde, he tells us at the end. How either of them felt about the subject matter of the Clerk’s Tale
is no longer of any relevance; and the complexity and problematic nature of this apparently simply-
structured tale depends on just that incitement – how an audience, hearing the tale now, interprets
and understands it in the context of their own (medieval or modern) attitudes to gender and marriage.

13.2 The Merchant’s Tale

13.2.1 Prologue to the Merchant’s Tale

Following the Clerk’s pronouncement on marriage, the merchant claims that he knows all about
weeping and wailing as a result of marriage-and so, he thinks, do many people who are married.
Even if his wife were to marry the devil, the merchant claims, she would overmatch him. Having
been married two months, and having loathed every minute of it, the merchant sees a “long and large
difference” between Griselde’s patience and his wife’s cruelty. The Host asks the merchant to tell a
tale of his horrid wife; and, though “for soory herte” (for sorry heart) the merchant claims he cannot
tell of his own sorrow, he will tell another tale.

13.2.2 The Merchant’s Tale Text

Once there was, dwelling in Lombardy, a worthy knight who had lived nobly for sixty years without
a wife. However when this knight, January, had turned sixty, whether out of devotion or dotage, he
decided to finally be married. He searched for prospects, now convinced that the married life was a
paradise on earth, particularly keen to take a young, beautiful wife.
The narrator then defies Theophrastus, the author of a tract attacking marriage, arguing that a wife
is God’s gift, which will last longer than any other gift of Fortune. There follows a lengthy passage
extolling the virtues of a wife, and the virtue of marriage, citing many biblical examples.
January one day sent for all of his friends, telling them of his intent to marry, explaining that he was
ill and old, and wanted a wife no older than twenty, which he could mold like warm wax in his
hands. Various men gave him various advice about marriage, some praising it, some arguing against
it, and the altercation continued all day. The core of the argument was between Placebo and Justinus.
Placebo cited Solomon, advising January that it would be excellent to marry a young wife, and
telling him to do exactly as he pleased. Justinus cited Seneca, arguing that January should be more
careful and more thoughtful before taking a wife, warning that a young wife was like to cuckold an
old husband.
“Straw for thy Senek!” January responds, agreeing with Placebo’s response that only a “cursed
man” would argue against marriage; and with that word, they all arose and January began to prepare
for his wedding. Fair women and fair bodies passed through January’s head like images reflected
on a mirror set up in a market-place–but eventually, January selected one women from the many
available to him.
Calling his friends to him again, January asked them not to make any arguments against what he
had resolved to do, and voiced his only concern - that a man who finds perfect happiness on earth,

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