Since the beginning of time, greed has saturated human nature. Geoffrey Chaucer makes this fact apparent in The Canterbury Tales, translated by Peter G. Beidler. At the foundation of all of these stories, Chaucer calls attention to the basic traits of humanity and how they affect the everyday life of everyday people. Of the ten tales that Chaucer wrote, the lust for money and material goods plays the most prominent role, especially in those which concern the Church. Chaucer uses two pilgrims to demonstrate the prevalence of this vice in the world. The Pardoner and the Wife of Bath’s characters both highlight the humanistic flaw of using external forces to fulfil greed; however, only the Pardoner embraces his own immoral acts, unlike the Wife who continually produces biblical references to excuse her avaricious actions.
Chaucer’s use of the Pardoner and Alisoun, the Wife of Bath, in order to bring up the issue behind greed and moral ethics is one of the most blatant motives in the entirety of The Canterbury Tales. In the General Prologue, Chaucer writes that the Pardoner, “With false flattery and tricks, / he made monkeys of the parson and the people.” (53. 707-708). The Pardoner uses fake relics in order to take money off of the “ignorant people” (511. 64) who attend his sermons. This man knows that he can profit from the pious …show more content…
6), and this is the overarching theme in both the Pardoner’s and the Wife of Bath’s tale. Chaucer uses this abundance of greed to teach the reader of the necessity of humility and empathy. The Pardoner and the Wife of Bath can be seen as similar in the fact that they both are representations of the abundance of greed in everyone’s life, but the Wife of Bath makes a distinction between the two by her reaction towards her faults. At the end of each tale, Chaucer leaves the reader with a subconscious question of whether or not avarice dictates their
Chaucer’s use of the Pardoner and Alisoun, the Wife of Bath, in order to bring up the issue behind greed and moral ethics is one of the most blatant motives in the entirety of The Canterbury Tales. In the General Prologue, Chaucer writes that the Pardoner, “With false flattery and tricks, / he made monkeys of the parson and the people.” (53. 707-708). The Pardoner uses fake relics in order to take money off of the “ignorant people” (511. 64) who attend his sermons. This man knows that he can profit from the pious …show more content…
6), and this is the overarching theme in both the Pardoner’s and the Wife of Bath’s tale. Chaucer uses this abundance of greed to teach the reader of the necessity of humility and empathy. The Pardoner and the Wife of Bath can be seen as similar in the fact that they both are representations of the abundance of greed in everyone’s life, but the Wife of Bath makes a distinction between the two by her reaction towards her faults. At the end of each tale, Chaucer leaves the reader with a subconscious question of whether or not avarice dictates their