The Pardoner's Prologue And Tale Analysis

The Truth about the Pardoner’s Prologue and Tale “The Pardoner’s Prologue and Tale” was written by Geoffrey Chaucer during his life time as a literary poet. He was born in the year 1340 and died in the year 1400. Chaucer was born during the late medieval period. He was able to serve under the aging king Edward III, his grandson Richard II and Henry IV. In late medieval England, people believed in a form of penance, in which a Christian confessed their sin to a priest as a sign of genuine repentance also, purgatory was common during this are, in which the person taken to a place to work off their sin before they are allowed into Heaven. Chaucer was able to witness this form of Christianity, and was able to write tales on them. The …show more content…
Before the pardoner started his tale, he gave a prologue about the nature of man. Apart from the fact he goes around trying to cleanse people of their sin the pardoner knows the kind of places to go preach his sermon. In the beginning of the prologue the pardoner initiated they go for a drink where he can find people dwelling in sin, and people who will be ready to do anything to go to heaven. The pardoner is a very skillful preacher and his technics works for him because during the thirteenth century preachers had a certain method they preach or present their sermon, according to Coolidge Otis Chapman, there are three method the medieval preachers present their sermon, and one of this method was employed by the pardoner when he was preaching to his audience. First the pardoner or preacher has to “indulge or pronounce a few word in Latin in a low voice and pronounce his prayer in a vulgar tongue” (Chapman 507), if we read through the pardoner’s prologue, Chaucer illustrates how the pardoner uses this method of preaching in his text by saying he “display a few words in the Latin tongue I say/ to add a little spice to what I Preach/ and stir men to devotion as I teach” …show more content…
Walter Clyde Curry noted that “ there is not the slightest exaggeration in Chaucer, that he knew well the pardoners of his time , and described them exactly as they were” (Curry 593). This implies that the pardoner prologue and tale was not just a poem to provide laugher, but Chaucer used his poem to tell his readers know how skillful the pardoners were, and that they were not has perfect as they seem because they had the authority to perform indulgence. During the middle age pardoners were known to be “shameless and impudent fraudsters, who go around Rome claiming they have the spiritual authority to exercise power of life and death to human soul” (Curry 601). Chaucer knows all this was happening that is why he is able to combine his worries into the pardoner’s tale to express how churches of his time abuses their position (Curry 601). The pardoner uses their position to exploit people, and this is because the people are ignorant to the extents of not seeing the horrible things they do, also the people have already been given the idea that if they do not indulge in penance they will go to hell. When reading through the pardoner’s tale, the pardoner himself said he have Christ curse the Host because he refuses to do as he say (943-946). This show how powerful the pardoners believe they were, and this is because they are given the license to go