the pardoners tale

[baremission]

someone please elighten me: what is the educational value of reading chaucer as an english AS text when the bloody thing isnt even in english? i cant understand it and have to for my exam! ooo what i wouldnt do to the chaucer bloke if he was around today! grrr!

[miss_me]

i thought that when i did it for my AS levals. I bought the york notes on it and if you cancentrate for a while on one or two pages it does click and becomes very simple! easier than bloody shakespeare!!

[LeMarchand]

It shows the development of the language and (as the recent BBC adaptations have shown) the stories and themes can be just as relevant today. As for the understanding, when I studied English the teacher would help explain some of the more difficult passages.

[JamesEverton]

It's one of the most important texts in English. I know that it's a different type of English but it just takes a little bit of getting used to and there's plenty of help in any decent text.

I think that you're probably just letting off some exam stress but stick with it. When we're studying literature we can't be expected to like every text that we read but it's well worth meeting all of them with an open mind.

[lynlockwood]

Of course it's in English. Stop whining. If you don't like the course then drop it or arrange some time with your English teacher to discuss it. Do some research- AS levels aren't meant to be easy- why not read up on Chaucer and find out things for yourself- York Notes is a good start. I'm an English teacher and I do have some sympathy but I get tired of students expecting it all to be on a plate- especially sixth formers.

[Narolines]

Tell me, if it's not in english (sic), what language do you think it is in? And if I'm not mistaken, chaucer (sic) at least knew how to use capital letters and punctuation......

[Narolines]

Now I suppose you're going to ask what "sic" means!

[baremission]

god knows whatlanguage he was talking ...middle english? just dont see the point, id like to do something more modern,,,,im morelikely to come across that in everyday life arent i! his punctuation is atrocious at times-enjambement!

[Narolines]

I'm still trying to work out what a poetic device (enjambement - of which I presume you know the meaning) has to do with punctuation........

[davver]

I did it for A level a few years ago and after a bit of disenchantment early on really got into it. I found it helped a lot to read it aloud - don't feel too silly about it! Get a bunch of classmates together for a revision sesh. This may sound a bit geeky but they're probably wanting help as well so don't feel embarrassed!

Books - I found the Cambridge Uni Press 1965 edition very helpful with an introduction by AC Spearing. David Wright wrote a very good 'translation' of the whole Canterbury Tales in modern prose if you need a quick and easy version.

Best of luck! Believe me, Chaucer is ten times better than his contemporaries like Langland, and Canterbury Tales is by far the best of his work. Parliament of Foulys - awful!

[jno]

you don't even know what language he was talking? You do have some way to go. But given that Chaucer has so inexplicably failed to write in modern English, it's up to you to understand the language he did use. You find it hard? Then maybe AS levels aren't for you.

[JamesEverton]

Guys, give baremission a break. I doubt if many of us found Chaucer very easy to begin with. There aren't masses of people nowadays who read the original text of theTales for fun, because it is hard work.

davver's advice is spot on.

[jno]

JamesEverton, who ever said study was supposed to be easy? If AS's, or any other exam, were easy, they'd be worthless. The whole point of study is learning something you don't know. lynlockwood has given sensible and serious advice: if you can't cope with it, and if you get no pleasure from trying, drop it.

[baremission]

thanks for the advice to those people who have been supportive, to those of you suggesting i drop it well i shan't, i dont do things like that! ill do the exam i only have 4 weeks to go now anyway it would be silly to stop. i just dont like it when im not on top of things..and this is one thing im not on top of. some of you have replyed implying that i expect to just pass as levels like that and thats not what i meant, i simply was letting off stress and seeing if other people had found chaucer like this at first! ill get some notes on the text!

[JamesEverton]

I wasn't saying that it should be easy. I just think that it's better to give a little encouragement rather than urge people to give up because they do find it hard.

[baremission]

thanks jameseverton, you seem to knwo what your talking about!

[lynlockwood]

I'm glad that you've taken all our comments on board and you sound like a pretty sensible AS student on the whole- at least you have asked for help and not sat around expecting it to come to you. Good luck- and the comments about reading it out loud is right- ask your teacher/librarian to find a recording of it being read by an expert- I heard someone do that when I was 17 and studying Chaucer for the first time and it really brought it to life for me.

[jno]

sorry if I seemed rude baremission... well, it's because I was rude; I apologise... But my point still remains: Chaucer's dead and unable to change, so the effort has to come from you. Chaucer's generally accepted as the greatest writer of the Middle English period; the Canterbury Tales is fascinating not just for literary reasons but also as a kind of social document. You can also learn much from it about the way language has changed; I guess about a third to a half of it is reasonably comprehensible, but to make sense of the whole thing you do have to study new words and meanings. That's what learning is all about. There may be parallel texts available - the original alongside modern translations - or recordings, though I haven't been able to track any down; and your teacher should be able to help. Good luck.

[jno]

actually, here you are, side-by-side translation:

http://www.librarius.com/canttran/pardtrfs.htm

[baremission]

okay thanks guys that sound slike good advice!