Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterburry tales. The Man of Law's Tale as a response to The Knight's Tale

Seminar paper from the year 2012 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature grade: 1 University of Graz (Institut für Anglistik) language: English abstract: At a first glance The Knight's Tale and The Man of Law's Tale seem to have very few in common. Yes both are romance adaptations of other works the Teseida and the Chronique and Confessio amantis respectively but not much more (unlike The Miller's Tale which obviously answers to The Knight's story of chivalry and gallantry).However when digging deeper one soon finds more to discuss and analyze than one might have expected: Both narrators are members of the upper class of society both tales deal with marriage love and the hard way of reaching the two both tales present us with a clear view on religion and The Knight's Tale as well as The Man of Law's Tale have prominent female characters allowing us an insight into the narrators' view on women. All these aspects not only make an in depth comparison of the two tales necessary to understand the Canterbury Tales and its composition better but it is also interesting as it permits us to enter the fictitious minds of both the Knight and the Man of Law. Through comparison single features that might have been missed when investigating only one story get emphasized giving us a whole new view on the two tales.The main aspects or themes that will be analyzed in the course of this paper are the narrators themselves their characters reliabilities and involvement with their stories the worldview they transmit or try to transmit via their tales the role of love and women in the romances and finally how religion influences the worlds the Knight and the Man of Law describe. Beforehand however a short general analysis of the two tales will be given discussing their form and origin as well as place in the frame narrative which is from the author's point of view necessary to fully understand the following chap