A. C. Cawley Reihenfolge der Bücher (Chronologisch)

Miracle plays were a popular form of entertainment throughout the Middle Ages, and part of the poetic and dramatic tradition on which Shakespeare drew. Everyman discovers what you can't take with you when you go. He beseeches in turn friends, family (one pleads 'cramp in my toe'), possessions ('I follow no man in such voyages'), and finally falls back on moral and religious values.

The procession that crosses Chaucer's pages is as full of life and as richly textured as a medieval tapestry. The Knight, the Miller, the Friar, the Squire, the Prioress, the Wife of Bath, and others who make up the cast of characters -- including Chaucer himself -- are real people, with human emotions and weaknesses. Chaucer's genius bursts forth from every page of The Canterbury Tales. According to the General Prologue, each pilgrim was meant to tell two tales on the way to Canterbury and two on the way back. Although he never finished this enormous project and the completed tales were not finally revised, the work remains a cornerstone of English literature. Scholars are uncertain about the order of the tales, and since the printing press had yet to be invented when Chaucer wrote, The Canterbury Tales has been preserved in several handwritten manuscripts. This collection captures the diversity of medieval society and explores themes of love, morality, and the human condition through its vivid storytelling.