CliffsNotes on Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales by James L Roberts

Author:James L Roberts
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Commentary

Even for those who have never read The Merchant’s Tale, the concept is widely familiar. A marriage between a decrepit old man and a young maiden is commonly referred to as a January-May wedding, taken of course from this tale. While this tale is the most original of Chaucer’s, the trick played at the end on the old dotard—often referred to as the “Pear-Tree episode”—was found in many popular tales of the time. In fact, the figure of the aged or feeble lover is frequent in literature of all ages. In this tale, as in others, the reader assumes that the older man will be cuckolded by a younger, handsomer, more virile man, especially because the older man has difficulty coping with his young wife in bed.

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