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The Miller's Prologue and Tale
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- This article is about the second of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. For the Tom Verlaine album, see The Millers Tale.
The Miller's Tale is the second of Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, told by a drunken miller to "quit" The Knight's Tale. When the host Harry Bailey asks for something to "quit with it," this can be taken to mean "to balance" or to "pay back."[citation needed] While the host who wants The Monk's Tale to follow means to balance, the Miller takes the other meaning. It is a vulgar, ribald, and satirical fabliau in stark contrast to the courtly love of the Knight's Tale.
The Miller's Prologue is the first "quit" that occurs in the tales (to "quit" someone is to mock them in a satirical way, or in the Middle Ages, to "quit" was to match their blow in jousting[citation needed]).
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The prologue of the tale is in the form of a conversation between Harry Bailey (the owner of the Tabard Inn) and the Miller, whose name is Robin. While the publican wants another good heroic and majestic tale to follow the knight's tale, he eventually allows the Miller (just to make him shut up) to tell his tale.
The Miller is portrayed as drunk and shouting, in the voice associated with Pilate in mystery plays (line 16). The Reeve urges the Miller not to joke about his profession; the Miller replies that he does not mean to insult carpenters in general, or portray them as cuckolds, and tells his tale anyway. Thus, The Reeve's Tale follows, which 'quites' the Miller with a tale in which some students make a fool of a dishonest and greedy miller.
The Miller's Tale is of a student (Nicholas) who persuades his jealous old landlord's much younger wife (Alisoun/Alison) to spend the night with him. They plan a way to have sex by duping John, the landlord, through an elaborate scheme in which Nicholas convinces him that he has found, through his astrology, that a flood of Biblical proportions is imminent. Their safety depends, says Nicholas, on waiting overnight in separate tubs suspended from the rafters, and to cut their tubs from the roof when the water has risen. He adds that if the landlord tells anyone else people will think he is mad (although he says this to make sure that no man tells the landlord to see sense in the matter). This comic prank allows Nicholas and Alison the opportunity to sneak down, after the landlord falls asleep, and make love.
While Nicholas and Alison lie together, the foppish and fastidious parish clerk, Absolon, who is also attracted to Alison and believes her husband to be away, appears kneeling at the bedchamber's low "shot-wyndowe" (privy vent) and asks Alison for a kiss. In the darkness, she presents her "hole" (bottom) at the window and he "kiste hir naked ers ful savorly," pausing only when he feels bristly hair. He realizes the prank and goes away enraged. He borrows a red hot coulter (a knife-like plough part) from the early-rising blacksmith. Returning, he asks for another kiss, intending to burn Alison. This time Nicholas, who had risen from bed to "pisse" in the privy, sticks his own backside out the window and lets loose an enormous fart in Absolon's face. The enraged suitor thrusts the coulter "amidde the ers" burning Nicholas' "toute" (anus) and the skin "a hands-breadth round about". In agony, Nicholas cries for water, awakening John. Hearing someone screaming for water, he thinks that the Second Flood has come, panics, and cuts himself down, falling to the floor and breaking his arm. The rest of the town awakens to find him lying in the tub. He tries to explain what he's doing in the tub, and sure enough in accordance with Nicholas' prophecy, he is considered a madman, and a cuckold too.
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This section may contain an unpublished synthesis of published material that conveys ideas not attributable to the original sources. Please help Wikipedia by adding sources whose main topic is "The Canterbury Tales". See the talk page for details.(October 2007) |
The tale appears to combine the motifs of two separate fabliaux, the 'second flood' and 'misdirected kiss', both of which appear in continental European literature of the period. Its bawdiness serves not only to introduce the Reeve's tale, but the general sequence of low comedy which terminates in the unfinished Cook's tale.
Some critics[attribution needed] see Christian symbolism in the Miller's Tale. Parts of the tale are similar to the Annunciation, with Nicholas as the Angel Gabriel and Alison as Mary, while the clueless carpenter John is Joseph. Nicholas's singing of the 'Virgin's Angelus', a popular song about the Annunciation, hints at the parallel.
The character of Absolon introduces another theme of the Tales, the corruption of the Church. The Nun's Priest's Tale and The Shipman's Tale deals with the same theme; the Summoner, Friar and Pardoner personify it. Absolon is a clerk, but thinks of little except wooing young women at church:
| “ | 3339: This Absolon, that jolif was and gay, Gooth with a sencer (censer) on the haliday, |
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Alison, however, does not return Absolon's affections, although she readily takes his gifts.
A third theme, that of knowledge and science, appears in several marginal comments. Nicholas is an avid astrologer (as Chaucer himself was[citation needed]), equipped with, "His Almageste, and bookes grete and smale, / His astrelabie, longynge for his art..." John the carpenter represents unintellectual laymen; John tells Nicholas:
| “ | 3454: Men sholde nat knowe of goddes pryvetee [God's private affairs]. Ye, blessed be alwey a lewed [unlearned] man |
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He also recounts a story (sometimes told of Thales) of an astrologer who falls into a pit while studying the stars. The issue of whether learned or unlearned faith is better is also relevant to The Prioress' Tale and The Parson's Tale.
Feminists[attribution needed] have occasionally criticised the story for its treatment of Alison as a "prize" to be fought over by the three principal male characters and by the fact that the hot colter was intended for her after refusing Absolon's unwanted attention. Others[attribution needed] have noted that Alison freely chooses where to bestow her affections, is a spirited character, and exercises a great deal of control over the situation. All three of her paramours end up in physical and/or emotional pain. Critics[attribution needed] have often noted Chaucer's progressively liberal morality, this incident being perhaps the most conspicuous example.
The insecure/ambiguous manhood of the three males has also been suggested as a theme.[citation needed] John, being elderly, and likely impotent, obsessively fears the shame of being cuckolded. Absolon is a prissy, effeminate, fop. Nicholas, while undeniably lusty, is described as having a woman's "sleigh and ful privee" character. Absolon's choice of the coulter, after his masculinity is humiliated, represents a phallic symbol. Nicholas' substitution denies him his revenge, while, by placing himself in Alison's posture, Nicholas reveals his feminine "sleigh" side. He may consider himself fortunate to merely suffer a form of buggery with the hot iron and not complete feminization (castration) which would have been the result of the glowing blade upon his dangling privates had Absolon's aim been slightly lower.
"The Millers Tale" has often be made out to look like a parody of the Knight's previous tale[citation needed], with the pursuit of a woman and reference to the stars. This was made to "lighten the mood" and to appeal to the lower class. It was also intended to add layers to the comedy.
For example, in the "Knight's tale", the two knights longed to just touch the princess but, in the "Miller's tale" both of the men get intimate with the woman, Nicholas in bed and Absolom kissing her "ers". In another parody, Absolom gets both a face-full of buttocks and a fart for his attempted wooing of Alisoun.
The fifteenth-century Tale of Beryn depicts the Miller trying and failing to explain the stained glass windows of Canterbury cathedral.
Chaucer refers to the Distichs of Cato with this passage: "He knew nat Catoun, for his wit was rude." The Distichs of Cato was one of the most common textbooks in schools throughout medieval Europe, and was familiar to most anyone with a basic education in Latin.
The song, "A Whiter Shade of Pale," by Procol Harum appears to contain a reference to Chaucer's work: "And so it was that later as the miller told his tale, that her face, at first just ghostly, turned a whiter shade of pale".[1]
- Read "The Miller's Tale" with interlinear translation, from a Harvard University website
- The Canterbury Tales (based on British Library copies of William Caxton's editions), via a De Montfort University website
- A study guide for The Miller's Prologue and Tale from a UK teacher's personal website
- Modern Translation of the Miller's Tale and Other Resources at eChaucer
| Preceded by The Knight's Tale |
The Canterbury Tales | Succeeded by The Reeve's Prologue and Tale |