Chaucer's Later Life and Legacy

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK The ultimate cookout starts with the ultimate ingredients. At Whole Foods market, no antibiotics ever burgers and kebabs are prepped and ready to throw on the grill. Fire up a juicy ribbeye. Grab creamy potato salad and savory flatbreads from the prepared foods department, and round it all out with three hundred sixty five brand condiments, chips and dips at everyday low prices Whole Foods Market, Make your summer sizzle. Ever invest in something that seemed incredible at first didn't li up to the height. Like those five dollar roses at a gas station or a second hand piece of technology that breaks in the first ten minutes. Marketers know that feeling We optimize for the numbers that look great. impressions reach and react that when they don't show revenue, Well That's a not so great conversation with the CFO. LinkedIn has a word for that Bullpan Now you can invest in what looks good to your CFO LinkedIn adds generates the highest roWas of all major ad networks You'll reach the right buyers because you can target by company, industry, job title M cut the blls spend Advertise on LinkedIn the network that works for you two hundred and fifty dollars on your first campaign on LinkedIn ads and get a two hundred and fifty credit for the next one 's go to LinkedIn d. com slash broadcast. That's linkedIn d. com slash broadcast Terms and conditions apply Hello and welcome to Your Dead To Me, the radio four comedy podcast that takes history seriously. My name is Greg Jenner I'm a public historian author and broadcaster and today we are preparing our pens and parchments and peregrrenating back to the fourteenth century to learn all about Geoffrey Chaucer, author of the famous Canterbury Tales And to inform and entertain us on our journey, we're joined by two very special traveling companions. In History Corner, she's the J.R R. Tolkien Professor of English Literature and Languages at the University of Oxford and an expert on Chaucer and late medieval literature. Maybe you've read her award winning biography, Chaucer a European lifeife, or her new book, The Wife of Bath, A biography It's Professor Marian Turner. Wlcome, Marian. D delight to be here. Thank you for inviting me. We're very happy to have you here. And in Comedy Corner. He's a comedian, actor and podcaster. You'd have seen him in Taskmaster, Man D downown, and as Rose Matafea's assistant on the wonderful Junior Taskmaster. Plus you may have heard his duls tones on my favorite podcast, Three Beeen Salad or seen his new live tour show, The Bench But you'll definitely know him from our previous episodes of Your Dead T Me, M most recently, Charles Dickens at Christmas and Arthuran Literature. It's Mike Wasneyk. Welcome back Mike. Thank you. Hello. Thanks for having me back We went medievalew last time out. Yeah. All King Arthury. I had a lovely old time. You knew a lot It was gristed to my mill. It was yeah, I felt like I hadn't wasted my childhood. You were in your elements But this this is a different kettle of. Oh, is it This is utter bleak ignorance. a new level of ignorance. It's beyond the unknown unknowns OkayK, well, we're going have a love of time talking about one of the great poets of English literature. So, what do you know So let's start with the first segment of the podcast. It's the So what do you know This is where I have a go guessing what your lovely listener might know about today's subjects. And if we're using Mike as the benchmark Maybe not much. but you've possibly heard Chaucer described as the father of English literature. Perhaps you've read his Canterby Tales at school and you modelled your way through the middle English while looking for the rude bits. Maybe you saw the BBC's two thousand three adaptation which transferred the famous Canterbury Tales to a twenty first century setting. and if you're a naught' kid like me, you will remember Paul Betany's turn as Jeffrey Chaucer brilliant movie, a Kights Tale that all medieval historians love. But what about the life behind the literature? What did Chaucer get up to when he wasn't scribbling his poems? And where do snazzy leggings fit into our story Let's find out Are you excited about the leggings? I'm excited about the leggings Okay, Mike. Yes. From your high level of knowledge you already promised us. what sort of family do you think Geffrey Chaucer was born into? What kind of class do you think he arrived into Oh, he's literate. and not just literate. I don't know, the son of some sort of merchant or triler or ship's captain or someone who's got some qualifications. posossibly a member of a guild Is's correct But not nobility, I'm saying. neck of the woods. Are you hustling us? Are you pretending to not know anything and then suddenly rolling up knowledge? Marian, I think Mike got it first time, son of a merchant. Yeah. B. Merchant is it? o? Yeah. so a wine merchant. Oh. So his father was a vintner, that's what we call them. So that's what we call them in Devon as well. Well we do we do when we're trying to be a little bit classy and a bit pretentious. I have a local vintner A Theyreent. called Ian and he's absolutely he's magnificent. Well, Ian, which is a version of the name John, which is Chaucer's dad. Good heaven. So John Chaucer, Vintner and Chaucer's mother was called Agnes. Chaucer was born early thirteen forties. we don't know the exact year, but about thirteen forty two in London, In Vintry Ward, so the ward which had lots of vintners in. So it was one of the areas of London that is right next to the Thames. So he's born place where he can see the ships coming in loaded with products from all over the world, bringing spices from as far away as Indonesia, and then going out again laden with English wool which was England's only real export product. Chaucer was living in this very multilingual cosmopolitan kind of area. You know People often think of the Middle Ages as people are kind of grubbing about. and of course, some people were. But life in London was reallyally international. he was rubbing shoulders with people who spoke lots of different languages, were bringing in lots of luxury products. But then one very big thing happened. Do you know the very big thing that happened to littleittle Jeff when he was five years old mid fourteenth century Big things a plague upon the Vindas? Yeah not just the Vindas right. Yes, the great plague of all plagues, the Black Death Okay, it hit hard. It hit pretty hard. Yeah. familyily wise and ye family friends. Yeah and to everyone. So the Black deeath came to England about thirteen forty eight and you know it completely dwarfs the pandemic that we've been through. If you imagine a pandemic, that wiped out maybe a third, maybe a half of the population really quickly of Europe, you know We're not just talking about Britain here.'s you know And and the near East. It' hugely dramatic And yes, Chaucer lost several relatives, but not his parents, not his immediate family and What then happened to Chaucer's family is typical of what happened to the country as a whole If you survived, although probably psychologically you might been in a bad way, but materially things were quite good for you. so that both his parents inherited property and land and money their relatives who had died in the plague. So there's a lot of social mobility after the plague. It's actually the late fourteenth century is an amazing time for social mobility. People can move jobs. If their employer isn't paying a decent wage, they can go to another employer or they can move to the city. The government passed lots of laws to try and stop employees from asking for higher wages It didn't work. None of know these statutes of Labours did not work It's very clear which side they were on. Yes Yeah. So we've got massive inflation and wage inflation. If you were alive, you were then doing well. So Mike, if you were a teenage Geffrey Chaucer. Yeah. you're living in Cosmopolitan London, what sort of profession are you aiming to go into next? Me personally. What would I don't think I'd have made the most of this. I think I' Chaucer, I think' got a bit better work ethic than me. Sure. I think I think Chaucer, I' assuming you would have gone into family trade. Okay, so you think wine, you think he's going following dad? I think wine, if he's having a lovely life and wine it's got a bit of glamour, hasn't it? if he's into his reading and his writing, he can do that on the weekends. It's a very sensible answer. I asse. He sort of goes He doesn't. No, he doesn't look quite different. He kind of starts to leap classes in a way Yeah because his up or down He becomes a page boy in a great household. And this is a very desirable thing to get. So usually know higher class boys would get this kind of job. So his father probably got him this job because his father had been a royal tax collector, so he had connections in the royal court. So Chaucer's first job When he's just a teenager, about fourteen or fifteen, he pops up in the accounts of Elizabeth de Burr, Countess of Ulster. who is the daughter in law of the king. So the daughter in law of Edward III, she was married to Prince Lionel So a page boy is, I mean, he would have done a bit of kind of errand running and things like that. but you're also simply a member of this lavish aristocratic household, but you're mainly just kind of sitting about learearning some poetry. You're there partly to make the heads of the household look good because they can have a retinue. Right. So he's working for Elizabeth D Bur Yeah. He does meet his wife doing this gig Probably yes, Philippa D Roe, there's a reference in the records to her being connected with the same group. so we're not certain, but he probably meets his wife at this point. And she was a bit a little bit higher class than him. Oh She's got a du in the middle of her name.ilippa D Roe. exactly. He's not Jeffrey De Chaucer is he? No, no. It's from this period we have our first documentary evidence for Chaucer's life Yes, abbsolutely. What do you think it is Mikea? Presumably from the annals of the Dur family in some way. So I'm wondering what they would document as he got involved in a Wedding or has there been a sort of a disaster and a hunt?ight Have they gone to Ulster and they've killed the wrong stag and stirred up some local drama? I mean I do think this is very impressive researcher type thinkiner thinking about the accounts because it is from the accounts and people often expect that the first record is going to be might refer to something to do with his poetry, for example. Yeah But in fact, it's a really frivolous reference is a reference to his fashion choices, to his clothes. This is where the snazzy leggings that Greg mentioned earlier come in So the record is simply that Elizabeth D Bt bought him these clothes. She buys him a pole top. with these two coloud hose like these leggings and some shoes. And chroniclers in in the early thirteen sixties start to write about the fact that young men are going about wearing these clothes and that they are very tight and short and are exposing their genitals and buttocks inappropriately. And indeed some chroniclers said that they thought that the plague could return to England because God was punishing people for wearing these outrageous clothes. He also ticked off another major event from the fourteenth century, having survived the Black Death. Ride straight into another one. Do you know what this one would be Mike? Mega event? Yeah hundredundred years war? Absolutely. Well done. Yeah, very good. Was he a soldier? Esentially the whole household went to war. So by this point, he seems to be working for Lionel, Elizabeth's husband. And so The princes are all going to war, they take their retinues. Of course With them. And so the hundredundred Years warar, which you know actually was longer than a one hundred years It's one hundred and sixteen years. Yeah the game. So it's supposed to start thirteen thirty seven, finish fourteen fifty three. Chauc is over there thirteen fifty nine, thirteen sixty. He does get captured Does he? Yeah, ye, exactly. So So suggests he was in a sort of zone of jeopardy at least. Yeah yeah, absolutely. So he was captured outside Rims and then he was ransomed for sixteen pounds. So sixteen pounds getseffrey Chaucer back. pay that ransom is it the king The king? Yes.. Does Jeffrey Chaucser bounce back from his ransom fiasco? I mean So we see him just afterwards carrying letters and I think that was what he was better at. you know accross his life. Soldier, what do you excel at? I'm really quite good at delivering letters Exactly. I mean accross his life, we do see him occasionally in these fighting situations, but much more commonly, we see him doing things like diplomacy, secret business of the King, carrying letters, peace treaties. That's more his thing.. But then we actually don't see him in the records for several years. So between thirteen sixty and thirteen sixty six, we're not sure what he's doing doing something to do with other royal households, you know as he had been for Elizabeth and Lyionel. That's the kind As he left Elizabeth and Lyionel's gaff then as he he's plowing his own Yeah furough at this point. Okay. So he's married to Philippa D Roe. They were married till the late eighties when she dies. They had at least three children. And when he's in royal service He's getting annuity from the king, also from other people at various times. He's also paid in wine. so he gets a pitcher of wine a day, which later on becomes a ton of wine a year, which is something like two hundred fifty two gallons He probably didn't drink all that. He was probably giving out to people, but ye, you know, wine is an ongoing. Picture a day. Yeah. Yeahah, how much is a picture? It was probably about a gallon Fy. Yeah. That's a lot of wine. That's a lot to go Yeah. As you say, it's probably for his household, right? It's probably sharing that. Yeah exactly. And so he's an international diplomat. Yeah. Jeffrey Chaucer, diplomat, man overseas, he's in Italy, he's in France, he's been to Spain, Navarre. Yeah. He's picking up languages or he knows languages. He knows languages. So every educated man is trilingual at this time But he also knew Italian, which he'd probably picked up from all the bankers and traders in Vintry Wward because he had a mercantile background. So aristocrats much less likely to come across Italian. He had Italian, which is probably why he was picked to go on the Italian miss. He's the only bloke at court who knows any Italian. And that's then going on those Italian missions is where he then picks up and reads Dante, Pccio, Get And his reading of those poets enables him utterly to change English literature. So he had a staggering number of jobs. We've already heard several already. But I've got a mini quiz for you. whichich of these was not a position that Geffrey Chaucer held during his service. So Inspector of Walls and ditches Deputy Forester clerk of the King's Wors overseeing the renovations of the Tower of London. The member of Parliament for Suffolk contontroller of the Wool custom trade the negotiator of the marriage of King Richard II of England to the daughter of the Lord of Milan. Which of those six things was not on Chaucer's CV It seems like an amenable fellow so far. Yeah. he feels like he's quite capable I can see him being pressured into doing the ditch' gig. Maybe early doors. Yeah but I can see him putting his foot down at the old forestry thing. That it doesn't seem like Forerest is going to be his meie. Okay Okay you're saying Deputy Forester is one we've made up. Yeah I'm afraid MP for Suffolk was wrong, Cses. because he was actually MP for Kent Whatas he really? So he did all six of those jobs in terms of being an MP, but he was representing Kent, not Suffolk. The ultimate cookout starts with the ultimate ingredients. At Whole Foods market, no antibiotics ever burgers and kebabs are prepped and ready to throw on the grill. Fire up a juicy ribeye. Grab creamy potato salad and savory flatbreads from the prepared foods department, and round it all out with three hundred sixty five brand condiments, chips and dips at everyday low prices Whole Foods Market, Make your summer sizzle everver invest in something that seemed incredible at first didn't li up to the height Like those five dollar roses at a gas station or a second hand piece of technology that breaks in the first ten minutes. Marketers know that feeling We optimize for the numbers that look great. impressions reach and react when they don't show revenue Well That's a not so great conversation with the CFO LinkedIn has a word for that Bull spend Now you can invest in what looks good to your CFO LinkedIn adds generates the highest RAas of all major ad networks You'll reach the right buyers because you can target by company, industry, job title more cut the bulls spnd. Advertise on LinkedIn the network that works for you Spend two hundred and fifty dollars on your first campaign on LinkedIn ads and get a two hundred and fifty credit for the next one. go to LinkedIn d. com slash broadcast That's linkedIn d. com slash broadcast Terms and conditions apply on kids. What should we order for dinner? Pizza Thai Tacos. Hey boys, let's not get local. What kind of restaurants is pizza Thi and tacos? Oh please. Oh my! Why can't we have food without the f? With Wonder, you can combine twenty restaurants in one delivery, so your family never has to compromise. Use code Maltime for fifty percent off your first Wonder order, terms applies to wonder dot com slash new customer Have you ever heard of Jhn of Gaunt, Mike , he's one of those sort of big names medieval history that no one really knows who he is, but they know he's famous Who is John of Gaunt and why is he important to Chaucer? John of Gaunt, fourth son of Edward III probably met him when he was working for Elizabeth. We know they were at the same place then John of Gaunt had also married Blanche of Lancaster. Blanche's death was the occasion of Chaucer's first poem that we know about. The book of the Duchess was about Blanche's death. John of Gaunt then made another important marriage to someone called Constance of Castillilee, the daughter of the king of Castilee personers he loved was Catherine Swinford Catherine Swinford was Chaucer's sister in law, and that probably encouraged John of Gaunt to help Chaucer. He helped him get lots of jobs. He was the one in charge when Chaucer got his apartment in London, his job at the customs office. He kept on favoring him. You said the book of the Duchess is Chaucer's first poem This is fairly middle aged Jeffrey Chauer, he's kind of quite far alone in his career. Yeah. I mean, the Book of the Duchess is the first poem that has survived. So he may have written earlier poems. He may have written poems in French when he was younger, That's right. mostost people were writing in French. But the earliest poem that has survived, yeah, he's around thirty early thirteen seventies And then he was just prolific. He wrote so much. today, people have often only heard of the Canterbury Tales, but he wrote so much else. So from the early thirteen seventies to mid thirteen eighties, He writes several dream poems, so the Book of the Duchess, The House of Fame, the Parliament of Fouls, the Legend of Good Women He translates Boetheius' consolation of phhilosophy from Latin into English. He translates parts of the Romance of the Rose, He writes lots of short poems and lyrics He writes some of the Canterury tales as stand alone texts that then later he put into the cananteryle The Kight's Tale, for exam exactly, most famously, the Kight's Tale. So he's writing in English, whereas it would although some people were writing in English, it would have been more normal, especially for a court poet, someone writing kind of courtly forms, you know love visions, dreams. It would have be more normal to write in French Yeah He's also very influenced by the world around him. There's this idea that you need both, you know you need to read the books. he's steeped in literary influences from all kinds of places, but he's also interested in contemporary society. And I think he does take a lot of inspiration from the things that are going on around him. So we can link things like his great interest in different voices in the common voice. We might link that to things like the development of the speaker in Parliament at time. And then you know this is also the time when we see insurgent voices, which can be productive, but can also be really problematic. So the G revolt ussually known as the peasants Revolt, though it wasn't really mainly peasants. It was lots of different people. But that also happens during Chaucer's lifetime. This is a man who has survived the Black Death, fought in the Hundred Years War, and then is literally next door when the peasants revolt happens. He's basically Forerest Gump. He's seeing the entire fourteenth century. justust keeps happening to him And he also ends up in a courtroom battle. in thirteen seventy nine. Marion, this is quite interesting. There was a time a few years ago where Jeffrey Chaucer was quite controversial because of this case. Yes. and now we can remove the sort of sting of cancellation because he's innocent, right? Yeah, I mean, it's a really interesting case, and it's also really interesting in terms of letting us know what's still out there to find in the records. So this is a case in which Chaucer was essentially accused of something called ratus in Latin which in different cases is sometimes abduction is sometimes rape A woman called Cecily Champagne released him from further actions relating to her raappttus But there was a lot of debate about what the word in the document meant, because in some documents it means abduction But a couple of years ago, and this is how exciting the world of Chaucer stududies is. So two scholars, Baton Specky and, youw and Roger found some new documents. and what they found was that Ceciie Champagne and Chaucer were' on the same side of this law case And they were both defendants together and they employed the same lawyer. Right. And then they found the writ, which was that someone called Thomas Stonden making a lawsuit against the two of them. What had happened, according to Stauer was that Cecily had been his servant and she had left before the end of her contract to go and be Chaucer's servant So this was a labor. Sure. The reason then that Cecily would release him from any actions relating to a raaptus be that she was saying no, I was not forcibly removed from my former employer. So we cancel Geffrey Chaucer, that's good.. I think it's time for us to move on to his most famous poem. It's time for us to get to the Canterbury Tales Marion, can you give us an actual synopsis of what is the Canterbury Tus group of people me they meet in the Tabardn, which was a real pub just south of the river in Southolk. They're all going off on pilgrimage to Canterbury. and they decide that you to make it less boring, so they don't just have to think about pilgrimage and God all the time. They're going to tell stories on the way there and on the way back and they're going to compete for a free meal. And the host, the innkeeper, Harry Bay is going to kind of run this tale telling competition. So you get this kind of group of people together who are all going tell stories. But it's really different from Beercaccios's. And the big difference is the nature of the tale tellers. So Becaccio's tale tellers are all of the same class, which is high class. Chsices are not. So the highest class person is the knight's not and there is a plowman at the bottom The vast majority are in between. So you we have a summoner, a friar, a merchant, a man of law, a lawyer, a sailor, a cook. all of these miller Yeah ye, the miller, the reader. All of these kinds of people That's really really important. the idea that a miller has just as much a right to tell a tale as a knighter might tell a better tale It allows Chaucer to tell lots of different kinds of tales and lots of different genres, lots of different forms. So you really do get this kind of sense that there's something for everyone. What would the comedian's tale be in the storytelling competition, Mike? Well, it would be of the worst gig.'s when that's when the heckla Mike in the green room or whatever. that's when everyone shushes and just everyone leans in when there's a really not gig that went Ready, ready by So it's not the swwing gigs, it's the ones where you' absolutely kill No one wants to hear that No A all. No, no, that comic is being booted out immediately. It's the real stinker. Okay, soes That's the one where the audence, yeah, people were following you out to do violence upon you and rununning to the car park. Yeah, yeah, it's locking the door Marion, why is the Canterby Tales so important both as a literary work and also in terms of our sense of the English language? I suppose in terms of language, Chaucer borrows and coins a lot of new words. Now of course sometimes that's simply been recorded because his work is so well known. But he certainly was expanding the English language a lot in the countterytails and in his other works as well. You know my favorite example is that he was so newfangled that he invented the word newfangled. Ohly He also changed what poetic forms were available in English. So he was the first person to use the ten syllable line and to use an early form of the Iiambic pentameter. so the five stress line that became the fundamental building block of English poetry. So Chaucer is writing in English, and that is why he is the father of the English language in many ways obviously you said IMic pentameter, that's Shakespeare later on But we need to move on with Chaucer's later life. Is he just constantly writing until the end of his life or is it a phase? No, he writes all of his life. Yeahes. So most of the Canterbury tales are written in the thirteen nineties, which is also when he writes his treaties on the Astrolaab, Hewites the prologue Legend of Good Women, He writes lots of short poems And he's working, you know so we see him working throughout the nineties. Towards the end of his life, he's living in the precincts of Westminster Abbey, which was not necessarily a religious thing. I mean, there were lots of shops and brothels and things like that in the precincts of Westminster Abbey. Wow. But he's living. That's why he gets buried there because he lives there N not because poets cororn there Yeahah there was no poets Corn at the time. is his local church Yeah, I mean, it would have been more normal for him to have been buried in St. Margaret's Westminster. He must have had a good relationship with the monks for them to bury him there, but it's because he lives there and it's later his tomb gets moved and Poet's Corner gets started. But yeah, certainly in the last year of his life we see him writing a poem the new King asking for his money. Oh great. Yeah. So his final literary work is titled Cash Please. In fact it's calledool what's the name of the poem? Yeah, compomplaint to his purse. A Complaint to his purse. Good. I think that all invoices should be tled. compomplaint to the purse. So he dies in fourteen hundred by the end of October. Nice round number though. Well, done, Jeffrey for first Yeah. He basically saw the whole fourteenth century and went, That's enough of that. Thank you. it done that. should accomplished all the highlights So that's the life of Jeffrey Chaucer Qite the life, quite the sort of literary history, really? Theu one's window Time now for the nuance window. This is where Mike and I spend two minutes silently inspecting ditches while Marion turns a new page and tells us something we need to know about Geffrey Chaucer. So my stopw is ready. takeake it away, Professor Marion. I're going to talk about Chaucer and character So when people think of Chaucer, they often think about his characters, the wife of Bath, the miller, the knight, the host And Chaucer did two really significant things with literary character First of all, he developed the idea of the unreliable narrator. So in many of his poems, the person telling the story is biased and withholds part of the story or lets their prejudices come through in the telling. so they're not objective And the idea of unreliable narration was to become a really key part of the novel. We see it especially in modern novels such as Lolita, for example Tauca shows us that what we see is dependent on where we are standing And I think this interest in perspective can be linked to the rise of artistic perspective at exactly this time Chaucer would have seen Giotto's art, for instance, when he travelled in Italy. So he's really interested in using literary character to explore subjectivity and ambiguity