AO5 interpretations in The Merchant's Tale

Stephanie Tolliver

‘Januarie has a strictly mercantile interest in May, and buys her only to spend her for heaven on earth.’

Tolliver argues in a feminist-marxist reading of the text, that Januarie and May’s marriage is transactional and that Januarie’s perhaps more unholy and sinful desire to marry is to satsify his sexual desire and possesses a comically naive view on marriage, calling it a ‘paradis’ and ‘heaven herre on erthe’.

Criticism of Tolliver

She states that Januarie and May’s marriage is an institution; she is his property. Januarie will never be able to see May’s adultery because he has never been able to perceive her as anything other than his possession.

Fiona Dunlop

‘The walls and gates of the garden are symbols of the ways in which medieval society sought to control women and their sexuality’. (male control)

Dunlop 

‘In the Merchant’s Tale, Januarie’s garden represents his attempt to withdraw himself and his wife from society, into a claustrophobic world of his own creating dominated by possessive desire.’

Thorne

Thorne observes, “Januarie’s bending of religious authority to his own selfish purposes”, which exposes us to his “delusion and error”.

Kitteridge- Chaucer’s discussion on marriage- Merchant + Clerk’s Tale

Chaucer writes in an ironic persona, as a Merchant. ‘The Merchant’s praise of marriage is savagely ironical’. The Merchant’s Tale- he begins with an ironic praise (encomium) of marriage to match the Clerk’s Tale. The Merchant is an egotist- he uses passion and rage.

The Clerk’s Tale (of Oxenford): the clerk- ‘my story is not told… to exhort wives to imitate Griselda’s humility, for that would be beyond capacity of human nature. It is told in order that every man or woman, in whatever condition of life may learn fortitude in adversity”.

Kitteridge- Wife of Bath

The Canterbury Tales is a connected human comedy. Wife of Bath’s Tale- wives should rule their husbands, and she enforces this doctrine on account of her own life- “wommen desiren to have sovereyntee and maistrye”.

Kitteridge- Franklin’s Tale

The Franklin’s Tale: Dorigen/ Aurelieus’ marriage is equal which ensures their happiness, as the knighte lived in “blisse and solas”. The Franklin’s sincere praise of marriage juxtaposes the Merchant’s savagely ironical praise on the “blisse betwixt (a husband) and his wife”. The ‘Marriage Act’ of the Human Comedy ends with the Franklin’s successful tale.

Chaucer, an early genre critic- Kathleen McPhilemy

Fabliaux features: featuring common people, they revolved around fraud, trickery and sexual misdeeds. The subversive nature of the fabliaux upsets the hierarchies and expectations of reality. In the free space of fiction, Chaucer can explore sexuality, love, marriage and power relationships between men and women, themes which occur in many of the tales. ‘Through a kaleidoscopic juxtaposition of literary forms Chaucer forces the reader beyond a naive enjoyment of storytelling to engage in his ironic critique of medieval society’.

Malcolm Hebron

“Marriage in these tales is thus always about the assertion of power”

“Power relationships seem to be incompatible with love”

Tina Davidson

‘May is silent and passive and will remain so beyond her wedding night”.