the merchants tale: critics

Harrington on happiness:

‘happiness is only possible through folly and deception’

Tolliver on the merchant:

‘the merchants misogyny is a product of his marital disillusionment’

Martin on may:

‘exploits his economic power for erotic purchase’

Aers on May:

‘sold and violated’

Brown on May:

‘garden is representative of her body’

Hanson on May:

‘devised out of January’s thoughts’

Tolliver on January:

‘blinded by the deception of his wife’

‘will never be able to see May’s adultery because he has never been able to perceive her as anything other than his possession’

Wegenknacht on January:

‘his lust for pleasure and desire for salvation blind him to the inherent dangers of taking a young wife’

Burrow in January:

‘subjected to the most unbunking scrutiny of the tale’

Martin on January:

‘believes he is inhabiting a romance which is finally bitterly exposed as a fabliaux’

Kelly on marriage:

‘mutual love between spouses is notably absent’

Neuse on marriage:

‘exposes the churches flawed conceptions of marriage’

Tatlock on marriage:

‘religion itself is bemocked in their marriage rite'

Haskell on marriage:

‘life for women on the gentry was synonymous with marriage’

Wentersdorf on men:

‘demonstration of the reprehensible folly and lechery of men’

Biedler on May and Jan:

‘emasculated by the wife who plays the knightly role he should be playing’

Ashton on women and marriage:

‘without doubt this portrayal of married love is firmly on the side of the female'

Kittredge on fabliaux:

‘frenzy of contempt and hatred’

‘complete disquisition of marriage’

Burnley on courtly love:

‘falsity of his pretensions as a lover’

Shores on courtly love:

‘cynical condemnation of courtly conventions’

Varnam on courtly love and the garden:

‘chaucer’s garden is no longer a place of courtly love or intellectual debate, but for lust and sexuality’

Lee on May:

‘May turn her tempting appearance into her advantage’