Of Sondry Folk. The Dramatic Principle in the Canterbury Tales

Article number 10224057

R. M. Lumiansky examines Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales as a unified dramatic composition rather than merely a collection of individual stories. He argues that the pilgrims reveal their personalities, motives and conflicts through the tales they choose to tell and through their interactions during the journey. Detailed analyses of the pilgrims and their stories demonstrate how Chaucer uses characterization, irony and narrative connections to create a complex dramatic structure.