Stephen Fitch

10/24/11
English III Honors
Midterm Exam
Flawed Justice in the Canterbury Tales
(Group A #2)

The protagonists in both the Miller’s Tale and the Wife of Bath’s Tale of the Canterbury

Tales, commit a tragic sin, each deserving of condemning judgement. However, these Tales il-

lustrate a skewed perception of judgment and fairness, giving these sinful protagonists unjusti-

fied grace and mercy proportional to their wicked deeds. Contrastingly, harsh misfortunes affect

other minor characters in these Tales who, by the merits of their actions seemingly deserve no

punishment whatsoever. Geoffrey Chaucer, the author, therefore conveys an incomplete and il-

legitimate concept of justice in these two particular Tales, lacking the proper resolution and clo-

sure the characters truly deserve.

Firstly, the onset of the Miller’s Tale presents John, an uptight carpenter and his wife

Abigail. While kindly housing an astrology student named Nicholas, John is unaware of this stu-

dent’s affair with his wife. After continued adultery, Nicholas and Abigail agree to trick John

into believing a second apocryphal flood was coming. Nicholas then warns John of a false flood,

allowing Abigail and Nicholas to spend a night together. This tale ends with the innocent John

falling of the roof breaking his arm, and the mockery of his name around the town for his “mad-

ness” in believing a flood, while Nicholas and Abigail are at end without conviction. The deliv-

ery of sufferings to such an undeserving candidate as John as compared to the other characters

exposes the absence of sound judgement and punishment by Chaucer. John, in relation to

Nicholas and Abigail, is of much greater moral stature, for his only flaw is controlling Abigail

out of possessive selfishness. John then, in actuality would not deserve these punishments.

John’s burdens would ideally be redirected to penalize the sexual sins of Nicholas and Abigail,

but because of Chaucer’s use of altered justice, Nicholas and Abigail are free without atoning for

wrongs.

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Stephen Fitch
10/24/11
English III Honors
Midterm Exam
Additionally Chaucer also obscures the notion of justice in The Wife of Bath’s Tale. The

story begins with a lustful and reckless knight raping a young maiden. After being sentenced to

death for such a crime, the knight is given mercy by the Queen on the condition that he discover

what woman want most after one year. Throughout that long year, the knight desperately asks

many woman, who give him many scattered answers. Then one day, close to the day of answer-

ing to the Queen, the knight sees many woman in a meadow and after approaching them, the

women all disappear but one. This woman, who is an old crone, after being promised a reward,

answers the knight’s epic question by telling him that woman want most to have sovereignty

over their husbands. Furthermore, they successfully relay this answer to the Queen. The crone

then demands a reward from the knight: marriage, which occurs shortly after her demand. After

giving his wife sovereignty over him, the wife supernaturally changes into a young beautiful

woman for the knights pleasure. This tale shows another example of mishandled justice, giving

the knight no retribution for his vile action, but rather blessing him with a beautiful wife and life,

rather than an execution. Although the execution first decided for the knight may be an arguably

harsh punishment, the fact that he receives no consequential response for a horrible sin is re-

markably unfair. Lacking the reconciliation between his evil action with his joyous fate, the

knight, like Nicholas and Abigail, also escapes freely from the bindings of warranted suffering.