Graduate Work

The Canterbury Tales
By Scott Hays

THE MILLER’S PROLOGUE
Tension Between Characters Leads to ‘Insincere’ Double Apology
Scott Hays

In the Miller’s Prologue of The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, tension arises between characters and social classes over which pilgrim should narrate the next tale, the second tale following the Knight’s Tale. During the course of this exchange, the author (as narrator and through the Miller’s character) makes not one but two apologies to readers for what they’re about to stumble upon in the Miller’s Tale, an elaborate, obscene parody that includes infidelity, ass kissing, and farting. The framing of this “double apology” , however, seems to serve less as an actual apology and more as a powerful storytelling technique that entices readers into the Miller’s Tale.

Consider readers’ expectations after reading the Knight’s Tale, a poetic romance set in mythological Greece that captures the ideals of courtly love, defined by some scholars as a type of love in which a man devotes himself entirely to the woman he loves, even if she’s unavailable. The Knight represents the archetype of a medieval Christian gentleman-soldier, and in the narrator’s eyes, he is the noblest of the pilgrims: “A Knyght ther was, and that a worthy man / That fro the tyme that he first bigan / To riden out, he loved chivalrie / Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie” (lines 43-46). It seems appropriate, then, that his tale should uphold his role within the storytelling community. And so it does, leaving readers with a sense of order and arrangement.

But this sense of order and arrangement gets knocked to its proverbial arse in the Miller’s Prologue when—after the pilgrims applaud the Knight’s Tale for its nobility, and after the Host asks the Monk to narrate the next tale—the drunk and belligerent Miller insists that he narrate the next tale with which he can “quite” the Knight’s Tale. Otherwise, the Miller threatens to leave the pilgrimage. This exchange, in effect, challenges the Host’s authority and threatens the entire storytelling community; a community with its own set of rules. And although the Host clearly wants to maintain the storytelling order according to social rank, he submits to the Miller’s request.

Here’s where Chaucer makes the first of his two “apologies,” both of which serve only as a powerful storytelling technique to “whet” the reader’s appetite. The Miller reminds the pilgrims that he’s drunk and therefore shouldn’t be held responsible for anything he says. “Now herkneth,” quod the Millere, “alle and some! / But first I make a protestacioun / That I am dronke; I knowe it by my soun. / And therefore if that I mysspeke or seye, / Wyte it the ale of Southwerk, I you preye” (lines 3136-40).

This apology from the drunken Miller seems insincere, at best. For openers, by blaming the “ale of Southwerk” for any words that may get muddled during the telling of his tale, the Miller, in effect, ends up blaming the Host who plied him with the ale. And although this is stereotypical of the Miller’s character and low social status—at least, in terms of Chaucer’s description of him in the Prologue—it comes across as lacking any substance, whatsoever. After all, it’s a storytelling game designed, facilitated, and judged by the Host—a large man, bold of speech, who made it clear from the beginning that whoever disagrees with his authority must pay for everything spent along the way. Yet here the Host acquiesces to the Miller’s drunken demands, even without putting up so much as a small protestation. This becomes particularly troublesome when one considers the Miller seems to enjoy overturning all conventions in social and storytelling order. And non one’s there to stop him—not the host, not even the Knight.

The Miller next introduces his tale of a carpenter and of his wife, and how a clerk makes a fool of the carpenter by sleeping with his wife. This anger the Reeve who happens to be a carpenter of first-rate skill and objects to a tale that injures or defames any man, or brings scandal on wives.

The Reve answerde and seyde, “Stynt thy clappe!
Lat be thy lewed dronken harlotrye.
It is a synne and eek a greet folye
To apeyren any man, or hym defame,
And eek to bryngen wyves in swich fame.
Though mayst ynogh of othere thynges seyn.”
This dronke Millere spak full soone ageyn
And seyde, “Leve brother Osewold,
Who hath no wyf, he is not cokewold.
But I sey nat therfore that thou art oon;
Ther been ful goode wyves many oon,
And evere a thousand goode ayeyns oon badde.

That knowestow wel thyself, but if thou madde.
It has been argued that Chaucer’s narrative structure of this particular heated exchange is his way to “anticipate every important argument of [his] formal defense of realism and ribaldry” in the Miller’s Tale which, ultimately, would make any apology (whether through the Miller or the narrator) nothing more than Chaucer’s attempt to entice readers into reading the Miller’s Tale exactly because of the realism and ribaldry.

Although Chaucer as narrator is merciless in his depiction of the Miller—loud and portly with black nostrils, and a wart on his nose and bright red hairs sticking out like bristles from a sow’s ear—there also exists an intriguing similarity between the Miller’s apology and the narrator’s apology, which comes 30 lines later, and reminds readers to again blame the Miller if they find the tale offensive.

What sholde I moore seyn, but this Millere
He nolde his wordes for no man forbere,
But tolde his cherles tale in his manere.
M’athynketh that I shal reherce it heere.
And therefore, whoso list it nat yheere,
Turne over the leef and chese another tale;
For he shal fynde ynowe, grete and smale,
Of storial thyng that toucheth gentillesse,
And eek moralitee and hoolynesse.
Blameth nat me if that ye chese amys.
The Millere is a cherl; ye knowe wel this.
So was the Reve eek and othere mo,
And harlotrie they tolden bothe two.
Avyseth yow, and put me out of blame;
And eek men shal nat maken ernest of game.

Chaucer’s second and final apology to readers to not think him ill-inclined or evil in his purpose , and to skip to another tale if they should find the Miller’s Tale offensive (lest they be found lacking in nobility of character) ultimately serves, once again, as less an actual apology and more as a narrative structure to heighten tension between the pilgrims and their social classes, and to engage readers’ interest in the Miller’s Tale with nothing less than an open mind. And when one considers the “framework” from this perspective, it can only lead to the conclusion that Chaucer himself is an storyteller-extraordinaire.

WORKS CITED
Benson, Larry D. The Riverside Chaucer. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987.

Coghill, Nevill. Geoffrey Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales. New York: Penguin Books
USA, 1977.

David, Norman and Douglas Gray, Patricia Ingham and Anne Wallace-Hadrill. A Chaucer Glossary. New York: The Oxford University Press, 1979.

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