Product Description

Six-hundred-year-old tales with modern relevance. As well as the complete text of the General Prologue, the student will find illustrated information on Chaucer's world, including a map of the Canterbury pilgrimage, a running synopsis of the action, an explanation of unfamiliar words, and a wide range of classroom-tested activities to help bring the text to life. Guided by the suggestions for study and the wide range of helpful information, students will readily appreciate Chaucer's wit and sense of irony, his love of controversy and his delight in character portrayal.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #210802 in Books
• Published on: 1999-10-21
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 96 pages

Customer Reviews

Great literature, outdated notes
It is, of course, impossible to rate one of the greatest and most ground-breaking peices of literature of all time.
I am not attempting to review the General Prologue, which would take months, as well as a greater intellect than mine!
It is worth saying however to anyone who is unfimiliar with the works of Chaucer or is currently studying it, that the notes at the back of this edition, while useful to a degree are flawed.
There are many more up-to-date interpretations of the characters and of Chaucer's view of them, and the opinions expressed in this edition are misleading; in particular, the portrayal of the knight as the "ideal character". The notes also fail to make a clear enough distinction between Chaucer's real view of the characters and the things he ironically says about them through his naive and unintelligent narrator.
This is more than worth buying and reading, providing you then form your own opinion of the characters and don't take the notes for gospel.

Here we meet the pilgrims travelling to Canterbury.
For many of us Chaucer's characters are familiar figures, such as, the Pardoner, The Miller to name two of his more unsavoury characters. Yet it is in the Prologue that we meet the entire company of disparate characters on their way to Canterbury. In the Prologue Chaucer seeks to describe the Pilgrims and their characters. Insight is given to their personalities by what they have to say of themselves and also the reactions of their companions. All too often the clearest indication to the true nature of the individuals' personality, is what others say about them.
The Prologue is necessary reading for anyone wishing to read The Canterbury Tales, as it sets the scene for what is to come. In many cases the description of the Pilgrim in The Prologue prepares the reader for the tale that they will tell.

Generally Good Study Edition for Beginners
In the general prologue Chaucer introducs the pilgrims and set the scenario for "The Canterbury Tales". It is a delightful start. Chaucer already showcases his narrative method of projecting multiply layered viewpoints through the voices of the characters and himself, achieving the satirical wittiness for which he is famous for. His poetic devices are superb and "The General Prologue" cannot fail to convince the literary reader to proceed to the individual tales.

Almost like its Shakespeare for school series yet it seems that, consequent of its being expended alongside all other great works of English literature to disproportionately concentrate academic effort on Shakespeare, it falls far short of its prototype to deliver its purpose. For one, Chaucer wrote in Middle English. And however similar it is to Modern English rather more linguistic pointers are needed to initiate its target group of students to Chaucer's language than Shakespeare's Early Modern English. From the point of view of someone who is long past A Level standard, the additional information provided is frugal, though I should think certainly more than enough for A Level (after all it is more important to regurgiate information according to the prescribed formula for essay writing if one wishes to gain marks at A Level than display genuine depth). Nevertheless, texts other than Shakespeare's are rarely presented with so much linguistic guidance let alone with that printed on the pages facing the text, that this is still probably the best study edition there is for those reading Chaucer for the first time.