I like Alexander Pope. He’s sarcastic and funny and doesn’t take any crap. He wrote one of my favorite poems. It’s short so I’ll just show you.
Epigram, engraved on the collar of a dog which I gave to his Majesty.
I am his highness dog, at Kew
Tell me sire, whose dog are you?

Burn!

Anyway, so I spent my whole life thinking The Rape of the Lock was about a lock and a key.
Think about it.
But it turns out it’s about a lock of hair. This guy cut a lock of hair off some rich chick, and to stop capulet and moteque retribution, Pope wrote the story in this mock heroic poem so everyone could see how stupid they were being. Belinda is priming for a day out are her sprites are dead set on protecting her hair from all harm. They fail when a man cuts a lock of her hair off and Belinda pitches a fit and demands it back. The hair is sent to the stars to become a constellation so all can look upon it and it’s never lost.

Seriously, it’s hysterical.

My take on King Lear? Cordelia could have prevented a lot of deaths had she been more tactful, including her own. Still studying for the GRE subject test, and the next book on my list was King Lear. Now I have an ethical issue with reading Shakespeare. Plays are meant to be seen, preferably live, not read. Forcing kids to read them in school is not going to open their eyes to their literary merit.

But King Lear isn’t performed all that often, so I watched every version of it I could find. My favorite had Gandalf as Leer (I’m sure that actor has a real name, it’s just escaped me for the moment). I was still having a tough time remembering all the characters and their motives, so I read Fool, by Christopher Moore. I would read this for entertainment alone, but in the case of studying don’t use it to study the plot, JUST to remember the characters and the setting. But the book was incredible. The plot interwoven like a tapestry, and Pocket was such a great character. I really can’t say enough good things about this book.

Random side note: I wonder if I’m the only one who thinks “The Last Unicorn” every time I hear the name Lear?

I’d never heard of Pierse the Plowman before, but it was in the Kaplan list of books to read for the GRE subject test. I soon learned why I’d never heard of it, it was impossible to find. I finally managed to track down a copy of this book on amazon, but there were not many versions to choose from. My library hadn’t heard of it, neither had sparksnotes, and the Wikipedia article was so vague it might as well not exist.

Piers the Plowman was written by William Langland around the same time as the canterbury tales. It is written in unrhymed alliterative verse and divided into sections called passus (steps). The story follows a narcoleptic man named Will who randomly falls asleep and has visions. His visions have a heavy catholic slant as he is guided though his dreams on a quest for Dowel, Dobet, and Dobet (do well, do better, and do best) though the allegorical land of Piers the Plowman. Piers, who is sometimes an allegorical representation of Jesus, teaches that life is best lived poor and pious. They come up against people like Fee, faith, thought, old age, and the good Samaritan. The dreamer is frequently yelled at for misinterpreting the visions. My favorite quote is

“Judge not, that he be not judged.”
“what would be the use if moral law,” replied Good Faith, “if no one stood out against fraud and falsehood.”
(14)

My version is obviously in modern verse. I like that quote, not because I agree with it (I’m pretty anti-judgement), but because that is the first time I’ve ever seen Judge less thou shall be judge NOT be a conversation killer. I’ve never heard a rebuttal for that argument.

I had this teacher in high school that made my whole class memorize the general prologue to the Canterbury Tales. I complained about it at the time, but when it came time to re-read it for the GRE subject test, I was grateful. I fell right into the rhythm right away. It made reading the story a hundred percent easier, and much less daunting.

There’s no denying Chaucer was brilliant, but what we glossed over a lot in High school was that he was a pervert. The premise of the tales is that a group of pilgrims are journeying to Canterbury and decide to pass the time engaging in a story telling competition. The tales don’t end. So spoiler alert. you’ll never figure out who won, but I’m rooting for the Nun’s priest.

Some of the more notable tales are the Knights Tale (nothing like the movie), the Wife of Bath’s Tale, The Miller’s Tale, The Merchants Tale, The Reeves tale, and the Nun’s Priests tale.

Cynical One line summaries:
Knights tale: Two guys fight to the death over a girl that doesn’t want to marry either of them. Also be really careful how to phrase your prayers. “I wish to win AND live” would be good.
The Miller’s Tale: Woman cheats on husband while he takes a bath to wait out the second flood. Open your eyes when you kiss.
The Reeve’s Tale: Students screw over a dishonest miller in more ways than one.
The Cooks tale: unfinished. But lots of drinking and revelry
The Man of Law’s Tale: people at a feast get killed, woman gets set adrift in the ocean, gets found, converts to Christianity, goes on lots of adventures, eventually lives happily ever after. Long tale.
Wife of bath: her prologue is more interesting than the tale. But here goes, knight rapes woman, punishment is to find the thing all women want in a year and a day. Seriously, his punishment is to wander the land looking for answer, because criminals should be a transient population? An old woman gives him the answer (sovereignty) but he has to marry her. Wedding night comes, he’s grossed out, but she turns into a pretty young woman when he gives her sovereignty. Because even rapists deserve a happy ending.
The Friar’s Tale: Arch deacon black males lecherous people, compares notes with the devil, wins, gets dragged to hell.
The summoners tale: a fart joke. Friars are so greedy they try to divide up a fart among them
The Clerk’s Tale: man tests his wife’s loyalty by pretending to kill her children and leave her for a younger woman. She stays loyal. Seriously?
Squires tale: magic sword heals bird, unfinished
Franklin’s tale: wife promises to sleep with a man if he removes dangerous rocks from the coast so her husband can get home safely. He does, her husband tells her the honorable thing to do is fulfill the bargain. Man regretfully turns her down.
Physicians tale: virgin would rather get behead than have sex with a particular man. Her father complies
Pardoners tale: men go searching for death and end up killing each other
Shipman’s tale: merchant tricks someone else’s wife into sleeping with him by lending her husband money.
Chaucers tale 1 and 2: 1, doggerel. Horrible poetry about sir Thompas fighting a dragon. 2: house is robbed and wife and child are beaten. Wifeb(prudence) tells husband (melibee) to forgive and forget
Prioress’s tale: a Jewish child is killed, his singing leads his mother to his body
Monks tale: every hero has a low point
Nuns priests tale: chanticleer the rooster has a prophetic dream about getting chased by a monster. His wife thinks he’s silly, but the next day he is attacked by and outwits a fox
Second nun: wife sends husband on a holy journey to convert him to Christianity before allowing him to have sex with her
Canon and yeoman’s tale: they pretend to use alchemy to trick people into buying gold and get caught
Manciples tale: borrows from Ovid’s Metamorphasis and a thousand and one nights, crow (formerly white) tells man his wife is cheating, man kills crow and curses it with blackness
The parsons tale: preaching against the seven deadly sins
Chaucers retraction: give god credit for what you like, give me credit for what you don’t.

To reward myself, and to review what I’d read, a friend of mine and I went to see the The Canterbury Tales at the Shakespeare tavern. I’m so glad I went, it was hysterical. The pilgrims were on a tour bus, and the tales were acted out very tongue and cheek (the nun’s priest was a drunk, the millers tale ended in a shoot out, ect). My favorite was the nun’s priest tale. They were SO funny and over the top. I’m glad I went, I feel like I’ll remember those tales for sure.