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not done in bed". Immediately after this
Januarie is struck blind, although it is not explained why, though Chaucer's suggestion is that his vanity, lust and general immorality have rendered him blind in body and in moral judgment. This disability, however, spiritually serves Januarie well. His language and character, formerly lewd and repulsive, becomes beautiful and gentle love poetry, and his love for May could be seen to evolve to more than just lust and desire. On 8 June, Januarie and May enter a garden that he has built for her. Meanwhile, Damyan has sneaked into the garden using a key that he has made from a mould May has given him and waits for May in a pear tree, symbolising, it has been said, the forbidden fruit from
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woman and the religious confusion in the tale, which invokes both the classical gods and the
Christian one. Indeed the presence of particular gods has individual relevance when related to this tale: as the classical myth tells, Proserpina, a young and much loved goddess, was stolen and held captive by Pluto, the King of the Underworld, who forced her to marry him.
259:), indicating that, perhaps, her infidelity will not stop there. Conforming with the wider symbolism in the tale of spring triumphing over winter (May over January), the conclusion supports the unimportance of Damyan (whose name has no seasonal context): he only has two lines of direct speech in the tale, and at the end is utterly forgotten, even by the Merchant.
217:, soon to be cuckolded by a manipulative female figure, a clear reversal from the horrific and repulsive figure painted by the narrator in the opening presentation of the man. In the tree, May is promptly greeted by her young lover Damyan, and they begin to have sex, described by the Merchant in a particularly lewd and bold fashion:
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do physically intervene later, Damyan's love could be seen as literally induced by Venus. May reciprocates his attraction and plots to have sex with him. Januarie creates a beautiful walled garden, reminiscent of the Garden of Eden as well as courtly love poetry, where he and May do "things that were
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Two gods are, at this moment, watching the adultery: husband and wife Pluto and
Proserpina. They begin a passionate argument about the scene, in which Pluto condemns women's morality. He decides that he will grant Januarie his sight back, but Proserpina will grant May the ability to talk her way out
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Januarie regains his sight – via Pluto's intervention – just in time to see his wife and Damyan engaged in intercourse, but May successfully convinces him that his eyesight is deceiving him because it has only just been restored and that she is only "struggling with a man" because she was told this
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Januarie marries May, a young woman not yet 20 years old, largely out of lust and under the guise of religious acceptability. He chooses her seemingly spontaneously after telling all his friends to go and look for a wife for him. It is unknown why May accepts
Januarie; however, it is safe to assume
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should be able to excuse themselves easily from their treachery can be seen as a distinctly misogynistic comment from the narrator, or perhaps even from
Chaucer himself. These presentations of these two characters and their quarrel crystallises much of the tale, namely the argument between man and
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Januarie decides that he wants to marry, predominately for the purpose of lawful recreational sex and to produce an heir, and he consults his two brothers, Placebo (meaning 'I shall please'), who while encouraging him offers no personal opinion, and
Justinus (meaning 'the just one'), who opposes
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May, implying that she is pregnant and craving a pear, requests one from the tree and
Januarie, old and blind, and therefore unable to reach, is persuaded to stoop and allow May to climb onto his back herself. Here Chaucer evokes enormous pathos for the
271:. Typically a description for a tale of carnal lust and frivolous bed-hopping, some would argue that especially the latter half of the tale, where Damyan and May have sex in the tree with the blind Januarie at the foot of the tree, represents fabliau.
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The tale ends rather unexpectedly: the fooled
Januarie and May continue to live happily. However, Chaucer does not end the tale entirely happily: a darker suggestion is there, as May tells Januarie that he may be mistaken on many more occasions
235:"I swere / That I shal yeven hire suffisant answere / And all wommen after, for hir sake; / That, though they shulle hemself excuse, / And bere hem doun that wolden hem excuse, / For lak of answere noon of hem shall dien."
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lyrics. Philips and Plaice structured this adaptation across all four seasons of the calendar year, extending
Chaucer's original Tale into Autumn thereby following Januarie's tale on beyond the grave.
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Many characters in this Tale have cratylic names: Januarie, the main character, is named in conjunction with his equally seasonal wife May, representing their individual characters: Januarie is
126:, though of a very unusual sort: It is cast in the high style, and some of the scenes (the marriage feast, for example) are among Chaucer's most elaborate displays of rhetorical art.
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at the wedding party – meaning she set his heart on fire with love. This could simply be a personification of Damyan falling in love, but since
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not only adapting the original
Chaucer text for an operatic setting, but also drawing on other works by Chaucer and creating entirely original
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wife represents the spring seasons. This has particular relevance when considering the parallel between this tale, and the Biblical tale of
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A squire in Januarie's court, called Damyan, falls in love with May and writes a letter to her confessing his desires: the goddess
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marriage from his own experience. Januarie, a vain man, hears only the flattery of his sycophantic friend Placebo.
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that she did it for social betterment and possibly some kind of inheritance, Januarie being a rich man.
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Indeed, the narrator does apologise for this explicit description, addressing the pilgrims saying:
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Similar tales are Boccaccio's Story of Lydia and Pyrrhus and The Simpleton Husband from
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http://en.wikisource.org/Masnavi_I_Ma%27navi/Book_IV#STORY_IX._The_Mule_and_the_Camel
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One question that splits critics is whether the Merchant's tale is a
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146:. Januarie's brothers are named Placebo and Justinus: the former a
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Innes, Sheila, ed. (2007). "The Merchant's Prologue and Tale".
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premiered a new, full-length operatic adaptation of Chaucer's
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A Commentary on the General Prologue to The Canterbury Tales
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Chaucer's influence on fifteenth-century Scottish literature
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The central episode of the Merchant's Tale is like a
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428:http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type1423.html
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508:24 December 2002 at the
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331:The Tale of Januarie
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53:Theophrastus
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41:) is one of
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1356:derivations
1354:Single tale
1278:(1634 play)
1018:(2001 film)
911:Rhyme royal
854:Jack Upland
730:Other works
363:as May and
328:, entitled
308:Adaptations
157:senex amans
1489:Proserpina
1468:Categories
1453:The Tabard
1395:" (Dryden)
1388:(Edwardes)
1329:Literature
1302:Television
1171:Sir Thopas
681:Sir Thopas
585:Canterbury
200:Proserpina
67:Deschamps'
1073:Order of
926:Order of
904:and Texts
462:. London.
148:sycophant
139:"fresshe"
118:remarks:
62:Decameron
57:Boccaccio
954:Scribe D
902:Language
811:Spurious
522:Archived
506:Archived
494:Archived
353:'s film
351:Pasolini
167:Lombardy
1417:Related
1215:Addenda
973:Related
297:Masnavi
269:fabliau
205:Genesis
124:fabliau
107:Masnavi
92:Statius
1321:(2003)
1313:(1975)
1259:(1972)
992:(wife)
94:, and
1248:Films
1004:(son)
861:Tales
773:Boece
587:Tales
574:Works
402:: 600
371:Notes
196:Pluto
187:Venus
165:, in
163:Pavia
438:See
302:Rumi
198:and
112:Rumi
96:Cato
1075:The
1061:'s
583:The
349:In
300:of
110:by
82:by
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33:" (
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1051:e
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29:"
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