Geoffrey Chaucer | Words And Peace

Six degrees of separation:
from
the Bible to Canterbury

Another cool result this month!
Using my own rules for this fun meme hosted by Kate at Booksaremyfavouriteandbest (see there the origin of the meme and how it works – posted the first Saturday of every month), I started with a containing the word Bible and ended up in Canterbury. This is really fun, you never know where you’ll end up.
Here are my own quirky rules:

Use your list of books on Goodreads
Take the first word of the title offered and find another title with that word in it
Then use the first word of THAT title to find your text title
Or the second if the title starts by the same word

After the covers, you can find the links of my reviews or the title on Goodreads:

1. The Poisonwood Bible = this is the first book I read by Kingsolver. I was still in France, but a friend loved it so much, he mailed it to me from the US. After that, I have almost all her books.
2. The Poisoned Crown = this is the 3rd book in the famous historical fiction series by the French Maurice Druon, called The Accursed Kings. I really enjoyed the first two, but was no longer in the mood for #3 and DNFed it. Maybe one day I’ll get back to it.
3. The French Sultana (The Veil and the Crown, #2)= wonderful historical novel on Josephine’s cousin!
4. Fairy Tales for the Disillusioned: Enchanted Stories from the French Decadent Tradition = fabulous and quirky anthology by PrincetonUniversity Press
5. Perrault’s Fairy Tales = I actually read them in French, a few decades ago.
6. The Canterbury Tales = I listened to them 7 years ago, it was fun!

***

HAVE YOU READ ANY OF THESE BOOKS?
HAVE YOU PLAYED
SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION
THIS MONTH?

The Canterbury Tales

Geoffrey CHAUCER

– audiobook: 18:45 hours –

This counts for

2011 Audio Book Challenge

MY THOUGHTS

It took me over a month to finish this lengthy audiobook, but I enjoyed almost all of it – there were a few passages, especially the ones related to old Greek classics, that I did not appreciate too much. I do enjoy Greek classics, but the passage related to them was very long here, I think.

This is part of my goals of reading classics I have never read, or read in French decades ago. I had not read/listened to verse for quite a while, so that was good too. The translation by Nicholson into modern English verse was very good.

It is a witty satire of the English society and Church of the 14th century, but still, one can find some good Christian passages, as well as good morality. One of the Tales is actually the martyrdom of Saint Cecilia.

Some passages are really hilarious, and I often caught myself laughing out loud.
Some tales, with animals, have some commonality with the famous French Fables de La Fontaine.

ABOUT THE BOOK

The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century. The tales (mostly in verse, although some are in prose) are told as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from Southwark to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral. In a long list of works, including Troilus and Criseyde, House of Fame, and Parliament of Fowls, The Canterbury Tales was Chaucer’s magnum opus. He uses the tales and the descriptions of the characters to paint an ironic and critical portrait of English society at the time, and particularly of the Church. Structurally, the collection bears the influence of The Decameron, which Chaucer is said to have come across during his first diplomatic mission to Italy in 1372. However, Chaucer peoples his tales with ‘sondry folk’ rather than Boccaccio’s fleeing nobles. [wikipedia]
The version I listened to was translated into modern English, but still in verse.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Geoffrey Chaucer (pronounced /ˈtʃɔːsər/; c. 1343 – 25 October 1400) was an English author, poet, philosopher, bureaucrat, courtier and diplomat. Although he wrote many works, he is best remembered for his unfinished frame narrative The Canterbury Tales. Sometimes called the father of English literature, Chaucer is credited by some scholars as the first author to demonstrate the artistic legitimacy of the vernacular Middle English, rather than French or Latin. [wikipedia]

HAVE YOU READ THIS BOOK?
OR DO YOU FEEL LIKE READING IT?
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS IN A COMMENT PLEASE

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