Chaucer was, of course, himself heavily invested in language, since he wrote both for pleasure and to fill his coffers. He read and spoke a number of different languages, including English, Latin, Italian, and French. For a man of his day, he was quite the linguaphile. As someone who was knowledgeable about language and also profited by his pen, it is only fitting that he should compose a tale along the line of “The Nun’s Priest’s Tale”, which is wholly centered around language and the power of words, flattery in particular.
“The Nun’s Priest’s Tale” is written in the style of a ‘mock-epic’, meaning that it uses grandiose language, the sort of diction usually reserved for the epic genre, except that here this elevated eloquence is used ironically to tell the tale of a rooster living in an ordinary barnyard of a poor old widow. Right away the reader is made aware of the elevation in style: the rooster, as opposed to being named Tom or John, is given the pretentious sounding name of “Chanticleer.” (404) This was actually a common name for roosters in folk tales and is derived from the French name Chantecler, meaning “clear singer”.
To wit, Chanticleer is noted for his very precise, very clear, and very pleasant crow, “In all the land, at crowing he’d no peer./ His voice was mellower than the mellow organ/ You hear in church on feast-days…” (404) Chaucer is only two stanzas into his poem and already he is touting the powerful qualities of vocalizations, “And where he lived, his crowing told the hour/ Better than any clock in abbey-tower.” (404) Given that the church was the corner-stone of Medieval society and, yet, Chanticleer keeps better time than the church, Chaucer is subtly inserting the power and influence of language over large and powerful institutions, or else he is suggesting that these institutions are at the mercy of words and that their very power is derived from language and how it is wielded. Either interpretation is somewhat flirting with danger, as the church and its doctrine/ power were not concepts that were openly challenged.
Chaucer truly highlights the strength of language and its ability to sway behavior from one course of action to a wholly different one in the part of the poem where Chanticleer meets the “…black fox, iniquitous and sly…” (413) hiding in a bed of cabbage. Chanticleer’s first reactions are aversion and fear:
“At this he never felt less wish to crow,
But, chattering a ‘cok-cok’, he leapt up
Like someone in a panic, terror struck….
He would have fled, had not the fox exclaimed,
‘Good sir, where are you off to? I’m your friend!
Alas that you should be afraid of me!” (415)
The fox uses the persuasive power of language to disarm Chanticleer and halt his flight; furthermore he uses copious amounts of “blandishments and flattery” (416), the ‘oil of communication’, to dupe Chanticleer into closing his eyes and exposing his neck, a vulnerable position for any creature. But Chanticleer, fooled by the fox’s complimenting his father’s as well as his own singing, readily acquiesces to the fox’s cajoling to, “…sing for sweet saint charity!/ Show me if you can emulate your father!”. (416) Chaucer is making the very clear comment on the power and influence that words, when yielded deftly, can not only alter one’s actions, they can make one act in foolish and dangerous ways.
If words can be used to manipulate, the natural antithesis of this would be the power of words to motivate the masses to act for the greater good or to respond to a threat, as Chaucer illustrates by having Pertelote sound the alarm, resulting in the denizens of the barnyard to coalesce and advance on the retreating fox, thereby giving Chanticleer his opportunity to use his words to save his life:
“…if I were in your place,
So help me God, I’s turn round and say this:
‘Go home, you stupid yokels! Plague on you!
Now I’m at the wood’s edge , what can you do?’” (418)
Now it’s time for the fox to play the dupe, for he, too, falls victim to suggestion and pride and opens his mouth to speak, upon which Chanticleer escapes. Chaucer’s point that no one is immune to the influence of words is made patently clear.
If Chaucer is underscoring the power of language and sound, he is also, and equally importantly, stating a contradictory yet complimentary fact: there is a power in silence, as well. Had Chanticleer not fallen for the fox’s flattery and refused to sing, he would have never been caught. Likewise, had the fox ignored Chanticleer’s suggestion, he would have had a sure meal. As Chaucer, himself, wrote:
“Bad luck to him who knows no better than
To talk too much when he should hold his tongue.” (419)
Leave a Reply