Chaucer Essay

Chaucer Geoffrey Chaucer is one of the most famous authors in world and British history. His story of “The Canterbury Tales” is one of the most renowned worlds over. In the article titled, “All England,” Joan Acocella, gives a very interesting insight into the life, writings, and writing styles of Chaucer. He was a very witty person and loves flatulent jokes. She delves into the modern translation of his famous work and explains her opinion of it in this description of the most famous Old English poet, Geoffrey Chaucer.
One of the most interesting things I discovered in this paper was about Chaucer himself. The fact that he enjoyed a good fart joke makes me laugh. On the third page of the story, Acocella references his enjoyment for jokes containing flatulence by quoting from the Summoner’s Tale. “A friar asks a man for alms. The man agrees but says that he has secreted his money beneath his buttocks. The friar should reach down there. He does so, and the man lets fly a fart so loud, Chaucer says, that ‘no cart horse could produce a fart of such a sound.’" To me this shows both the human and down to earth side as well as the underlying boy side to his personality. Most men, as we grow up, still tend to get a good laugh out of fart jokes. For some reason in our psyche, the enjoyment never ceases. Chaucer was not afraid to show that he still could have, at times, the mind of a child and made sure to put that in his stories. What I think is most interesting about this anecdote, is that this kind of lewd behavior exists still today... and we still find it to be funny! Working in the county jail, I can tell you that I see my fair share of fart jokes going on around the inmates. At times, it is hard for me not to crack a smile, even. Something I learned which also surprised me, in this story was that Chaucer was actually in the King's service. He even was a prisoner of war at one point. Chaucer was a very diplomatic man according to Acocella. At one point she tells