The Knight's Tale Analysis

Chaucer uses the paintings on the walls of the Temples in “The Knight’s Tale” to display how the story being told does not necessarily match reality. On the walls of Venus’s temple are illustrations of feelings associated with love, since she is the goddess of love. However, most of these illustrations appear negative. The pictures on the walls are of, “The broken sleep, the lonely sighs, the cold/And sacred tears,” associated with love (1920-1). The words used to describe the pictures on Venus’s temple, such as “lonely” and “broken,” have negative connotations, thus suggesting that love does not always grant happiness. In fact, it often causes sadness. Chaucer portrays these images to show how the love within the story, which appears passionate and romantic, is
Since the images are painted on the temple of a goddess, and gods are meant to rule over people and essentially know more than regular people, the images on the walls are of significance and hold a certain truth. Therefore, the temple exposes the truth about love, suggesting that it does not always match how it is in the story. After describing Venus’s temple, Chaucer describes the temple of Mars, the god of war. Once again, this temple displays gruesome images. In the images, “The hunter [is] strangled by wild bears,” and, “The sow [devours] the child right in the cradle” (2019-20). These descriptions focus on negative aspects that arise during fights and wars, thus showing how rewards are not always received after a war. This contrasts the ideas displayed in the story of Arcite and Palamon because Arcite and Palamon are fighting over Emily, and the winner will have the chance to marry Emily. However, this is not always the case with war. Generally, in wars, multiple people lose their lives without receiving any sort of prize. The nauseating paintings displayed on the walls of Mars’s temple expose this truth of