To the taste of a twentieth century reader Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales can be extremely difficult to understand and appreciate. Written in Middle English, even some literary experts believed the piece to be somewhat amateurish in its use of meter and rhyme. The make-up of the language clearly displays its roots to French, though it is linguistically much closer to modern English. With a proper understanding of the pronunciation the Canterbury Tales can recognized as the work of art that it is. This composition of the first identifiable English writer solidifies Chaucer's position as a master of melody and rhyme, and the "father of English literature."
             Aside from being a literary masterpiece the tales are a window into the society living in medieval England. At the time English was considered the "peasants language," making this piece, among other things, a work of national patriotism. As part of an English nationalist movement it helped to rally against France at the beginning of the Hundred Years War. Considering that its capital city covered an area of only one square mile England was home to a wide range of characters. Instead of following the traditional format for writing an epic poem, which included writing about several characters of high social standing, Chaucer gave his audience a sample of social variety by involving various characters from a spectrum of social classes. In the Canterbury Tales, this diverse group of characters was individually responsible for narrating two stories while on a pilgrimage that journeyed from Southwark to Canterbury. During the Middle Ages it was custom for many Christians to go on pilgrimages to perform what they believed was God's work. Canterbury was one of many sites that the pilgrim would go to. Geoffrey Chaucer centers his book The Canterbury Tales center around the pilgrims on their way to thank St. Thomas of Canterbury for his help in k...