English 3115E Lecture Notes - Geoffrey Chaucer, Petrarch
Document Summary
Discuss the relationship between any one middle english text and its source. The relationship between chaucer"s clerk"s tale and petrarch"s story of griselda is close, however, there are many differences among similarities. The main difference between the two tales is the view the audience gets of walter. Overall, in chaucer"s version, walter is a lot softer and kinder than petrarch"s. Chaucer"s walter asks only that the bride to be doesn"t voice it when she dis- agrees with her, he never says that she cannot disagree though, just that she doesn"t say anything. Petrarch"s walter asks that not only does she pretend as if she agrees with ev- erything, but he wants her to actually agree. This is essentially completely changing her way of thinking and making it parallel to his. There is also a difference in the way that the woman reacts to walter"s proposal.
