Quotes from The Canterbury Tales
21 notable lines from Geoffrey Chaucer · c. 1400
Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote / The droghte of March hath perced to the roote, / And bathed every veyne in swich licour / Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
Quotations follow the Nevill Coghill translation (Penguin Classics, 2003) — our recommended edition.
Love is blind.
Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales He was a verray, parfit gentil knyght.
Of the Knight, General Prologue And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche.
Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales And gladly wolde he lerne and gladly teche.
Of the Clerk of Oxford, General Prologue Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, / And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes,
General Prologue Mordre wol out, that se we day by day.
The Nun's Priest's Tale Wommen desiren to have sovereynetee / As wel over hir housbond as hir love, / And for to been in maistrie hym above.
The old woman, The Wife of Bath's Tale Radix malorum est Cupiditas.
The Pardoner's theme, The Pardoner's Prologue (Latin: greed is the root of evils) Experience, though noon auctoritee / Were in this world, is right ynogh for me / To speke of wo that is in mariage;
Opening of the Wife of Bath's Prologue Housbondes at chirche dore she hadde fyve, / Withouten oother compaignye in youthe —
Of the Wife of Bath, General Prologue This world nys but a thurghfare ful of wo, / And we been pilgrymes, passynge to and fro.
Theseus (Egeus's wisdom), The Knight's Tale Mulier est hominis confusio, — / Madame, the sentence of this Latyn is, / 'Womman is mannes joye and al his blis.'
Chauntecleer, The Nun's Priest's Tale Ful wys is he that kan hymselven knowe.
Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales I preche of no thyng but for coveityse.
The Pardoner, The Pardoner's Prologue But, for ye speken of swich gentillesse / As is descended out of old richesse, / That therfore sholden ye be gentil men, / Swich arrogance is nat worth an hen.
The old woman on true nobility, The Wife of Bath's Tale For though myself be a ful vicious man, / A moral tale yet I yow telle kan.
The Pardoner, The Pardoner's Prologue Wostow nat wel the olde clerkes sawe, / That 'who shal yeve a lovere any lawe?' / Love is a gretter lawe, by my pan, / Than may be yeve to any erthely man;
Arcite, The Knight's Tale Pacience is an heigh vertu, certeyn, / For it venquysseth, as thise clerkes seyn, / Thynges that rigour sholde nevere atteyne.
The Franklin's Tale Unto this day it dooth myn herte boote / That I have had my world as in my tyme.
The Wife of Bath's Prologue For of fortunes sharp adversitee / The worste kynde of infortune is this, / A man to han ben in prosperitee, / And it remembren, whan it passed is.
The Monk's Tale