|
|
|
Are you tired of searching for the term paper you so much need? Look no further! A group of experienced writers will produce any term paper you request in a matter of hours. All papers are written from scratch on an individual basis. For only $12.95 a page you will receive an exclusive custom term paper.
Such comments as, “I pray to God his nekke mote
to-breke” quickly reveal that the verbal game of “quite”
involves much more than a free meal to the Reeve in “The
Canterbury Tales” (I 3918). This overreaction, which grabs
the attention of the audience and gives it pause, is
characteristic of the Reeve’s ostensibly odd behavior, being
given to morose speeches followed by violent outbursts, all
the while harboring spiteful desires. Anger typifies the
Reeve’s dialogue and his tale, which begs the question why.
It appears to be a reaction to the Miller’s insults, but they
are not extreme enough to provoke such resentment. He
seem-ingly has no hesitation in articulating his bitterness,
yet he and his story are as much marked by suppression as
expression. Silence resounds as loudly as any noise in the
Reeve’s Prologue and Tale. The reader is as puzzled by his
utterances as the lack of them: his sudden sermon on death
is matched by the quietness of two couples copulating in a
small room of five, none of which are able to hear what the
others are doing. The reality is that the behavior of the
Reeve and the characters in his tale are not random or
unaccountable. The Reeve is continually si-lenced by other
pilgrims and himself, which is paralleled in his tale, and in
turn suppresses his emotions, which leads to even more
explosive conduct.
I. Characterization
In order to appreciate the melancholic and serious
temperament of the Reeve, it is nec-essary to view him in
comparison to other characters, as Chaucer intended. The
identities of the pilgrims are relative. They are characterized
by their description in the General Prologue, but not fully
developed until they are seen in contrast to the pilgrim they
are “quiting.” As the Miller’s personality is developed by his
dissimilarity to the Knight, so is the Reeve by the Miller.
Therefore Robin’s enjoyment of life shows just how little
Oswald receives from the same. For instance, the Miller’s
large frame and excessive drinking show his delight in small
pleasures. The Reeve, however, is “a sclendre colerik man”
who controls his beard and hair (in opposition to the unruly
strands that grow on a wart on the miller’s nose) as
manipula-tively as the accounts of the farm on which he
works (I 587). The Miller mastered the bag-pipes for
entertainment in his spare time while the Reeve trained with
more practical tools: “In youthe he had lerned a good
myster: He was a wel good wrighte, a carpenter” (I 614).
Robin is very physical; he is strong and willing to wrestle
anything and carries a sword and buckler at his side.
Oswald only carries a rusty blade, which indicates that it is
not used very often and is only for show. If compelled to
fight, he would most likely back down, preferring verbal
sparring. The Miller socializes with the group with no
regards to the class system, in-terrupting the expected order
to tell his story before the Monk, while Oswald prefers to
sepa-rate himself and ride last among the group.
These disparities give the impression that Oswald is
focused inward while Robin con-centrates on the outward.
The Reeve is ruled by his practical mind, which directs him
to make as much money as possible, whether it is through
theft or saving or learning useful trades, and to avoid
dangerous situations, even if it entails cowardice. The Miller
is more of a Dionysian figure, who does only what pleases
him, whether it is knocking heads or ignoring his wife’s
infidelities. These differences in character foreshadow the
differences in their tales. They both tell similar dirty stories
but the nature varies greatly. It is the Miller’s good-humor
that trans-forms the chivalric tale of the Knight into an
account of adultery that is both bawdy and hi-larious. As
will be discussed in greater detail in this essay, it is the
Reeve’s introversion that causes him to recite his
mean-spirited tale of adultery as punishment.
II. Outward Manifestations of Suppressed Emotions
The Reeve’s vindictiveness and mood swings are
based in his being repeatedly silenced and his subsequent
suppression of emotions. Oswald speaks three times in
Fragment I, and on the first occasion his wishes are ignored,
on the second he is told to speak of a more amusing subject,
and he is finally allowed to speak on the third, but only
because every pilgrim must tell a tale. The Reeve’s first
words are spoken to the Miller. He orders Robin to “Stynt
thy clappe!” before beginning his story of a carpenter and
his wife which will defame him and bring scandal to wives
in general (I 3144). Instead of forcing the Miller to wait
until he is so-ber so that he will recite a less offensive tale,
the Host lets him compete next, disregarding the Reeve’s
and his own objections. When the Miller finishes, the Reeve
does not introduce his story, but ruminates on his old age
and the lifeblood that has been flowing out of him since he
was born. He tells us that his heart is full of mold, that his
fire has burnt out. All that remains are four embers:
boasting, lying, anger and greed. And though his body is
failing him, sexual cravings and desire in general are still
present: “Oure olde lemes mowe wel been unweelde, But
wyl ne shal nat faillen, that is sooth” (I 3886-3887). He is
expressing his fears and inade-quacies to the group, but they
find it too serious. The Host interrupts him and commands
that he begin his story.
This is a very critical moment in that the Host halts
the speech in which the Reeve tries to purge himself of all
that has been festering inside of him. The Reeve is an old
man close to death and is scared. He feels that he has
nothing noble left in him. Just as he can find no satis-faction
for his desire through his feeble body, he can find no release
for his pent-up emotions because he is always being
silenced. He will soon be silenced forever, and yet is still
not al-lowed to voice this or anything of significance while
is he alive. Chaucer may only portray the Reeve’s treatment
by this one group and only for a short time span, but it is
reasonable to as-sume that this is a pattern in his life. Why
else would a quiet man mention his sexual prob-lems to a
group of relative strangers unless his family and
acquaintances were also unwilling to listen and he was
desperate to speak it? Therefore, because of this life-long
recurrence of being silenced, he suppressed his feelings. The
Reeve is not artistic, preferring the practical over the
aesthetic, so when others refuse to listen, he has no choice
but to keep his emotions to himself, there being no other
outlet such as art or music in which to channel this. As a
re-sult, when he believes he is permitted to speak about
whatever he wishes, he lets loose all that has been locked
inside of him and gives his morose monologue. But the
Host denies him this relief, demanding that he must now
tell a story. As expected, the Reeve does not give a
hu-morous account similar to the Miller. Instead he directs
his anger and his unexpressed emo-tions into his tale. This
is the reason why his story is so vindictive. This explains his
prayer that the Miller, who previously described how a
carpenter was cuckolded (a very real fear for the married
Reeve because of his impotence), would break his neck.
His behavior is not irra-tional and his feelings are not
naturally malicious. Being confined, his negative emotions
multiplied and became amplified as they were freed.
As C. G. Jung explains, repression is the
“half-conscious and half-hearted letting go of things” that
veer from conventional morality (780). Suppression of
antisocial elements, how-ever, is done deliberately.
Repression, but not suppression, is one of the main causes
of neuro-sis. “Suppression amounts to a conscious moral
choice, but repression is a rather immoral ‘penchant’ for
getting rid of disagreeable decisions. Suppression may cause
worry, conflict and suffering, but it never causes a neurosis.
Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suf-fering”
(780). Since the Reeve is aware of his negativity and
conceals it from others and not himself, he may have
unresolved issues but is not guided by a dysfunctional mind.
Therefore, while he does exhibit extreme behavior, he and
his actions are still rational.
III. The Influence of Suppression in the Tale
The Reeve’s Tale has been criticized for its
single-minded intent to insult and its cold, impersonal tone
in comparison to the Miller’s Tale. The Miller does poke fun
at the Reeve and the Knight, but that is not the sole
purpose of his story. His goal appears to be entertain-ment.
Nicholas and Alison’s desires are simple: to have some fun
in bed without getting caught by her husband, John. Yet the
plot is very elaborate and comic in the unnecessary planning
devised to trick the naïve carpenter. The characters are well
developed for such a short piece and, most importantly, are
uninhibited in communicating their wants: When Nicholas
“courts” Alison, he grabs her by the “queynte” and tells her
of his secret love (I 3276). Though she protests at first, she
gives in to his pleading and promises to love him. Ab-salon,
another admirer of Alison’s, serenades her while she is lying
next to her husband. When he later asks for a kiss, she
presents him with her backside, and Nicholas impersonates
her voice with a rude expulsion of air. They are as
comfortable expressing themselves, in whatever manner
they wish, as the Miller. The Reeve’s Tale is starkly
contrasted to this. Os-wald’s characters are as plain as his
story, the height of their scheming consisting of a relo-cated
cradle and an untied horse. The personalities of the two
university students are irrele-vant; all that matters is that
they deceive the miller. And Symkyn’s importance is based
only in his thieving nature and his eventual status as a
victim, the purpose of the story being the Reeve’s revenge.
The mother has a more lengthy character sketch, but only
because it shows that the miller wedded an illegitimate
woman. Both women are objectified and valued only in the
distress they cause the miller through their ravishment.
Adultery is again committed in this tale, but it is done
mechanically rather than from any sexual desire on the part
of the students. The wooing by Nicholas and Absalon may
have been brief, but they at least made an effort to win
Alison. John and Alan have intercourse with the wife and
daughter before any words of acceptance or denial are
spoken by them, and just as soon as they are in the same
bed as a fe-male. As I mentioned earlier, the five characters
spend the night in the same room, but not all are aware of
what is occurring. John does know his friend slept with
Malyne, but only be-cause Alan told him his plan. The next
morning Alan tells the miller, believing he is John, “I have
thries in this shorte nyght Swyved the milleres doghter bolt
upright, Whil thow hast, as a coward, been agast,” revealing
that he was unaware John had been with the wife the entire
night (I 4265-4267). And when Symkyn hears this, he
becomes enraged, this being the first he learns of it also,
since he did not hear the two couples either. This lack of
noise in such an in-timate act may appear peculiar, but it is
related to the Reeve just as Alison and Nicholas’s
enthusiasm is to the Miller.
One clear reason for this silence is connected to the
Reeve’s aversion to the Miller. Since his tale is told to
reprise Robin, little else matters. Just like the
two-dimensional char-acterization, the actions appear to be
performed by rote, done only to make the plot progress to
the desired ending. This explains the simplicity of the tale;
the Reeve is only interested in the quickest method of
revenge. The mother and daughter do not speak or struggle
after learning the intentions of the clerks because it is
inconvenient for them to do so. Their pur-pose in existing is
to be disparaged. Any efforts against this may cause the
miller to wake, dis-rupting the greater scheme. They are as
quiet during the sexual act as the clerks because any type of
sound would expand their characterization at the expense of
the plot. The daughter does speak the next morning, but
only to further the narrative by divulging the location of the
stolen corn so the students can reclaim it. Unexpectedly,
Malyne begins to cry at the thought of Alan’s departure.
This is actually done for the sake of his reputation. The
Reeve wants to make Robin appear foolish, but knows that
turning his “protagonists” into rapists will only cause the
audience to turn against himself. Because Malyne despairs
that the night has ended, the audience assumes that she
enjoyed the experience. The same can be said for the
mother who “so myrie a fit ne hadde she nat ful yore” (I
4230). So even though John and Alan initiate the act with
force, the women received pleasure, which cancels out the
offense in the pil-grims’ minds. Thus, the characters and
their satisfaction are mere tools used to create a de-sired
result.
The lack of expression exhibited by the actors in this
scene is also related to the si-lencing of the Reeve. He is
accustomed to being quieted when his thoughts are not
agreeable to his audience. Because of this, he censors
himself even as he is releasing all that is trapped inside of
him. In his prologue, the Reeve does not keep speaking of
the rapid progression of his demise, but changes subjects as
soon as the Host orders him to do so, directing his emo-tion
into the more acceptable form of his tale. Occasionally, the
build up of feeling forces him to release it, but he always
expresses them within the bounds of decency, even if he
does stretch those bounds. It is necessary for the plot that
the two couples have sex in the same room. He does not
shy away from the subject and informs the audience of what
is occurring as clearly as the Miller, if not more so. But
Nicholas and Alison have intercourse downstairs in privacy,
away from John. In the Reeve’s tale, a mother is committing
adultery in the same room in which her daughter is having
premarital sex. This can easily be construed as sexual
perversion, to put it lightly. Yet the Reeve believes they can
be somewhat redeemed if they are not aware they are
participating in what amounts to an orgy. If the couples
make no noise and do not hear one another, then, in a
sense, they are in private. To have the clerks and women
voice their pleasure and the mother and daughter realize the
other’s actions would have been unallowable. Because of
this, the Reeve stifles them so as to not offend his audi-ence
and thus be allowed to finish his tale.
But the Reeve’s manipulation and censorship of the
characters does not mean he com-pletely separates himself
from them. He channels his sexual frustration into the story
along with his anger. Since he cannot use his body to find
satisfaction, he must use his imagination. The Miller, who
gratifies his appetite in the real world, builds up the tension
between Nicho-las and Alison through the long wait before
consummation, but barely mentions the act itself:
And thus lith Alison and Nicholas,
In bisynesse of myrthe and of solas,
Til that the belle of laudes gan to rynge,
And freres in the chauncel gone synge.
The reverse occurs in the Reeve’s story, with John and Alan
engaging in sex with Malyne and the miller’s wife almost as
soon as the thought comes to their minds. His description is
short as well, but much more detailed: “He priketh harde
and depe as he were mad” (I 4231). In this line, which is
referring to the cause of the wife’s pleasure, John appears to
embody Oswald’s frustration. The Reeve is as “mad” to
find satisfaction, both sexually and emotionally, as John is.
The Reeve lives through the students, finding an alternate
outlet this way. He creates two characters who have no
qualms about taking another man’s wife and daughter in the
same room to perform a rather twisted fantasy. The silence
and objectification of the females also supports this. In the
Reeve’s Tale, there is no seduction; the wife and daughter’s
willingness is ignored. The Reeve does not view them as
participants, but as the objects of desire. It would not do to
have sexual objects demand courtship or become too
humanlike, in which case they would have the power of
rejection and dissatisfaction. Because he is living through
the bodies of the clerks, the females must not be anything
but pleased by the students, so the Reeve can hold the
notion of himself as virile and sexually desirable to women.
Thus, the bedroom scene becomes a substitute reality for
the Reeve, in which he subtly releases his lasciviousness
into a more socially acceptable form, the fabliaux.
The Reeve and his tale manage to be, simultaneously,
both complex and simple. Os-wald and his characters seem
to fit snugly into a stereotype when they are first described,
but then their actions seem to be guided by an
unpredictable force. The pilgrims are confused by the Reeve
even as he is explaining his motivation to them. So they cut
him off from the group even as he is attempting to connect
with them. They will only listen to his tale out of
obliga-tion, and hear nothing more. So, while his story
seems uncomplicated, it is anything but, due to the fact that
all of his unspoken thoughts have been conveyed within it.
It may be vindictive and base, but the Reeve’s Tale contains
something far more interesting than a moral: the inner
workings of his mind.
Bibliography
Jung, C.G. Psychology and Religion: West and East.
New York: Hull, Pantheon Books, 1958.
Word Count: 3025
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
