Geoffrey Chaucer ( /ˈtʃɔːsər/; c. 1343 – 25 October 1400), known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey. While he achieved fame during his lifetime as an author, philosopher, alchemist and astronomer, composing a scientific treatise on the astrolabe for his ten year-old son Lewis, Chaucer also maintained an active career in the civil service as a bureaucrat, courtier and diplomat. Among his many works, which include The Book of the Duchess, the House of Fame, the Legend of Good Women and Troilus and Criseyde, he is best known today for The Canterbury Tales. Chaucer is a crucial figure in developing the legitimacy of the vernacular, Middle English, at a time when the dominant literary languages in England were French and Latin.
Read more about Geoffrey Chaucer: Life, Works, Popular Culture
Famous quotes by geoffrey chaucer:
“A yeman hadde he and servantz namo
At that tyme, for hym liste ride so,
And he was clad in cote and hood of grene.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“We all desiren, if it mighte be,
To han husbandes hardy, wise, and free,
And secret, and no niggard, ne no fool,
Ne him that is aghast of every tool,
Ne none avaunter, by that God above!”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“Men may divine and glosen up and down,
But wel I woot, expres, withouten lie,
God bad us for to wexe and multiplye:
That gentil text can I wel understonde.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“‘Woman is mannes joy and all his bliss.’
For when I feel a-night your softe side,
Albeit that I may not on you ride,
For that our perch is made so narrowe, alas!
I am so full of joy and of solace
That I defye bothe sweven and dream.’”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“A clerk ther was of Oxenford also
That unto logyk hadde longe ygo.
As leene was his hors as is a rake,
And he nas nat right fat, I undertake,
But looked holwe, and therto sobrely.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)