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.
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Famous quotes by geoffrey chaucer:
“I wolde no lenger in the bed abide
If that I felte his arm over my side,
Til he hadde maad his raunson unto me;
Thanne wolde I suffre him do his nicetee.
And therfore every man this tale I telle:
Winne whoso may, for al is for to selle;
With empty hand men may no hawkes lure.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“I wol nat lye;
A man shal winne us best with flaterye;
And with attendance, and with bisinesse,
Been we ylymed, bothe more and lesse.”
—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)
“A gentil maunciple was ther of a temple,
Of which achatours myghte take exemple
For to be wise in byynge of vitaille.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“A monk ther was, a fair for the maistrie,
An outridere, that lovede venerie,
A manly man, to been an abbot able.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)