 Friends, welcome to my channel and in this video I am going to talk about the magnum opus of Joffrey Chaucer which is Canterbury Tales. Now Canterbury Tales is a collection of 24 stories Chaucer initially intended to write 120 stories but then he died before he could complete these 120 stories. These stories are told as a part of a storytelling contest which takes place by a group of pilgrims who are moving from London to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Sir Thomas Beckett. There are in all 30 pilgrims 29 pilgrims coming from different sections of society and one narrator. So these 30 people journey from London to Canterbury and while they are going towards Canterbury and when they will be coming back from Canterbury they will be telling two tales. So each pilgrim will be telling four tales in all two while they are going towards Canterbury and two while they are coming back from Canterbury. So in all these 30 pilgrims would be telling 120 stories but Chaucer was not able to complete writing these 120 stories he wrote only 24 stories and he died. So in Canterbury Tales what is important is that we look at the characters who are coming from different sections of society and also the tales told by these characters. From net point of view today in this video I am going to share my views on four most important Canterbury Tales. So let's start. So the first tale is Night's Tale. Night's Tale is the first tale which is a part of Canterbury Tales. Also it is a high romance told in Heroic Couplet. This was a question in December 2005 that Night's Tale is a high romance told in and the answer was Heroic Couplet. So remember these two things about Night's Tale. Number one it's the first tale and number two it's a high romance told in Heroic Couplet. Now let's look at the tale told by Night which is called Night's Tale. Night's Tale plot is that there are these two friends, Arkite and Palamon. They are both best friends and they are also knights. They go to Athens which is a city in Greece and when they go there they are Duke of Athens, Thesias. He captures them and he imprisons these two friends. Okay now they are both friends, Arkite and Palamon. They are looking outside the prison and they see this beautiful girl, Emily. And both of them immediately fall in love with Emily. So both of these knights who are best friends fall in love with the same girl and this creates tension. So now these two friends decide that whatever we win in the battle will marry Emily. Fine so these two people trick the guards and they come out of prison and they are involved in a battle. Arkite wins in the battle but due to divine intervention there is a sort of earthquake which happens and Arkite dies at that moment. He falls from his horse and he dies. So who gets the hand of the beautiful girl Emily? It's Palamon and this ends the Night's Tale. So Night's Tale is basically story of two knights Arkite and Palamon falling in love with the girl Emily. They battle together and who wins Arkite? But then who gets the hand of Emily? It's Palamon. So this is the Night's Tale. The second most important tale is Wife of Bath's Tale. Now Wife of Bath talks about a very beautiful story of a knight who's a part of King Arthur's court. But before telling that story she talks about several other questions in her prologue. So in the prologue to Wife of Bath she talks about three important questions. Number one she talks about her relationship with her five husbands and how those husbands tweeted her. Number two she talks about her views on marrying several times. So she contemplates on this question that is it fine to marry several times? When she gives instances from King Solomon's life, from Bible? The third question that he talks about is about her views on virginity. So she contemplates on this question that is virginity important for being a true female? So these questions are very important from net point of view because they have been asked several times in net. If you want to study Chaucer in detail in all the other works by Chaucer as well as Canterbury Tales you can join my online course. The details of my online course is available on my website www.advithakarva.com. Also you can check the description box below to find all the details. So Wife of Bath talks about the story of a knight who is a part of King Arthur's court. That knight rapes a young maiden and he's been punished for this crime. But Queen of King Arthur intervenes and saves the knight by telling him that if you go and get me an answer for the question that what woman wants most I will save you from the punishment. So the knight finally goes on this quest and he goes and asks so many people about this question that what woman wants most but he's not able to get a satisfactory answer. Finally he comes across an old lady who tells him that I will tell you the correct answer but only at one condition that you will do whatever I say. The knight agrees and the old lady tells the knight that if a girl is able to control her husband and if she is able to do that she finds herself happy. So what woman wants most? So a woman wants that she is able to control her husband. This is what a woman wants most in her life. So finally the knight goes to the King Arthur's court and tells this answer to the queen. The queen is happy and satisfied with the answer and she finally tells that you will not be punished anymore. The knight goes back to the old lady and tells her that yes you were correct and now as I have promised you I will do whatever you say. The old lady tells the knight that you should marry me this is what I want and the knight is horrified because a knight would never like to marry a lady who is so old and so upbeat but he doesn't have an option. So the knight says that okay it's your choice whatever you say. So the old lady gives the knight a choice that I can either be faithful and faithful and upbeat or I can be unfaithful and beautiful. You tell me what you want me to be. So the knight says that it's a difficult choice and I ask you to choose. I will not choose whatever you find satisfactory you can do that and at this point the old lady turns into a beautiful girl and says that I was testing you and you were able to fulfill the challenge by giving me the right to choose because the question that the queen posed on knight was that what woman wants most and the answer was woman wants that she is able to control her husband and she is able to choose for her husband and this is what the knight did in the case of old lady and the old lady was happy about it. So this is how the story ends and finally knight marries a beautiful young lady who is beautiful as well as faithful. The third important tale is Priorous Tale. Priorous is the head of group of nuns okay and Chaucer before starting Priorous Tale tells that Priorous is wearing a brooch which has these words inscribed on it and the words are love conquers all. The prologue to Priorous Tale contains a prayer to Virgin Mary and the tale is about Jews hatred towards Christian. So now let's look at Priorous Tale. Priorous Tale starts with a description of a boy a small Christian boy who lives in Jewish quarters okay so Jews as you know are anti-Christians and they hate Christians. So the Christian boy is living in Jews quarters and in that Jewish quarters we find that there are so many Jews who see this boy this small little boy going to school every day and while he is going to school he keeps singing Alma Redenturus. Now Alma Redenturus is a sort of Christian prayer and he keeps singing up and this angers Jews and Jews finally decide that we will kill this boy so they cut the throat of the boy they murder the boy and they throw his body in a sewage ditch boy's mother comes and search for the boy and finally finds the dead son lying in the sewage ditch and she starts crying and praying to Virgin Mary and she also starts singing Alma Redenturus and when she sings Alma Redenturus the dead boy two joins and he too starts singing Alma Redenturus and the mother is amazed to see this miracle and then she realized that it is due to the blessing of Virgin Mary because Virgin Mary has put a miraculous seed on the tongue of the boy which allows the dead boy to sing and finally she removed the seed from the tongue of the little boy and the body of the boy raises to heaven so with this ends the priorous tale and it beautifully shows the power of prayer. The fourth important canterbury tale is Nam's priest tale it is a beast fable with a clear model and I'm sure that even though you've not heard of canterbury tales but you must have heard of this tale in your childhood I read this tale once when I was going through a panchitantra book okay so it's a that kind of story now let's look at the tale it is about this rooster called Chonti-Clear Chonti-Clear is a rooster who is dreaming that he's been eaten by a fox and he's very scared in his dream next day when he gets up he goes to a field where he finds the fox and that fox wants to eat Chonti-Clear so finally what that fox does is that that fox started praising Chonti-Clear singing and says that he sings so well and I would like to hear a song from your mouth and Chonti-Clear you know gets into his trap and he closes his eyes and he starts singing okay and that is the moment when Fox grabs Chonti-Clear and runs now Chonti-Clear is also clever so Chonti-Clear does the same thing what Fox does and he starts saying that you know I am so amazed that you grabbed me and you tricked me in such a way I would like to listen from you that how did you grab me and how did you come up with this plan so the Chonti-Clear is there in Fox's mouth and Fox is holding him and he opens his mouth in order to tell the story how he planned this trick and how he grabbed Chonti-Clear and that is the moment when Chonti-Clear runs away so the moral of this story is never trust a flatterer and this was also a question in UGC net exam wherein they asked that what is the moral of none's pre-state and the moral is never trust a flatterer beware of flattery so with this we end some important discussion on cantibally tales if you would like to study all other important works in detail you can join my online course the description of my online course is given in the description box below also at the same time do subscribe to my youtube channel because we post videos for UGC net English aspirants every saturday and sunday you can go to my facebook page and participate in the go net quiz also you can contact me on whatsapp my whatsapp number and other contact information is given in the description box below so till the time we meet next happy learning keep loving literature