ABSTRACT
The Tabard Inn in South London is the chance gathering place for a group of travellers making their way to Canterbury. Story collections were popular in the Middle Ages, but The Canterbury Tales is unusually wide-ranging in content, with an unusually diverse group of narrators. The Wife of Bath ambles into the Canterbury Tales straddling a large, comfortable horse, her red stockings on show and a pair of sharp spurs on her feet. Readers of the Knight’s Tale frequently find it difficult to distinguish between the two main protagonists, Palamon and Arcite. The Knight’s Tale begins with Theseus encountering on the road the dispossessed widows of Thebes and responding to their grief by attacking the new leader of the city and his people. The first tale having been told by the Knight, the Host looks around for another high-ranking pilgrim and decides upon the Monk.
