Chaucers Canterbury Tales - Comparing The Pardoners Tale and The Nuns

Irony in The Pardoners Tale and The Nuns Priests Tale Irony is the universal name given to literary techniques that involve surprising, interesting,or amusing contradictions. 1 cardinal stories that serve as excellent demonstrations of irony are The Pardoners Tale and The Nuns Priests Tale, some(prenominal) from Chaucers The Canterbury Tales. Although these two stories are truly different, they both use irony to apprize a lesson. Of the stories, The Pardoners Tale displays the most irony. First and foremost, the entire telling of the boloney is ironic, considering just who is the teller. The Pardoner uses this story to speak out against many complaisant problems, all of which he himself is guilty of. He preaches about drunkenness, while he is drunk, blasphemy, as he attempts to sell fake religious relics, and greed, when he himself is surprisingly greedy. Yet there are also many ironic situations in the story itself. The irony starts when, in the begining of the st ory, the three rioters make a contract to be brothers and each defend the others and to live and die for one another(prenominal) in protection from Death, (lines 37-43) and then in going out to save their vow, they end up finding money, and killing each other over it. Even more ironic, is how they end up killing each other. later finding the money, the men plan to stay with it until it becomes dark and they can safely take it away. To tide themselves over until then, they send the youngest one out to absorb food and wine, and while he is away they plan to kill for his voice of the money. Ironically, the youngest one is planning the same thing so he slips toxicant into the drinks... ...tion. By teaching this in two very different stories Chaucer makes it very clear that irony is an extremely effective method of teaching a lesson. Works Cited and Consulted Arrathoon, Leigh A. The Pardoners Tale, Chaucer and the Craft of Fiction. Ed. Leigh A. Arrathoon, Rochester, Michigan Solaris Press, Inc. 1986. 241-318 Beidler, Peter G. The Nuns Priests Tale Chaucer Review Vol 34, materialization 4. April 01, 2000. 388-397 Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Canterbury Tales Riverside Chaucer Third Edition. Ed. Larry D. Benson. Boston Houghton Mifflin Company,1987. 3-328 Secondary Taavitsainen, Irma. Personality and styles of Affect in the Canterbury Tales Chaucer in Perspective. Ed. Geoffrey Lester.Midsomer North, Bath Sheffield Academic Press Ltd. 1999. 218-232 White, Annie Irony in Chaucers Tales, 20 Jan. 2001.