the pardoner's tale is a moral tale.
what type of tale is the pardoner's tale?
a moral tale
the pardoner's tale





















































"the pardoner's tale" is one of "the canterbury tales" by geoffrey chaucer. in the order of the tales, it comes after the physician's tale and before the shipman's tale; it is prompted by the host's desire to hear something positive after that depressing tale. the pardoner initiates his prologue—briefly accounting his methods of swindling people—and then proceeds to tell a moral tale.
the pardoner's tale
frederick b. jonassen in his article “cathedral, inn and pardoner in the prologue to the tale of beryn” presents a critique of the canterbury interlude which focuses on its relation both to "the canterbury tales" as a whole and to the pardoner's tale specifically. jonassen begins by positing that the pardoner's encounter with kitt is a fabliau which closely models the miller's tale. jonassen then draws parallels relating the relationships between the pardoner and kitt, and between the characters of other chaucer tales. jonassen argument finds the greatest strength of the beryn author stemming from his chaucerian-like juxtaposition of 'solaas' and 'sentence' throughout the tales, as well as his emphasis on the dichotomy between the high and the low. jonassen argues that the main difference in the beryn author's "interlude" and chaucer's tales rests in its harmless presentation of the pardoner. the beryn author makes the tale a light fabliau rather than a tale detailing sin to “emphasize the foolishness of the pardoner to the exclusion of the sinister moral threat of misleading the pilgrims he poses.”
prologue and tale of beryn