The reduced Canterbury Tales: Monk's Tale to Parson's Tale

(The challenge was to write a complete story in exactly 100 words. So here is Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tale with each tale reduced to 100 words. This post contains Tales nineteen to twenty-four.)

Follow these links for the other Tales in "100 word" versions:

Prologue and Knight's Tale to Wife of Bath's Tale
Friar's Tale to Franklin's Tale
Physician's Tale to Tale of Melibee

Click the titles for fuller accounts of each Tale

Monk's Tale

This is not one tale but seventeen short ones, all telling how various people from history and mythology have come a cropper. Some of them are well-known characters, such as Nero and Alexander the Great, some are from the Bible or Apocrypha, such as Samson, Belshazzar and Antiochus, and some are characters that were better known in the 14^th century than they are now, such as Bernabo Visconti and Ugolino of Pisa. Eventually the Knight has had enough and tells the Monk to stop because he would prefer to hear stories of rises to greatness rather than falls from it.

Nun's Priest's Tale

Chauntecleer the cockerel has a long debate with Pertelote, one of his hens, about the power of dreams and how they can be portents of disaster, with each of them quoting extensively from literature, history and mythology. Some weeks later Chauntecleer is caught by a fox and the farm people give chase. Chauntecleer tells the fox that he should face his pursuers and tell them to back off. When the fox opens his mouth to do so, Chauntecleer escapes and flies up into a tree. The fox tries to inveigle him back down but Chauntecleer refuses to be caught twice.

Second Nun's Tale

In Roman times, Cecilia marries Valerian but tells him that her virginity is guarded by an angel. She advises him to consult Pope Urban, who baptizes him so that he can now see the angel. Valerian persuades his brother Tibertius to become a Christian. Almachius the Roman prefect arrests the brothers and condemns them to death, but Maximus the executioner says that he saw their souls ascend to Heaven and is himself converted but then executed. Cecilia survives being boiled alive and lives for three days after an attempt to behead her. She uses this time to make more converts.

Canon's Yeoman's Tale

There are two tales. In the first the yeoman reveals the secrets of his employer who has a sideline as an alchemist who cheats people out of their money when he persuades them that he can find the “philosopher’s stone” to cure all illnesses. In second tale a different canon/alchemist tells a priest that he can change quicksilver into real silver. This is done with trickery and sleight of hand that nevertheless convinces the priest that a real change has taken place. The priest pays a huge sum of money for the “recipe”, after which the canon makes himself scarce.

Manciple's Tale

Phoebus the sun god once lived on Earth where he kept a white crow with a beautiful song and the ability to speak. He also had a young wife whom he loved and treated well but guarded closely. Once, when he was out, his wife entertained a lover. The crow saw everything and told Phoebus, who killed his wife by shooting her with an arrow. Phoebus immediately regretted this and blamed the crow for telling him lies. The crow’s punishment was to have his white feathers turned to black and to lose the power of speech and his singing voice.

Parson's Tale

This is a long sermon based on a text from Jeremiah, supposedly preached by a reformist Lollard priest. It is a disquisition on the Seven Deadly Sins, for each of which there is a long list of actions that can be counted as committing the sin together with recommended remedies, such that, for example, gentleness and patience are the cure for anger. The terms of confession and penitence for each sin are laid out, but there is also a warning against making false confessions of sins that have not been committed. Given the length of the list, this sounds improbable!

© John Welford