BOOK: New Canterbury Tales Retelling & Bio

[Ryan Goble]

I read this great review in the New Yorker about a new - hyper modern and f-bomb loaded Peter Ackroyd translation of Canterbury Tales. Unfortunately, I didn't get to the New Yorker before they made it subscriber only content.

You can read an abstract of the review here:
Books: “All England” by Joan Acocella - The New Yorker, December 21, 2009, p. 140

The reviewer seemed to really dig Ackroyd's Biography of Chaucer but disliked his new translation of the tales.

Some passages I liked from the review:

"Chaucer was the first poet to give his characters both emblematic value (they stand for kinds of people) and, at the same time, concrete individuality (they are people.)."

"What he wanted was not to introduce new forms but to give new force and nuance to the accustomed forms."

"With scatology Chaucer is equally blunt. How he loves fart jokes....Some scholars claim, however that people in Chaucer's time were less self-conscious than we are about passing wind in front of others ... Whatever its source, Chaucer's lewdness is balanced by a tenderness that is almost always there in the poem, asserting itself gently. "

The review also explains how Chaucer was known even more during his time as a statesman who served under three kings! Interesting mini bio of the artist and his translators. The books:

The 2004 Ackroyd Biography: Chaucer: Ackroyd's Brief Lives (Ackroyd Brief Lives)

The 2009 Canterbury Tales Translation: The Canterbury Tales: A Retelling (Hardcover)

[Elizabeth Simpson]

If you look in the iTunes store, you can find 'The Rap Canterbury Tales" by Baba Brinkman. I am not teaching CT this year, so I haven't been able to get student feedback. It does stay true to the story and has a very nice beat to it. I've been listening to it while at the gym and enjoying it quite a bit.

[Ryan Goble]

Nice - I hadn't thought of linking that! You know you can even hyperlink out to iTunes - they let you copy links and share them - cool, eh?

In addition to the album on iTunes (check that groovy hyperlink) he also has an illustrated version The Rap Canterbury Tales that have some pretty kooky cartoons that students seem to enjoy!

Look forward to reading more of your posts in the future - you're a rock star!!

[Amy Major]

OK! I just ordered both via Amazon....thanks so much!!!

[Ryan Goble]

Cool - you'll have to come back and let us know if you dig them!

[Jaimee Mirsky]

I took your recommendation and played Baba's Raps for my AP students when we finished our "unit" on the Canterbury Tales. They loved it. One student actually went on Youtube and found a video of Baba performing - really fun.
Thanks for the tip!

[Ryan Goble]

JM - great awesome excellent and super cool! Thanks for taking the time to share the good news!

RRG:)

[Tamara J. Fetzer]

Does anyone have any suggestions on a film adaptation of Canterbury Tales? I am more of a visual learner myself and it could be a good activity for the end of the unit to show some of the more difficult tales. I will also look into the rap version, that sounds amazing!
Thank you,
Tamara Fetzer

[Ryan Goble]

Hey Tamara,

Thank you for writing! Remember, as we are talking about in class that you want to cover students who are visual (like yourself) as well as those who learn best with other modalities.

I don't know of a ton of CT film adaptations however you can try the Heath Ledger "A Knight's Tale" although it is a heavy remix of that story & I'd recommend using clips of Terry Jone's (Monty Phyton's) doc Medieval Lives

The BBC recently did a modern adaptation, it does not seem to be available in the states yet....

I haven't seen many allusions to the tales in modern films BUT check out the wiki on the tales in the section under "stage and film adaptations." Also be sure to check out that New Yorker article mentioned above - it really gives a lot of additional insight into the play.

[Ryan Goble]

Oh, and on my ride home I remembered this is my favorite cartoon retelling of the Tales - esp. helpful for students because each tale is told in about 4 pages - GREAT pre-reading materials:

Chaucer's Canterbury Tales by Marcia Williams

[Tamara J. Fetzer]

Great, I love "A Knight's Tale". They would get a sense of what medieval life was actually like, with the exception of Queen blaring in the stadiums that is.
Thank you!

[Sandra Klan]

http://houseoffame.blogspot.com/search?q=Blazing+Fellowe

 

This is a great blog! Although students at my school are not required to delve too deeply into Middle English, the "Blazing Fellowe" topic had them struggling through for the laughs. Even if the students don't understand some of the content/language here, the humour will appeal to Chaucer/pop culture enthusiasts.

Here's a bit more:

http://houseoffame.blogspot.com/2006/04/idea-for-poeme.html

[Ryan Goble]

Sandra, this is great! If you have a hot minute would you copy and paste this into its own discussion forum - only people on our discussion above will likely see you posted whereas if you drop it as its own discussion "C-Tales Blog" HERE then everyone in the BritLit Group will get an e-mail about it.  Thanks for getting in the mix!  I hope you're having a great weekend! Ry:)