Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury

by Paul Strohm

A lively microbiography of Chaucer that tells the story of the tumultuous year that led to the creation of The Canterbury Tales

In 1386, Geoffrey Chaucer endured his worst year, but began his best poem. The father of English literature did not enjoy in his lifetime the literary celebrity that he has today—far from it. The middle-aged Chaucer was living in London, working as a mid-level bureaucrat and sometime poet, until a personal and professional crisis set him down the road leading to The Canterbury Tales.

In the politically and economically fraught London of the late fourteenth century, Chaucer was swept up against his will in a series of disastrous events that would ultimately leave him jobless, homeless, separated from his wife, exiled from his city, and isolated in the countryside of Kent—with no more audience to hear the poetry he labored over.

At the loneliest time of his life, Chaucer made the revolutionary decision to keep writing, and to write for a national audience, for posterity, and for fame.

Brought expertly to life by Paul Strohm, this is the eye-opening story of the birth one of the most celebrated literary creations of the English language.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Biography, Medieval, Literature, Historical, British Literature

304 pages, Hardcover

First published November 13, 2014

Reviews

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ok, writers, so you think too many things are getting in the way of your writing? Take it from Chaucer: nothing is so bad that you can't write. Because his wife was a special "friend" to the king, Chaucer was given a free apartment. It was over a gate, tiny, had arrow slots for windows and sometimes the military stashed weapons or even soldiers in his house. An open sewer ran beside it and criminals' heads were mounted on pikes beside his room. Plus, he had to go to work everyday making sure wool merchants were honest. Sounds like fun. His wife didn't live with him because she had more pleasure living in the king's palace. Yet, he managed to write poetry. Then he got kicked out of his apartment. Hey, it wasn't great with no windows, wayward soldiers walking in, and heads staked outside the door, but it was free. So, what do you do when life gets even worse? In his case, he wrote The Canterbury Tales.

And you thought changing the cat's litter box was a good excuse not to write.

Thanks to goodreads, I won this in a firstreads contest.

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 3 out of 5]

One year changed the life of Chaucer. The year when he lost basically everything is when he turned to what he had left, his writing. This year would lead to his writing Canterbury tales.

Loved the first part of the book, it wasn't just centered on Chaucer but also on John the Gault, his scandalous life and mistress of many years, and the political and personal maneuverings of the time. The second part of the book dragged a bit, but all in all it was a good book for those who are interested in The Canterbury Tales and its creator.

ARC from NetGalley.

[Lauren Stoolfire · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's interesting that while Chaucer's Tale: 1386 and the Road to Canterbury by Paul Strohm revolves around Chaucer that he's not always the center of the story. Honestly, that formatting choice was the most surprising aspect of this book. That said, it works for the most part but I just wish there was more detail about his life.

[Sarah - All The Book Blog Names Are Taken · Rating 4 out of 5]

My Book Blog ----> http://allthebookblognamesaretaken.bl...

One year. That's it. In that year all the pieces fell into, or out of, place. But either way you look at - and most will decidedly say out of place - without the events of 1386, would we have one of the greatest English works ever written? Would we revere Chaucer the way he deserves, as THE FIRST English author/poet? Maybe, maybe not. No doubt these humbling and likely humiliating events in 1386 wore on Chaucer, and it's almost tragic that he's never see the fruits of his labor, or even make a single penny off of it.

This is an interesting text, looking at Chaucer and the world he inhabited in 1386. It is by no means exhaustive - though how much can/will we ever know, 600+ years on? The author sets the scenes nicely, almost too nicely with plenty if addition information about the people moving around Chaucer at the time. You could argue it was too much 'other' information, not directly tied to Chaucer himself, but much of it set up important events to come. And with this volume itself being roughly only 255 pages, it's not as though it was a burden.

While you may not learn anything new from this one if you're already well-versed in the life of Chaucer, it's still an interesting read - in fact I read it in just an afternoon. Recommended for those interested in both the time period and the man himself.

[Kathleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Paul Strohm is a fine historian and Medieval scholar with a wealth of information on Geoffrey Chaucer. I very much wanted to read this book via NetGalley and only received it yesterday with an archive date of today, so I rushed through the reading.

I very much enjoyed the first half of the book but the rest sort of lagged a bit. Was that the result of Chaucer's life and how it played out perhaps, or was it the writing? I must explore and add to what I do already know and what might be fanciful.

It was excellent in its depiction of what Medieval London was like, and even what Chaucer's grace and favor small lodging would have looked like. Less satisfactory was the flow of the material into more of a narrative. I could have just been rushed by the one day I had to read it, an oversight I hope.

Terrific endnote and references and grasp of the times. Recommended to Medievalists and Chaucer buffs.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

GOODREADS FIRST READS REVIEW

The importance of Geoffrey Chaucer on English literature cannot be measured, but if not for one bad year both Chaucer and the history of English literature could have been remembered completely differently. Paul Strohm writes in his new book, “Chaucer’s Tale”, that if not for the rapidly changing political environment in 1386 Chaucer’s life might have not provided him the opportunity to write “The Canterbury Tales”.

Strohm begins his microbiography of Chaucer by placing the author within English society as first the son of a wine importer then a courtier and finally a bureaucrat. Chaucer’s connects to the growing Lancastrian family through family connections while politically aligned to Richard II are discussed in connection to the position he received in London. Chaucer’s professional career in London, along with his sideline interest in composing words into poems and tales, is discussed before he is transitioned into a Member of Parliament for the fateful 1386 Parliament.

After setting the stage, Strohm shows how Chaucer became adrift in the political storm that was just beginning in 1386 which resulted in him losing his job and home leading to a change of focus. At this point Strohm gives a glimpse into the emerging culture of English letters in the late fourteenth century and how Chaucer approached the concept of fame before and after 1386. Strohm then relates how Chaucer did something completely different in relation to audience and creating the spark of English literature that would continue through Shakespeare through Joyce to today.

The research that Strohm put into this book is excellent, even with the lack of sources because of the seven centuries gap. The detailed descriptions of life in medieval London were fascinating as well as the political drama going into the background that impacted Chaucer for good and ill. However this detail in setting background for 1386 dominates the first half of the book leaving the reader waiting for Strohm to show how 1386 resulted in Chaucer’s masterpiece. The biggest fault of the book is that Strohm continually adds detail after detail along with supporting evidence to facts he has already proven for background while not advancing towards the central thrust of the book.

“Chaucer’s Tale” shows how a minor individual in the political landscape of medieval England became a literary giant that is better remember than the kings, lords, and gentlemen of his time. Paul Strohm shows Chaucer’s radically new idea that spawned “The Canterbury Tales” and jumped started English literature, however he takes his time to get to the point while over describing the background of life and events leading to the fateful Parliament of 1386 and the consequences of it.

[Argum · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won a copy of this through Goodreads First Reads program.

The second subtitle to the book refers to it as a microbiography and I think this is apt. If you want the whole story of Chaucer this isn't your book lots of time is lobbed off, but if you want a good sense of the man and a small slice of his life that helped shaped him and his most famous work then this is your book. I was concurrently reading the speculative history Who Murdered Chaucer when this book arrived so I had another perspective fresh in my head. The books paint very different pictures of the time period. While acknowledging that one is speculative and thus gives itself more latitude, this book blocks off any of the evidence for English under Richard II and Chaucer's more intimate ties to the court. Definitive statements when some evidence exists otherwise is not my favorite academic pursuit so that is my big problem with this book. It reads very well and had a style that leaned storytelling rather than didactic facttelling which I enjoy. Extensive footnotes back up the claims.

[Carol Storm · Rating 5 out of 5]

There comes a time in the life of every great artist when he or she just has to throw away everything they've done, everything they've learned, and start over. Warren G said it best: "Should I a.) Go back to slinging dope or should I b.) Maintain and try to cope or should I c.) Just get crazy and wild -- but no I chose d.) Create the G child!"

This book is all about how Geoffrey Chaucer made the same decision in the year 1386. A court poet, accustomed to reading aloud his romantic poetry for a small circle of knights and damsels, he chose to write a new kind of English poetry for a new kind of English audience. Bawdy, irreverent, profane, his Canterbury Tales laid the cornerstone for everything English literature was to be for the next five hundred years -- from Shakespeare all the way to Fielding's Tom Jones and beyond.

And it all starts here. With the birth of the G child!

[Sajith Kumar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Geoffrey Chaucer (1343 – 1400) is well known as the Father of English Literature, whose work was crucial in legitimizing literary use of English at a time when the dominant languages in England were French and Latin. He is the greatest poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to be interred in Westminster Abbey. This book presents Chaucer’s life as a bureaucrat, philosopher, astronomer, courtier and diplomat of middling fame. He was part of many official or diplomatic ventures, but never led any of them. It discusses his literary life as an avocation at night, while keeping his regular job as the controller of wool custom during the day. He was not much known outside the close circle of his friends until the year 1386, when Chaucer’s life was changed beyond recognition. His fame rests predominantly on the Canterbury Tales. The present book traces the literary path of the poet, from London bureaucracy to the creation of the classic, with leading events that transformed his career. The author, Paul Strohm, is a professor of English and has authored many books on the subject. He divides his time between New York and Oxford.

Chaucer’s reputation came about in later centuries as a result of re-appreciation of his literary contribution by a society that was increasingly addicted to literature. Being the son of a vintner, Chaucer had a humble beginning. Instead of pursuing a career with guilds of that trade, he chose royal service by becoming an esquire of the king. He was assisted in great measure by Katherine Swynford, his sister-in-law who was a mistress of John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster and the crown prince. His wife, Philippa, was also on the Duke’s service, which extended his patronage to the poet as well, through Nicholas Brembre – mayor of London and a corrupt official. Chaucer’s sons also came under Lancastrian patronage. Having secured a position as the controller of wool custom, which was the most lucrative export from England, he was granted a room in the Aldgate gatehouse that was one of the seven city gates. The whole traffic in and out of the city literally passed under Chaucer’s feet. He wrestled with accounts of bales transported in daytime and indulged in solitary poetic endeavour by night. The room was dark even at noon, as the only source of natural light was through slits on the wall constructed primarily for archers to shoot arrows against enemies attacking the gate. Naturally, his wife never lodged with him. For twelve years, he continued this existence until 1386 when his powerful allies made him a member of parliament from Kent. Unfortunately for Chaucer, it was a time of troubles for the royal faction. Made furious by the witless king Richard II and his intransigent cronies, the parliament rose in revolt. The next few years were really hellish for the royal camp. Chaucer was ejected from his accommodation and had to leave the city to take up residence in Kent, his constituency. The most fruitful period in Chaucer’s career thus began.

This book is also about England in the late-fourteenth century as it is about Geoffrey Chaucer. It presents an original picture of London’s social life then. The city gates were closed at dusk and opened only at first light the next day. During night time, special permission was required to even walk on the streets. When the Compline bell tolled in the church, people retreated to their residences. There was virtually no privacy anywhere in the city for poor people, which may be true even now. Having no clocks or other time-keeping devices, people’s lives were regulated by the tolling of church bells marking various services being performed there. The parliament in which Chaucer was a member took a bold initiative to install a clock to mark time independently and the reckoning of years changed from regnal years to calendar. This change from liturgical and regnal time to clock and calendar time may be thought of as a distant herald of the enlightenment that was still much ahead. Strohm also describes the working of parliament in interesting detail. The power struggles between the king and parliament lays bare the battlefield where democracy won its laurels in the end.

Strohm portrays the development of English as a literary language along with Chaucer’s career. Writing in English was taking hold when Chaucer began in the 1360s. By 1386, he was fame-worthy, but not famous yet – with the completion of Troilus and Criseide. His audience constituted his friends, allies and possibly patrons which can be numbered in a few hundreds. The common way of appreciating literature at that time was for an author to read aloud to an audience of his acquaintances, who then responded favourably or negatively to the composition. Silent reading was a novelty and required expansion of literacy among the masses to take hold. Authors wrote only for the sake of writing and appending one’s own name as its creator was thought to be a brazen and boastful practice, though the Italian masters like Dante and Petrarch did it. As the public became more literate, cheap reproduction techniques for manuscripts came to the fore. This was further facilitated by rapid advances in papermaking rather than vellum and parchment. The entrepreneurs who later transformed into publishing houses first took root in this fertile tract of land.

The forced relocation to the countryside and separation from his audience forced Chaucer to change his style so as to address a larger, though imaginary, audience through his books. This made him cultivate a desire for expanded literary reputation and a sense of rivalry with Italian poet Giovanni Boccaccio, who was a literary master close in time to Chaucer. The Canterbury Tales was a path-breaking work in the English language that catapulted Chaucer to everlasting fame. Strohm has included a chapter on its theme, major actors and how the story proceeds. The work did become popular only a decade after the poet’s death in 1400. He led a lonely life in the end. His wife died immediately after his relocation to Kent and his dominating sister-in-law leaned more to the religious side. Powerful patrons like king Richard II, John of Gaunt and Nicholas Brembre were further weakened as the years went by, while Chaucer grew in stature as time ticked away.

The book is very heartening to read with a slight demand on the reader to be appreciative to good verse. Snippets from many of Chaucer’s works are reproduced in the book, first as translation in modern English, followed by the original text in Middle English. Sufficient number of Notes is included, along with books for further reading. An index at the end is very helpful. A nice collection of portraits of the life and times of Chaucer adds interest to the book. This is not a biography of the poet as it stops at the point when he began his real career and then veers to a description of the masterpiece. The final years of his life are not included, which is a real handicap. An epilogue might be very effective in future editions.

The book is highly recommended.

[Lukerik · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book markets itself as an exploration of 1386 being Chaucer’s year of doom. As it turns out this is short section of literary criticism at the end where Strohm argues that Chaucer was lonely without his poetry group so he invented a group of pilgrims who listened to each other’s poetry. Fine.

The rest of the book is far more interesting. Strohm’s procedure is as follows. He takes what we know of Chaucer from the documentary evidence and fleshes it out, giving us a snapshot history of the late 14th Century. This history informs our knowledge of Chaucer and there’s thus a nice feedback loop. So we have a picture drawn for us of the court of John of Gaunt, one of conditions in London and Chaucer’s digs, and the English wool trade. Particularly interesting were the digs and, strangely, the wool trade, which Strohm presents as a hive of scum and villainy.

Strohm is at pains to stress a sort of low-status Chaucer living in poor housing in a filthy city. I’ll accept that London was filthy, but otherwise I think we need a reality check. His father may have been ‘in trade’, but in comparison to the poor shack-dwellings sods whose job it was to collect faecal matter he was living it large in his stone tower. I wonder if Strohm is attempting to create a vulnerable Chaucer we can identify with. Still, you don’t need to agree with everything to learn something from it.

The first edition is particularly nice. Paper cover covered boards blind-stamped with the author’s initials. Quarter bound in cloth with gilt lettering on the spine. The dust jacket is platicky on the inside and pithy on the outside. A bit like an inside-out satsuma.

[Ethan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Boy was this a treat! First, it was great getting to read the easily accessible thoughts of one of the great Chaucerian scholars of our age. Strohm is an excellent literary analyst and an engaging writer. Much of the positives about this book you've heard are true: Strohm's description of London is exciting, his recount of the politics of the day is intriguing, and even his deep dive into the wool trade is interest-peaking. But what I found most impactful was Strohm's deft and insightful explanation of just how Chaucer came to write The Canterbury Tales, and the gestures (or successful grabs) Chaucer was making at literary genius when truly building this new tradition for English letters. I had a moment when reading Strohm's analysis that I think is illustrative of its success: I realized, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Chaucer was a genius, and would have been a genius regardless if he was the first of the great English writers, in large part because The Canterbury Tales is just that revolutionary. His conception of the self-contained audience and his decision to write a tale focused on the new and the changing over the stagnant and repetitive is worth all the literary gold in the world.

[Christopher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intriguing and detailed look at a pivotal year in Chaucer’s life and how it led to his writing of The Canterbury Tales.

[Keely Hood · Rating 1 out of 5]

yawn. read for class.

[Annette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Source: Free copy from Viking in exchange for a review.
Summary:
Paul Strohm has written a concise biography of Geoffrey Chaucer.
Strohm states the aim of the book.
My aim is to write an evidence-based account that respects the past as past, but that simultaneously seeks out linkages between that past and our present. At various points in the pages to follow I will attribute motives to Chaucer that, with modest adjustment, are close cousins to our own: motives of love (and accommodation to its absence), ambition (and its curious lack), loyalty (and its limits), financial security (and an apparent indifference to wealth), a wish for fame (and a disdain for its requirements). Page 13-14.
The subjects covered are:

Geoffrey Chaucer's early life, marriage, and family.
His business and political career.
Life in London and living above Aldgate.
Literary career.

My Thoughts:
Geoffrey Chaucer's, The Canterbury Tales, was introduced to me in college. My teacher was Mrs. Caesar. The coarse was British Literature. I loved both the teacher and class.
I had heard about The Canterbury Tales, but had not read the tales until the class. I fell in love with the wit and rich word usage.
My favorite tales are The Nun's Priest's Tale and The Wife of Bath's Tale.
I was anxious to read a biography of Geoffrey Chaucer. I wanted to know about his life and personality.
While reading Chaucer's Tale, I felt better acquainted with him, but I did not believe Chaucer's Tale had fleshed-out the man himself. Please understand, I was not looking for a romantic, nor witty book on Chaucer. The book felt a bit conservative. But...after reading Chaucer's Tale, I came to understand Geoffrey Chaucer was a conservative man. He was not ambitious. He was not interested in being in the forefront of social circles. I had prejudged the book by expecting something that would not have been an accurate portrayal. I have come to the decision that Paul Strohm's book fully represents the person and life of Geoffrey Chaucer.
An excellent point in the book: Paul Strohm said,
Racy narratives within Chaucer's own literary oeuvre-such as the "Miller's Tale" and the "Reeve's Tale" within his Canterbury Tales-have literary sources in the Old French comic tales called fabliaux and elsewhere, and I do not mean to suggest that he drew them from surrounding life. If anything, Chaucer-working within literary rather than judicial traditions-tones his stories down a bit, tempering and redirecting their energies away from raw incident and toward more modulated points about mutual betrayal (the "Shipman's Tale") and displaced requital and revenge (the "Reeve's Tale). But no none reading of Margaret's travails or Elizabeth's enterprising greed could fail to notice that Chaucer had the advantage of a London public that knew how to recognize and appreciate a well-told yarn. Chaucer's assumptions about tales and tale telling were formed within a society in which narrative exchange and the recital of racy incidents was part of the fodder of daily life. Page 78-79.

[T.J. Gillespie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Tedious.

The opening of the third chapter-- “An explanation of Chaucer’s ill-starred and ultimately frustrated years in the wool trade will require an extended look at the trade itself, the operations of the Wool Wharf, the machinations of the collectors of customs”--tells you all you need to know. Are you interested in an extended look at the English wool trade of the fourteenth century? If so, this is the book for you.

A much better idea would be to just go back and read the master himself. Reread the Canterbury Tales or delve into the Riverside Chaucer. Check out Shakespeare’s Richard II. If you are in search of a nonfiction account of the times, I’d recommend Norman Cantor’s much more entertaining The Last Knight, which focuses on John of Gaunt and presents Chaucer’s times in much more engaging way.

It's not all bad.The final chapters are a bit better as they return the focus to Chaucer as an author and what that actually meant in the late 1300s. There is an interesting section of Chaucer’s ambition, his readership, his rivalry with the Italians (particularly Dante and Boccaccio), and finally how two major developments, the use of English by the Lancastrian kings and the 1474 arrival of the printing press, helped cement his reputation.

Here’s one interesting piece of trivia: On April 23, 1374 Chaucer receives a grant of a pitcher of wine every day, by gift of the king, to be collected at the Port of London.

[Claire · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received Chaucer's Tale as part of a Goodreads giveaway.

This nonfiction volume explores the personal and professional circumstances that led Geoffrey Chaucer to pen his masterpiece The Canterbury Tales. Born to a prosperous merchant family, Chaucer left the family business to pursue a life at the royal court in the mid-14th century. Despite his marriage, however, his marriage wasn't a particularly happy one, he was a permissive and often careless bureaucrat, and his oversights got him into trouble on more than one occasion. Yet in the midst of this, exiled from London, he wrote The Canterbury Tales, which remains a classic of English literature over 600 years later.

Chaucer's Tale is a study of the author's "prime" years, from a young man seeking his fortunes at court, to his jaded middle age when his personal and professional failing. I liked the relatively tight scope of the book; it seemed much more manageable than a broad, sweeping biography, and as a medieval history fan, I'm always in favor of more books (both fiction and non) on the subject! Very interesting look at the roots of this classic work of literature and of its fascinating author.

[Candy Wood]

Almost fifty years ago, Paul Strohm taught a graduate course in Middle English Literature Exclusive of Chaucer, and I'm grateful for the introduction it offered not only to unfamiliar poetry but also to methods of advanced study and teaching. Readers of this general-interest book on what the subtitle calls "the year that made the Canterbury Tales" might feel that much of it excludes the poetry while focusing on context, but context is important and interesting. Chaucer's marriage and social standing, the intricacies of the London wool trade, Parliamentary wrangling after the death of Edward III, and major changes in language, authorship, and audience all must have influenced the composition of his major poem. Strohm distinguishes clearly between fact, documented unobtrusively in paragraph-style notes at the end, and speculation--because the poem was assembled by others after Chaucer's death, we don't know exactly what he intended, for example. Modern English quotations are accompanied by originals in Middle English, French, and Latin, a welcome reminder of the linguistic diversity of Chaucer's world.

[Cynthia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was very much looking forward to reading this book. I am the book's target audience. I love history, and I love reading about writers, so this book seemed tailor-made for me. And I am very used to reading the more scholarly types of tomes, not quick, glib "history" books, so I don't want or need history that reads like a novel. That being said, this book was mind-numbingly tedious to read.

I really, really, really wanted to learn the information contained in this book. But the book was so ploddingly written, that I had to force myself to continue. A typical night of reading it- "I must read at least 20 pages before I can go to sleep." Seriously. I had to force myself to read it, to learn the information contained therein. And I LOVE to read.

The information itself was good. Glad I learned it. Wanted to learn it. If you are very interested in the subject matter, then I suppose it might be worth at least a skim. But if you are simply looking for a good, engaging non-fiction book, this ain't it.

[Hannah Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wouldn't say this is the most interesting book on Chaucer. I was hoping more for an individual treatment of the tales themselves, and this is what I thought it was based off the subtitle, "The Road to Canterbury." The author of the book has an overall pleasing style, but I couldn't help but feel he placed undue emphasis on aspects of Chaucer's life that frankly were just not that interesting. For example, he devoted an entire chapter which was one of the longest ones to the wool trade. And another equally long one on parliament. I'm sure for people seeking information on the economics of medieval England this would have been interesting, but I couldn't help but be frustrated by how much time this took up in what is a book of relatively modest length. I wish his focus had been more honed in and discussed more about what influenced Chaucer as a writer and what might have inspired his treatment of the various characters in the tales.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

The best thing about the book is the title. It's isn't terrible - just disappointing. There was nothing about Chaucer that I didn't already know - which isn't much. (And I knew a few things the book doesn't mention.) I understood much better when I checked the info about the author, Paul Strohm - he is a professor of English, not a historian, and much of the history he relates is based on historical lore which has since been discredited, or seriously questioned. Much of the book is not directly related to Chaucer's life - I thought the chapter on Nicholas Brembre and the wool trade went on far too long - and of the information that is related to Chaucer, such as his relations with his family, has largely unconvincing speculation. Much better to read Alison Weir's book about Katherine Swynford for a clear picture of the era.

[Sasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

First I would like to say I received this book through the goodreads giveaway in exchange for an honest review. Thank you goes to the author for giving me the honor to read his novel. Chaucer's Tale covers his years from young adult seeking his life's fortune in court to his difficult middle years showing his failings. It is a compact shorter version of his life instead of going into a broad version making this much easier for you to read about his life. I love history and I love Chaucer so this was a great book for me to be reading. This was a very fascinating and interesting look into his life and his classic work of literature, and I would suggest that you put this book on your to read list.

[BJ Richardson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This an excellent detailed and readable biography of Geoffrey Chaucer leading up to and concluding with the posthumous publication of the Canterbury Tales. Actually, I'm not sure "publication" is the right word for a book created before the invention of the printing press. Either way, if you are interested in Brit Lit or in the history of medieval England than this is a great read. If you like early British literature or are a fan of Chaucer, this is essential.

On the other hand, if such things do not interest you, don't bother with this book. It is definitely well written enough to hold interest but the subject matter is quite focused. Personally, I'm more a fan of the preceding era (from Richard the Lionheart to Edward II) but even still I enjoyed the read.

[Christopher Rowe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a deeply learned and meticulously researched work of deep context. Strohm's project is to explore the social, political, literary, and personal situations which existed just prior to the "compilation" of the Tales, and in that project he admirably succeeds. Our access to Chaucer, the man, will always of necessity be best realized through reading his work, but in this study, Paul Strohm allows us to glimpse the circumstances in which the poet miraculously became the wellspring of some of the English language's foundational imaginative texts.

[Lauren Albert · Rating 4 out of 5]

First, I have to say thank you to Strohm for "translating" the English into modern English and still giving Chaucer's version. While usually it is readable if you "hear" it, you have to hear it correctly. It was nice being able to read the modern English and then to read the original.

I'm not sure if he succeeded in his effort to show how Chaucer ended up writing the Canterbury Tales, he did write an interesting little book that gives one a sense of how Chaucer lived and his role in the court around him.

[MsMax · Rating 5 out of 5]

Marvelous book, even if it was non-fiction, which aren't normally as entertaining a way to get my history, and I don't normally read. Strohm did an excellent job of showing how and why Chaucer became so noteworthy to literature with his Canterbury Tales. A notoriety that he never even lived to savor in his lifetime.

[Gerald Davis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well-written, informative and entertaining.

A well-researched, engrossing portrait of Chaucer and his era. At times a little too much detail about the wool trade and customs procedures, but, given the scarcity of information available concerning the life of Chaucer, I suppose this is understandable.

[Garry Walton · Rating 4 out of 5]

A popular dissertation topic for researchers at the Shakespeare Institute in the 1970s and 1980s was "Books and Readers," when students would select a particular year and read everything published in English for that year - as a way to understand history as it was happening. James Shapiro brought a similar strategy to a wider audience with his 2006 book, 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare and then his 2015 follow-up, The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606.

Shapiro's friend and colleague at Columbia, Paul Strohm, follows this example by focusing on a key year in the life of Geoffrey Chaucer. Twenty-five years earlier Strohm authored a document-based cultural history of Chaucer and his times, and that research is abundantly evident here. Strohm demonstrates a clear, repeated claim that in a single year Chaucer lost almost everything: patron, political connections, wife, job, dwelling, audience (5, 209). And yet, he argues, his displacement from bustling London to distant Kent was crucial to his completion of his most famous work, The Canterbury Tales. If Harold Bloom credits Shakespeare with "the Invention of the Human," Strohm seems ready to anoint Chaucer with "the invention of the audience," at least an audience that was diverse in rank and class and gender, not only audible but literate, and portable.

Strohm drops interesting and valuable nuggets throughout his work: the documentary record of over 400 items offers not a trace of Chaucer as a poet (7, 184); he never referred to himself as poet or author - not auctor but compilator (205); he denigrated Dante and Petrarch for seeking fame and self-aggrandizement (204+); he borrowed from Boccaccio while concealing his debt (220).

The book is at its best in its first and last sections. In between he slowly builds a portrait of Chaucer as a mid-level government functionary, perpetually reliant on patrons or family connections for advancement, typically the lowest ranking member of any group that he joined, from marriage to court to Parliament. Strohm is intent to show how total was Chaucer's fall in 1386, but how from that low point the writer envisioned his greatest achievement.

Repetition and slow pacing prevent this work from being an unqualified success, but the rich final chapter is worth the slow buildup, almost.

[Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very excellent book. My ideas of Chaucer's life circumstances are pretty vague. But after reading Mr. Strohm's book I realize that not much is really known about the details, not as much as is known about, say, Abraham Lincoln or Philip Larkin. Mr. Strohm does a wonderful job of doing the most with what we have: putting Chaucer's life into the precise context of the world we do know he lived in. Mr. S. focuses on Chaucer's job, the streets on which he walked, his lodgings and who were his wife and sister-in-law. He shows us how it is likely Chaucer came to have an important job in view of the politics of the day and why Chaucer had to leave it. In addition, Mr. Strohm provides great speculation and philosophizing as to, respectively, how Chaucer became (after his death) a literary sensation, what Chaucer's literary hopes and ideas might have been during his lifetime, what was literary life like in the 14th century, and what does it mean to have and want an audience.

Two big takeaways for me were Mr. Strohm's detailed expliction fo the importance of the wool trade to the budget of England (and the budget means the king's revenue), how immense were the sums involved, how the money and the prospect of it could be speculated upon, and how corruption inevitable crept in. The other takeaway is Mr. Strohm's ideas on The Canterbury Tales as the creation of an audience internal to the book that could live on forever -- as indeed it does.

Lawrence says: Check it out.

[Leanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

The New Yorker says, "Strohm's victory from the jaws of defeat account is touching, but the real thrill is his portrait of Chaucer's London, one square mile of church bells pealing, neighbors gossiping, politicians conniving, severed heads rotting on spikes (quite near Chaucer's windows) and poetry rising out of all of this."

It is true that People in the middle ages were fascinated by the twists and turns of fortune. In fact, Chaucer translated the writer who most represented this fascination with fate, Boethius. Chaucer was much taken by this theme. And Strohm, in examining a pivotal year in Chaucer's life-- A year when his good fortune comes to an end and he finds himself without a job without supporters and without Readers-- sees this as being the key moment when Chaucer makes "virtue of necessity." This is a refrain that occurs several times in his poetry and basically means by confronting bad circumstances he turns them to his advantage.

While this thesis is exciting and interesting, still as the New Yorker review suggest it's not the best part of this book. It really is the descriptions of the time and the place. I need to pull out my medieval time travelers handbook for medieval England. Both books really bring to that world to life. This book was so well written it really was a pleasure to read.

[Paul · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this because I teach the Prologue and a few tales from The Canterbury Tales in my EN 12 classes, and I was hoping to learn a bit more about the man, and his process of writing the Tales.

As the title indicates, the writer focuses on one year in the life of Chaucer, the year he supposedly began to write the Tales. He focuses, in mind-numbing detail, on the building Chaucer lived in, the goings-on of the wool trade on the wool wharf, and the, in my opinion, rather historically unimportant relationships within the reign of Richard II. So this is really more of a snapshot of London, and Chaucer's supposed place within it, rather than a biography of Chaucer writing The Canterbury Tales. The reason for that, as the author Strohm does point out, is that, like Shakespeare after him, Chaucer the writer, ironically, did not leave behind much of a record behind, so writers like Strohm try to fill in the blanks of his life using the historical context of the time. But if a reader is looking for insight into life in 1386, he or she should stick with the original take: Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.