Comparing Love and Marriage in Canterbury Tales, Lanval, Faerie Queene,

Love and Marriage in Canterbury Tales, Lanval, Faerie Queene, and Monsieurs Departure gothic and Renaissance literature develops the concepts of love and marriage and records the evolution of the relation among them. In Chaucers Canterbury Tales, Christian love clashes with courtly love, as men and women recognize with such issues as which partner should rule in marriage, the proper, acceptable single-valued function of sex in marriage, and the importance of love as a flat coat for a successful marriage. Works by earlier writers portray the mediaeval literary notion of courtly love, the sexual attraction amongst a chivalric knight and his lady, often the knights lords wife. The woman, who generally held mastery in these relationships base on physical desire and consummation, dictated the terms of the knights duties and obligations, much kindred a feudal lord over a vassal. This microcosm of romance between man and woman was anchored by the macrocosm of the bonds among men an d their fealty to their lord. The ascendancy of women and fealty to the leader in courtly love contrasts with the dominance ...