PUNISHMENT AND TRANSGRESSION IN MEDIEVAL LITERATURE
The theme of this paper is punishment and transgression in medieval literature. My purpose here is to compare DanteÆs formulation of apt punishments with the punishments inflicted -- or not inflicted û- on the characters in ChaucerÆs The MillerÆs Tale, The Pardoners Prologue and Tale (including the pardoner himself) The NunÆs Priest Tale. It will also be demonstrated how the prevailing vision of punishment here measure up against the punishments suffered by characters in a non-Christian narrative of roughly the same period, namely, The Thousand and One Nights.
LetÆs begin with The Millers Tale û a bawdy tale of adultery in which John, a rich old carpenter is being betrayed by his eighteen-year-old wife, Alison, with a boarder in his house named Nicholas. (Meanwhile, a man named Absolon also longs for AlisonÆs favors.) In order to be alone with Alison, John trick Nicholas into believing that Noah's flood will come that night. Nicholas believes him and three tubs are set up on the roof. That night, while John is asleep in one of the tubs, Alison and Nicholas go back to the bedroom. The scene ensues wherein Absolon ends up kissing AlisonÆs backside and then, embarrassed, returning with a hot iron. When Nicholas offers him his backside, Absolon burns it causing Nicholas to yell for water which in turn wakes up the carpenter who, believing that the flood has come, cuts the rope holding the tub causing John to fall from the roof and break his arm. The townspeople soon arrive and conclude that John is insane. In the end, all (except perhaps Alison) are punished. John was injured and declared insane, Absolon is embarrassed and Nicholas has his behind badly burned.
Compared to DanteÆs Inferno, the adulterers in The MillerÆs Tale get off rather easily. DanteÆs adultererÆs, Paolo and Francesca, are murdered for their adultery while on earth and end up in hell in the ...