Chaucer's Tale
Paul Strohm
Penguin Group US
<p><b>A lively micro-biography of Chaucer that tells the story of the tumultuous year that led to the creation of<i> The Canterbury Tales</i></b><br><br>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<br>today&#8212;far from it. Middle-aged in 1386, Chaucer was living in London, working as a midlevel bureaucrat and sometime poet, until a personal and professional<br>crisis set him down the road leading to<i> The Canterbury Tales.</i><br><br>In the politically and economically fraught London of the late 14th century, Chaucer was swept up against his will in a series of disastrous events that would ultimately<br>leave him jobless, homeless, separated from his wife, exiled from his city, and isolated in the countryside of Kent&#8212;with no more audience to hear the poetry<br>he labored over.<br><br>At the loneliest time of his life, Chaucer made the...</br></br></br></br></br></br></br></br></br></br></p>