Geoffrey Chaucer Book summary

 

Geoffrey Chaucer was born to middle-class parents in London sometime in the 1940s. They wished for him to make a better life for himself and so sent him to serve as a page to a countess in his teenage years. Chaucer continued to work as a page until he was given leave to work as a royal emissary, and sent to different parts of Europe in the capacity of a diplomat. Chaucer was working as a diplomat for the English Crown during the hundred-year War when he was taken hostage by French forces. Eventually, he was ransomed back to England for a sum of sixteen pounds, paid by King Edward III. Later onwards, Chaucer was nominated to Parliament due to the royal favor he had earned with his service, but this position did not long remain with him. By the end of his life, Chaucer was working as a forester, or rather a gardener, and was laid to rest in Westminster Abbey in 1400. Eventually, his literary work began to gain recognition and so Chaucer became the first writer to be buried in the Poet’s Corner in 1556.

Geoffrey Chaucer came to be known as the Father of English Literature, primarily due to his contributions to cementing the use of the pentameter for English verse. Many other English writers were inspired by Chaucer’s literature, including William Shakespeare.