What Ails Chaucer's Cook: Spiritual Alchemy and the Ending of the Canterbury Tales

Author / Editor
Kensak, Michael.

Title
What Ails Chaucer's Cook: Spiritual Alchemy and the Ending of the Canterbury Tales

Published
Philological Quarterly 80 (2001): 213-31

Description
Like the Canon's Yeoman and unlike St. Cecile (SNT), Roger the Cook is spiritually leaden, exhibiting all four of lead's distinctive qualities: heaviness, earthiness, pallor, and muteness. After his altercation with the Manciple in ManP, Roger is transformed from lead to earth, clarifying the state of the pilgrims as they near their destination and suggesting that Chaucer took care to connect CYT with ManP.

Chaucer Subjects
Manciple and His Tale.
Cook and His Tale.