THE ESCAPE OF CHAUCER’S CHAUNTECLEER: A BRIEF REVALUATIONby Marc M. PelenIn older traditions of scholarship on Chaucer’s Nun’s Priest’s Tale, criticssuch as Mortimer J. Donovan, Stephen Manning, and Charles Dahlberg1were concerned with the moral teaching of Chaucer’s fable, but perhapsthe most elaborate attempt to come to grips with Patristic symbolism inthe imagery and theme of the tale is the article of Bernard S. Levy andGeorge R. Adams,2who see in Chauntecleer’s dilemma a comic versionof the fall of man.3In some senses, Levy’s and Adams’ approach is justi-fied by the fact that Chaucer has introduced into his immediate Frenchsources the Genesis theme of paradise and man’s fall. Thus, in Marie deFrance’s “Del cok et del goupil,”4there is no mention of Scripturalthemes: the fox simply tempts the rooster, apprehends him, and thenloses him when he is tempted by the rooster’s challenge to open hismouth. As the fox speaks, the rooster flies into the branches of a tree:Li gupil volt parler en hautE li cocs de sa buche saut—Sur un haut fust s’est muntez.5(23–25)Similarly, in Branch II of Le Roman de Renart, the rooster is tempted bythe fox, apprehended, and then escapes by flattery from the fox’s jaws:Quant cil senti lache la boce, Bati les eles, si s’en toche.6(435–436)Thus, the Scriptural themes of the poem seem to be Chaucer’s own addi-tion to his immediate sources. On the other hand, in the “seventies a crit-ical reaction set in, whereby in two articles it is argued that Chaucer’sapproach to Chauntecleer’s escape is ironic, or cannot be taken entirelyseriously. Thus, Judson B. Allen treats the close of the tale as comicallyTHE CHAUCER REVIEW, Vol. 36, No. 4, 2002.Copyright © 2002 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA02/36/4/3rd PROOF 5/26/02 9:47 AM Page 329inconclusive,7while A. Paul Shallers notes that earlier assessments of thetale contradict one another,8and concludes that its ending has an ironic“irrational” (p.335) meaning. More recently, Larry Scanlon9looks for anironic appraisal of the poem’s significance (p. 64), while very recent arti-cles appear to argue for Chaucer’s escape from his own imaginativeworld. Thus, Doron Narkiss10sees in Chaucer’s renewal of his imagina-tion “a mass of pseudo-erudition” (p. 60), while Peter W. Travis invokesthe work of Jacques Derrida and other contemporary theorists ofmetaphor to argue that “Chaucer’s advertisement of his art appears toclaim that poetry is blessed with a unique and world-illuminating power”(p. 425).11These latter interpretations obviously address Chaucer’s atti-tude toward the figural power of language.That Chaucer should be concerned with man’s fall seems clear fromthe reference to “In principio” (VII 3163)12which draws our attention tothe opening of Genesis as much as to the opening of the Gospel of St.John, and later to the Priest’s own imprecation following the appearanceof the “col-fox” in Chauntecleer’s barnyard. The cock, the Priest declares,has taken the counsel of his wife (3253) in ignoring his dream about thefox, and he adds:Wommennes conseils been ful ofte colde;Wommannes conseil broghte us first to woAnd made Adam fro Paradys to go, Ther as he was ful myrie and wel at ese.(3256–59)But then, as has often been remarked, he swiftly retracts his accusationagainst Eve and Pertelote:But for I noot to whom it myght displese, If I conseil of wommen wolde blame,Passe over, for I seyde it in my game.Rede auctours, where they trete of swich mateere, And what they seyn of wommen ye may heere.Thise been the cokkes wordes, and nat myne;I kan noon harm of no womman divyne.(3260–66)13This kind of contradiction and self-contradiction is a trademark ofChaucerian composition,14and it is further developed in the Nun’s Priest’sTale by the narrator’s considerable antifeminism, and by his habit ofinvoking concepts or texts that he makes no claim to understand. Thus,on the crucial question of God’s providence in His foreknowledge ofman’s fall, the Priest loses control of his own argument:THE CHAUCER REVIEW33002/36/4/3rd PROOF 5/26/02 9:47 AM Page 330MARC M. PELEN331I wo nat han to do of swich mateere;My tale is of a cok, as ye may heere...(3251–52)In fact, the Priest refers to many texts in the poem in his parade ofpseudo-learning, so that in the end we may conclude that his handlingof the crucial moment of Chauntecleer’s escape from the fall figured inhis exit from the fox’s jaws, is likewise parodic, or humorous, or an elab-orate joke at the reader’s expense.15In this manner, once Chauntecleer has safely flown “heighe upon atree” (3417), the closing moment of the text features a discussionbetween him and the fox over the right use of perception and language.The fox replies:“Nay,” quod the fox, “but God yeve hym meschaunce,That is so undiscreet of governaunceThat jangleth whan he sholde holde his pees.”(3433–35)16This scene is inspired directly from Marie de France’s fable of the cockand fox:La buche cumence a maudire, Ke parole quant devereit taire.Li cocs respunt, “Si dei jeo faire:Maudire l’oil, ki volt cluiner,Quant il deit guarder et gaiter,Que mal ne vienge a lur seignur.”Ceo funt li fol: tut li plusurParolent quant deivent taiser,Teisent quant il deivent parler.(30–38)17It appears also in Branch II of Le Roman de Renart:“. . . Cosins Renart, dist Chantecler,“Nus ne puet en vos fier.Dahez ait vostre cosinage!Il me dut torner a damage.”(453–56)18But the oft-cited conclusion is Chaucer’s own:02/36/4/3rd PROOF 5/26/02 9:47 AM Page 331But ye that holden this tale a folye,As of a fox, or of a cok and hen,Taketh the moralite, goode men.For Seint Paul seith that al that writen is,To oure doctrine it is ywrite, ywis;Taketh the fruyt, and lat the chaf be stille.(3438–43)The “fruit/chaff” figure has obvious Scriptural overtones outlined in theRiverside annotation to line 3443, but, since Chauntecleer seems to haveescaped the fall, it is not clear to critics of the tale exactly what is the chaffhere, and what is the fruit of inner meaning. At this point it may be use-ful to remark that Chaucer has a special interest in ironic or contradic-tory endings in the Canterbury Collection: thus, we recall that, at theclose of the Wife of Bath’s Tale, the hag offers the young knight a choice,to have her foul and old, but faithful (III 1220–1221) or young and fair,but