Geoffrey Chaucer hath a blog, and an excellente planne for a worke of grete literarye merit, including:
The dog-maysteres Tale: the dog-mayster (talle, curtel of greene), his dogge, and his companiounes do fynde an olde wool-quaye that semeth to be havnted by a foule spectre – one of them has those fancie new eye-lenses, the which she doth frequentli misplace – eventuallie they fynde that yt is John Gowere who maketh the appearaunce and similitude of a hauntynge in ordre to kepe the quaye closid, for he disliketh the noyse of woole shipmentes when he writeth hys lame poemes. They do counfounde hys plannes and he sayth “Cest conseil avreit eu success, si non pur l’interference de voz jeuenez meddleurs!”
Maybe it’s been a longer day than I thought, but I’m inordinately amused by this… There’s a lot more, too.
The first thing I thought of seeing the phrase “Geoffrey Chaucer hath a blog” was “and Byngoe was itts nayme-oh.” Apologies if that joke is already made on the site linked.
My first reaction was to make the Bingo joke and blow it off, but for several weeks now that blog has been one of my guilty pleasures! The anonymous comments are just as brilliant as the posts:
“Traisonous? Non! Gowere knowes Kyngge Richarde ys so V minutes yore. Henri Lancaster ys the newwe hotnesse.”
And check out the Brokeback Mountain parody. . . it’s a good thing. I mean, goode thynge.
The dedication page of my thesis has
has this portion of the THE CANON’S YEOMAN’S TALE.
It’s a screed against the abuses of alchemy.
and, today, just think “grad school”.
At the end I appended the line
“700 years later, and nothing has changed”.
I apologize for the moderate length.
Seven years I’ve served this canon, but no more
I know about his science than before.
All that I had I have quite lost thereby;
And, God knows, so have many more than I.
Where I was wont to be right fresh and gay
Of clothing and of other good array,
Now may I wear my old hose on my head;
And where my colour was both fresh and red,
Now it is wan and of a leaden hue;
Whoso this science follows, he shall rue.
And from my toil yet bleary is my eye,
Behold the gain it is to multiply!
That slippery science has made me so bare
That I’ve no goods, wherever I may fare;
And I am still indebted so thereby
For gold that I have borrowed, truthfully,
That while I live I shall repay it never.
Let every man be warned by me for ever!
And any man who casts his lot thereon,
If he continue, I hold his thrift gone.
So help me God, thereby he shall not win,
But empty purse and have his wits grow thin.
And when he, through his madness and folly,
Has lost his own, by willing jeopardy,
Then will he incite others, many a one,
To lose their wealth as he himself has done.
For unto scoundrels it’s a pleasant thing
Their fellows in distress and pain to bring,
Thus was I taught once by a learned clerk.
Of that no matter, I’ll speak of our work.
When we are where we choose to exercise
Our elvish craft, why, we seem wondrous wise,
Our terms are all so learned and so quaint.
I blew up the fire until fit to faint.