1340-1400. English poet, author of The
Canterbury Tales about 1387, a collection of
tales told by pilgrims on their way to the
Thomas a Becket shrine. He was the most
influential English poet of the Middle Ages.
Chaucer's other work includes the
French-influenced Romance of the Rose and an
adaptation of Boccaccio's Troilus and
Criseyde. Chaucer was born in London. Taken
prisoner in the French wars, he had to be
ransomed by Edward III 1360. He married
Philippa Roet 1366, becoming in later life
the brother-in-law of John of Gaunt. He
achieved various appointments and was sent on
missions to Italy (where he may have met
Boccaccio and Petrarch), France, and
Flanders. His early work showed formal French
influence, as in his adaptation of the French
allegorical poem on courtly love, Romance of
the Rose; more mature works reflected the
influence of Italian realism, as in his long
narrative poem Troilus and Criseyde, adapted
from Boccaccio. In The Canterbury Tales he
showed his own genius for metre and
characterization.