Chaucer's "The Monk's Tale"

"The Monk's Tale," from Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, is intriging because it is different from the other poems in the collection. Presented by a monk who appears to be very unlike a monk, it focuses on the calamity of life with a slight mention of how fate can intervene and set anyone's life upon a new, and sometimes not better, course. Life is difficult and fate is cruel appears to be the message from this man of the cloth. His tale might have been dark but his message is clear: be happy because misfortune could strike at any moment.

It is a collection of short tales about men who lose their power in oe way or another. Readers are cautioned at the beginning of this tale to let "no one trust a blind prosperity" and to be "warned by these examples, true and old" (207)....
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