Satire In The Summoner's The Canterbury Tales

The Summoner’s Analysis Everyone is not as they seem. People say they will they’ll do one thing, and then they do another or decide to trick others to better themselves in a way. Geoffrey Chaucer uses a man, the Summoner, a vulgar drunk who is almost disgusting and accepts bribes to better gain himself, to make fun at all friars who as well do things to better themselves. In the “Summoner’s Tale” from The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer uses the Summoner to satirize the hypocritical Friar in order to reveal disloyalty amongst people of religion.

Chaucer uses satire to explain disloyalty among the friars. Chaucer uses the Summoner to explain how the churches use penance and how it is not for the good of the people. The Summoner explains through another character in his tale, “ ‘Masses,’ said he, ‘deliver from all penance/ Your friends’ souls, whether old or young,/ Yes, even when they are quickly sung -/ Not to say that a priest has gone astray;/ because he only sings one mass a day./ ‘Deliver then, anon’ quoth he, ‘the souls!/ Full hard

As well, scratching away the names of the families is hypocritical because one of the church can’t use it for personal gain. The Summoner says to the friar, “And when he was out the doors, and alone,/ he’d scrape away the names, every one/ That he had written on his writing tables;...”(Chaucer, 223) to point out his hypocrisy. And in doing so, the reader can infer how the Friar is not exactly as holy as he says. The Summoner’s tale speaks of a man named Thomas who the Summoner uses in his tale who dealt with friars before say, “So help me Christ, in but a few years/ I have spent on every manner of friars/ Full many a pound, yet never the better./ Indeed, it’s almost left me now a debtor;/ Farewell my gold, it is gone long ago!”(Chaucer, 228). Friars ask for money all the time “in the name of god” so to say but are leaving the peasants