Chapter One
Counselor or Critic?

An intellectual in its modern sense, as has been elaborated in the introductory part, is usually expected to be a social critic. Unsatisfied with the status quo, he should make efforts to improve the situation by combating social unfairness or discontent through his pen rather than his sword. Thus, Chaucer the poet, if regarded as an intellectual in modern sense, is supposed to write to expose the harsh reality, or to criticize the crimes and combat the corruption of his time.

However, Chaucer's identity of a courtier seems to have dismissed the probability of his being a courageous fighter against the evils of the society. His job determines that he should serve and please his court superiors; and poetry by him as a court poet is supposed to sing the royals praises, or to provide them with advice. So he might also act as a court counselor, not entitled to the name though. He is expected to feed his royal audience the morals or advice through his literary expression.

Then, was Chaucer a counselor who intended to help the authority to consolidate the existent power relationship, or was he a social critic who perceived the darkness of the reality and attempted to express his dissatisfaction? There is in fact a dialectical relationship in between.

Court Poet as Prince-pleaser, Counselor, or Critic?

Because of his multiple identities, Chaucer played several roles in the court. What role to play depended on what job he took. All his jobs however were related with each other and relevant to his position in the court. As a poet, Chaucer had to take his audience into consideration when he composed poems. The reason is evident:

The audience whether in social or in individual contexts brings to a literary situation certain expectations. [. . .] A poet's social functions are determined in some large measure by the occasion at which he performs and by the expectations of his audience (Bloomfield and Dunn 6).

Chaucer's audience, therefore, determined Chaucer's poetry writing in respect of his choice of subject matter, tone, and style etc. As a court poet, Chaucer would inevitably concern more about his royal audience.

So in the first place, he was apparently a prince-pleaser. He had to engage the interest of the royal audience, including kings and queens, aristocrats and other social superiors, and his colleagues. His image on the frontispiece of a manuscript of Troilus and Criseyde portrayed Chaucer's reading his poetry to what looked like a courtly audience.^〔1〕 Chaucer's self-portrait as naïve, dim, bookish, though definitely fictional and tongue-in-cheek, couldn't be more appropriate for a court poet, who wrote and read poems to please or entertain his social superiors. In fact, the subjects of his early poems were mostly of royal events and to the courtly taste. He was expected to dedicate poems to the king, which though were not necessarily confined to praises. He could at least make use of any royal occasions. For example, the Book of the Duchess provided comforts for the "prince" who had lately lost his beloved. Thus, Chaucer the court poet was expected to play the role of a prince-pleaser.^〔2〕

However, Chaucer's poems seemed never to have been devotedly and exclusively prince-pleasing. Chaucer was not a professional minstrel, who gave performance merely to entertain the court. He functioned as a poet in early society was generally expected to be. As Bloomfield and Dunn point out, "Early poets were teachers, diviners, prophets, and preservers of tradition. Part of their sacred office was to admonish and warn rulers and subjects alike, and to hand on the accumulated wisdom of the past" (4). Thus early poets served as teachers. Court poets functioned to provide moral or political models for his royal audience to follow. In a sense, therefore, Chaucer wrote and read to his royal audience to provide advice as a counselor.

Yet, his counseling role is debatably complicated. The complex nature is relevant to the controversy on Chaucer's politicalness and related to a rise of court poets over professional minstrels in late fourteenth century. The controversy on whether Chaucer is political or apolitical results from two aspects.

Firstly, the rare reference to any social events in his writings presents Chaucer to be a detached, low-profile courtier who accidentally had a hobby of composing poems. On one hand, Chaucer appeared to have no political interest, let alone ambition. Unlike Thomas Usk, he never sought to climb the slippery pole of political appointment by way of singing the royals praises. Most of his poems were not make-work projects for someone with connections, though he might include some court occasions. For instance, the Book of the Duchess, and the Parliament of Fowls. On the other hand, different from what his contemporary John Gower did in his Vox Clamantis, he never made any pointed and critical commentary on current conditions in his poems (though Gower did it in Latin from circumspection). Even in some poems that are apparently related to the court, it is always difficult to decide what the real political message is. For example, it is not correct to presume Chaucer's good standing with Henry Ⅳ if we judge from his short poem The Complaint of Chaucer to His Purse, in which he saluted him as a "true king" (verray kyng). The very fact that he had difficulty getting paid (though no difficulty getting approved by the King) after Henry Ⅳ's accession to the throne is on the contrary evidence of Chaucer's loss of favor.