Marriage in Chaucer's The Clerk's Tale and The Franklin's Tale

However, Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales incorporates different characters from every social class traveling together and competing in a story contest. The Canterbury Tales explores and exploits social conventions through different character's perspectives. Although, these characters are separated by social classes, there are overlapping themes throughout various stories. These characters tell stories that are both conventional and unconventional to the Fourteenth Century. The conventional stories follow the morals and ideals of the century. These stories are expected to be enjoyable to the members of the pilgrimage. Ironically, it is arguable that the unconventional stories represent at times conventional morals. .
             These stories point out the flaws of the Fourteenth Century and their conventions in order to depict a moral conclusion. Chaucer is suggesting that regardless of the class divisions, these individuals can contain similar morals and values. Chaucer's intent is to allow for his audience to be skeptical of these tales and their literal meaning. Although, many of these tales suggest a denotative view; the fate of the characters has a connotative meaning. The Clerk's Tale and The Franklin's Tale are told by two contrasting characters, The Clerk is a poor student and The Franklin is a wealthy landowner. The two storytellers depict their characters as people involved in two different types of marriages. The Clerk shares his story of a conventional marriage, which is bound by the ideals of society and depends upon the obedience of a wife to her husband. The Franklin's idea of marriage is unconventional and his characters belong to an equal partnership. In public, they appear as a conventional couple, where the wife is obedient to her husband. The reason for acting in public is to allow for her husband to retain high status. However, The Clerk and The Franklin do share some of the same views on the success of a marriage.