A good example could be the beginning of the general prologue in the Canterbury Tales where Chaucer describes the weather so precisely:.
"When in April the sweet showers fall.
And pierce the drought of March to the root, and all.
The veins are bathed in liquor of such power.
As brings about the engendering of the flower,.
When also Zephyrus with his sweet breath.
Exhales an air in every grove and heath".
The personal pronoun "I" is commonly used in narratives. In medieval times it usually expressed the author. Sometimes this "I" is an observer and it also gives "the air of truth" because it makes the story far more believable if there is an authentic source. Just think about the general prologue again when the writer was sitting in Tabard Inn and he was surrounded by pilgrims:.
"It happened in that season that one day.
In Southwark, at The Tabard, as I lay.
Ready to go on a pilgrimage and start.
For Canterbury, most devout at heart," .
There are some other ways to authenticate. For example one of them is the author's voice. Sometimes there is not any "I" or any special points just the narrator's voice that makes the tale more authentic. Sometimes it is not enough just to read the story, but we also have to attend to the tone. It can help us to imagine the world and the atmosphere that the writer talks about.
In modern literature tricks are often played with the authentication level. Just to mention one of them: when we see the author in his own name talking about writing the story. But it was no other way in the medieval times so this is not an "investigation".
The author and the reader are in a shared intimacy. The reader is asked to accept what is being told to him and the decision is on he/she whether he/she accepts it or not. They are sharing the experience together so they are in a close relation in some way. One thing which makes the decision so hard is the irony that is used so often especially in Chaucer's works.
In Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales1, participants of a pilgrimage to Canterbury tell tales to entertain each other, revealing many aspects of medieval society. Through the double narration it can be seen that the narrator of the Prologue is Chaucer but this pilgrim Chaucer is not the author...
In Geoffrey Chaucher's The Canterbury Tales, the view taken is that of the former. Chaucher looks at marriage as an obligation that is almost always dominated by one of its two members, as view proven in the Miller's Tale, the Shipman's Tale, the Merchant's Tale, and the Wife of Bath"s Tale.The "Shipman's Tale" exemplifies the sarcastic view of marriage taken by Chaucer. ...
