The Canterbury Tales is a collection of 24 stories that run over 17.000 lines written in Middle English. The author of these stories was Geoffrey Chaucer from England. Chaucer was a well educated noble with major jobs such as Controller of Customs and Justice of Peace, sooner in 1389 he became Clerk of the King's work. It was during these years that Chaucer perfected the work of the Canterbury Tales.
He uses the tales and descriptions of its characters to paint a comedic and critical portrait of English society at the time, and particularly of the Church. Chaucer's use of such a wide range of classes and types of people was unprecedented in English. Although the characters are fictional, they still offer a variety of insights into customs and practices of the time. This may be one of the factors to why the tales became so famous and loved by the people.
One of the stories he particularly portraits the lives of women at the middle age. This was something new for people due to women's minor effect in the society at these times. It's called "Wife of Bath", which presents the insights into the life of a woman in the 14th and early 15th century.
A fine work of art were stories and professional writing first came to place by Chaucer in the middle ages. That nationalized the English languange.
