Canterbury Tales: Two Tales (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

My review relates specifically to the Kindle edition of the Canterbury Tales (Bantam Classic) as at July 2011. Judging from the other very positive reviews, my guess is that the print version of this book is much, much, much better!

I was looking for a good version of Cantebury Tales for Kindle, ideally with both middle english and modern text, and this ebook sounded perfect as described. I downloaded the sample and I was impressed by the content as far as it went. Unfortunately, the sample content only includes the Table of Contents, Preface and Introduction etc. It did not contain any portion of the Tales themselves, not even part of the General Prologue. So I purchased the whole thing to have a better look. That's when I decided to give this a 1-star rating in Kindle edition.

Amazon really do need to ensure that Kindle sample content samples the book and not just its introductory sections.

According to other reviewers, in the printed version the two formats of the text (middle english and modern) are presented opposite each other on facing pages. Ideal!

I knew this would not be possible on Kindle which can only display one page (or part page) at a time so I expected a bit of a challenge. But...woe...the formatting is such that blocks of middle english text and the modern text just follow on from each other with no clear breaks between the two versions of text and no way of jumping between the two. The poetry line formatting is OK but The Knight's Tale, for example, is just one continuous poem with middle english, then modern english, then middle english again etc. Every page and a half you have to spot the line where one text ends and the other begins. There is rarely even a line gap to make that easy to do. It is very, very hard therefore to read the work fluently in either text format and pretty much impossible to try to compare the two. I gave up trying after flicking through the General Prologue and the Knight's Tale.

For me, this makes this Kindle edition of this book practically unreadable in either middle or modern english. I have requested a refund from Amazon which I am sure will be forthcoming.

Although difficult at first to get your head around the old english, be patient and before long you will enjoy geoffrey Chaucers unique sense of humour and light critizicm of the times.
The Wife of Baths story is particuarly interesting. Her tale of the woes of marriage - which for her are numerous! are hilarious! she argues for remarriage very well, and her whole demenour is a refreshing change from those male dominated times. it is worth buying this book, just to be able to read the wifes story.
Dont be put off by the language - it adds to the appeal.

As with all of the Penguin Classics, this is a nicely presented book. An introduction at the start covers the life and works of Chaucer in good detail.

The text has been updated into modern English by Neville Coghill. It is easy to read and retains the effect of Chaucer's poetic language.

The modern English means that it is easy to understand but is not suitable for those needing to study the original English. There are, however, boooks with the original old English.

A very informative set of notes and annotations add to the efectiveness of the translation, and give essential detail needed to understand the text.

All of the tales are included, including the General Prologue.

Worth buying if you need to study the tales or are interested in reading them and understanding them properly.