Based on Geoffrey Chaucer’s ‘A Miller’s Tale’

In nearly every story we read, there is a clear hero that we are expected to root for. They appear at the beginning of the story already facing some sort of obstacle, whether it be fighting a monster, dealing with a difficult class at school, or a whole range of other obstacles they might face. Throughout the story, especially in a romance, they face more challenges, including meeting their love interest – typically someone who is far out of their league – and finding out there is some sort of obstacle standing in the way of their love. Eventually, by the end of the story, they overcome the obstacle, get the girl, and everyone goes home happy.

In its own way, the Miller’s Tale in the Canterbury Tales makes fun of the typical “hero’s arc”. There is no clear hero of the story; all three supposed “love interests” have characteristics that keep them from fully being labeled the hero of the story. John is the old man who has trapped Alisoun in an unhappy marriage, although he may not be aware of that. Nicholas pursues Alisoun and sexually assaults her before she admits love for him, as well as planning to humiliate her husband in front of the entire town just so he can have Alisoun for himself.

Absolon, the third “love interest”, may be the closest thing we get to a hero in the story, based on the typical hero’s arc. He starts the story by meeting and falling in love with Alisoun, before learning she is married – the first obstacle between the two of them ending up together in the end. He describes her as “She was so proper and sweet and likerous, / I dare well say, if she had been a mous, / And he a cat, he would her hente anon.” (lines 236-239) He begins courting her, serenading her outside her bedroom window and giving her expensive gifts. 

“He singeth, brokking as a nightingale;

He sent hir piment, meeth, and spiced ale,

And wafers piping hot out of the glede;

And for she was of town, he proffered mede-” (lines 269-272)

Alisoun and her husband, John, ignore him, which is the first detraction from the typical “hero’s tale” – typically, the love, while forbidden, is requited. However, in ‘The Miller’s Tale’, Alisoun has absolutely no interest in Absolon and repeatedly ignores and even humiliates him as a way of rejecting his advances. 

Eventually, the story reaches its climax when Absolon finds Nicholas and Alisoun together in the midst of their elaborate plan to humiliate Alisoun’s husband. However, this is where Absolon’s story diverts from the typical hero’s story. Instead of him successfully wooing Alisoun and happily marrying her at the end of the story, Alisoun and Nicholas trick Absolon and embarrass him. Instead of finishing off the story as the hero, Absolon’s hopes are quickly dashed and he jumps onto the path of the villain instead. Chaucer writes 

“This sely Absolon heard everydel,

And on his lip he gan for anger bite,

And to himself he said, “I shall thee quite.”

Who rubbeth now, who froteth now his lippes

With dust, with sand, with straw, with cloth, with chipped,

But Absolon, that saith full oft “Alas”?

“My soule bitake I unto Satanas,

But me were levere than all this town,” quod he, 

“Of this despit awroken for to be.

Alas,” quod he, “alas I ne had ybleint!”

His hote love was cold and all yqueint.” (lines 636-646)

He begins seeking revenge against Nicholas and Alisoun for their humiliation, visiting a nearby smith to borrow his plow blade and, when Nicholas again tries to humiliate Absolon by farting out the window in his face, stabbing Nicholas with the hot poker. 

“And up the windows did he hastily,

And out his ers he putteth prively,

Over the buttok to the haunche-bon.

And therewith spoke this clerk, this Absolon,

“Speak, sweete bird, I noot not where thou art.”

This Nicholas anon leet fle a fart

As great as it hadde been a thunder-dent

That with the stroke he was almost yblent,

And he was ready with his iron hoot,

And Nicholas amidde the ers he smoot” (lines 694-703)

In this way, Absolon definitely does not end up with the girl at the end of the story, though it is unclear if there is any sort of consequence for him after stabbing Nicholas.

In the Miller’s Tale, Absolon seems to have been meant to make fun of the typical romantic hero. He is repeatedly humiliated by all three of the other main characters – Alisoun, Nicholas, and John – and ends up becoming a sort of villain by the end of the story by causing the downfall of the rest of the characters. As a direct result of him stabbing Nicholas with the hot poker, John believes the flood has come and embarrasses himself in front of the entire town, tarnishing both his and Alisoun’s names. Instead of the hero’s story ending with the typical happy ending, there is no “everyone lives happily ever after” and the guy doesn’t end up getting the girl. We still aren’t entirely sure who to root for at the end of the story, since no clear hero has been established during the course of the tale.

In ‘The Canterbury Tales’, the Miller’s story was meant to counter the Knight’s typical love story and make fun of the characters in it. While the tale itself, on the surface, is humorous because it contains details like farting, adultery, and asses. However, on a more literary analytical level, the characters themselves are humorous because they break away from what we as readers would typically expect from characters in a story along the lines of what we see in ‘The Miller’s Tale’, which is why readers of ‘The Miller’s Tale’ can confidently say there is no confident hero or villain of the story.