Canterbury Tales in Middle English

It appears that it is the Second Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading.  Well, I couldn't resist, having been an English major in college.  My favorite classes were in Old English and Middle English.  I actually read all of the Canterbury Tales in the original Middle English and our professor made us learn how to speak the language too.  In fact, we had to get up in front of the whole class and recite the beginning of the Prologue from memory.  To this day I still remember it! 

Just click on the link to hear me read aloud:

Canterbury Tales

And you can read along here:

Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote
And bathed every veyne in swich licour,
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,        
That slepen al the nyght with open eye-
(So priketh hem Nature in hir corages);
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blisful martir for to seke
That hem hath holpen, whan that they were seeke.

I'm sure my pronunciation isn't 100% accurate -- college was quite a while ago, but I think you can get the general idea of how it sounded.  What do you think?

More on the Second Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading at roots down.

Comments

[Denise]

oooh man!! heheheh Love it!
how about some Beowolf?
hehehhe were you an English major! I have this baby memorized!

[Lynn]

Love it! I had to memorize that section my Sr. year in High School. You just brought the whole thing back to me.

[Terby]

Excellent! I'd only read translations, and never heard the original aloud. Thank you (and, um, yeah- I was a Bio major). :)

[Jennifer]

I had to memorize and recite that for my AP English class in high school. I still remember chanting it under my breath all day long, and recording myself to make sure I wasn't screwing up.

[Quantum Tea]

That brings back memories of Sixth Form English classes back in England, we had to study the Prologue in the original Middle English, no translations allowed. :-)

[Kim]

I am a high school English teacher and this week we're working on "The Prologue." I'll have to play this for my classes.

[Veronica]

That's very cool, I've never heard it aloud. Much different than I thought it would sound! Thanks for sharing!

[Neveth]

! eeeee. I love middle English. I've never actively studied it and I'm not an English major, but it's always made sense to me. I may be weird though.

Did you know Chaucer has a blog? http://houseoffame.blogspot.com/

[Jennifer]

Ooh - I love the Canterbury Tales. I even bought a children's version during college so that I could read it to my children someday.