Tolkien and Chaucer

[Hugh]

Please see below for the article in today's Observer on Tolkien and Chaucer: "Lost volume sheds new light on Tolkien's devotion to Chaucer".

Among other references, a link is made between "The Pardoner's Tale" and the story of Smeagol/Deagol, and there's also a coincidence involving "The Notion Club Papers".

Lost volume sheds new light on Tolkien’s devotion to Chaucer

 

[Toby Frost]

That's really interesting. There's also a semi-supernatural element to the Pardoner's Tale, if I remember rightly, as the villains go looking for Death, and find it.

"Radix malorum est cupiditas" - the root of evil is greed/desire - is the moral of the Pardoner's Tale, and works pretty well as a moral of The Lord of the Rings.