Route masters: William Blake's Chaucers Canterbury Pilgrims

'Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote / The droghte of March hath perced to the roote ...' The first lines of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales make this 14th-century cycle of travellers’ tales a poem of spring. When the world comes alive, folk long to go on pilgrimages. In William Blake’s Romantic portrayal, the pilgrims, who have all met at the Tabard inn in Southwark, ride out into the countryside, each one of them acutely characterised by Chaucer. Blake makes it a serious moment for such a funny book Illustration: Public Domain