The Pardoner's Tale: Chaucer's Use of Irony to Criticize the Church

Nearly every aspect of the Pardoner's tale is ironic. Irony exists within the story itself and in the relationship between the Pardoner and the story. The ending of the story presents a good message despite the Pardoner's devious intentions to swindle money from the other pilgrims. By using irony in the Pardoner's tale, Chaucer effectively criticizes the church system. The irony begins as soon as the Pardoner starts his prologue. He tells the other pilgrims …

…that he is an admitted glutton. There are also many ironic elements of the stor itself. The rioters in his story, vow to set out and slay Death. In doing so, they promise to fight and die for each other. There are two ironies in their mission. First, Death is hardly a being that can be killed. Second, the three drunken fighters pledge to die for each other, but in reality they kill each other.