Chaucer's drama of style

David Benson's lively new interpretation of Chaucer's great story collection attributes the variety and contrast of the tales to the unique literary style of each narrative. In contrast to the popular "dramatic approach," which assumes that the diversity of the tales comes from the supposed psyches of the pilgrim tellers, Benson argues that each tale is a fully formed expression of an individual kind of poetry. Each is constructed on its own distinct literary principles so that the Canterbury Tales is best seen as a drama of poetic styles, not personalities.