Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1342-1400)
“You’re wearying me
to death, I say, with your illiterate stuff.
God bless my soul! I’ve had about enough.
My ears are aching from your frowsty story!
The devil take such rhymes! They’re purgatory!”
- The Canterbury Tales (Host’s interruption of the Tale of Sir Topaz) by Geoffrey Chaucer, translated to modern English by Nevill Coghill (Penguin Classics, 2003).
