Sophie Gee

Jonty, you did such an excellent job there that I'm not going to add anything.

Well, I'm barely going to add anything.

One thing...

One thing I will say is that the Lollard, that no one quite knows where the word Lollard comes from.

It seems to be a Dutch word, but it also seems to be connected to a word in French.

But whatever it is, it's derogatory.

It's a slight.

It is a pejorative term.

So we now say Wycliffism or Wycliffism.

We don't talk about Lollardy anymore.

I'm offended.

As a modern defender of the Reformation, I feel duty bound to say that I'm offended by your use of the term Lollard.

It's politically incorrect.

Yeah.

As is Anglo-Saxon, as discussed in the Beowulf episode.

So, yes, Wycliffe is incredibly important.

And his thinking can be summed up by saying that, as with the Reformation itself, what he wants to do is to strip back the hierarchical, rigid, ecclesiastical organization of the Catholic Church, the emphasis on wealth and material success and the need to pay money to aid your own salvation, and the idea that social class should become

less and less important in the question of people's right to have salvation, but also their right to live virtuous and respected and kind of worthy lives.

So we can see immediately the ways in which Chaucer

writing in the way that he does, not so much in those earlier works that you've mentioned, the dream visions of Book of the Duchess and House of Fame and so on, but in the Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Crusade, we can really see how Chaucer, especially given his high-ranking diplomatic life, very, very close to the monarch and therefore very close to senior members of the church, we can see how Chaucer is sailing very close to the wind.