The Canterbury Fails
Episodes
Hereward the Wake: Neofascist Guerrilla Resistance Lackey
03 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A wild romancish history--human faced bears, swamps, English-dubbed knights--coupled with a delicious smoky honeyed treat: the Scotch Neg!
Pride of Life: Life will Never Die! and a Layered Toasty Citrus Special
13 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Special guest stars Matt Sergi and Dylan Coley crash the Fails to discuss the unheralded and wild morality play about Life learning to Die and learnin...
Rising of 1381: A 'Florlegium' of 'Rebellious' 'Literature' and a Spiced Apple Brandy 'Cocktail'
28 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Secret codes, schizoid populism, radical Christian National MEGA-lomaniac spit-swapping doggerel and the seismic priestly violence washed down with an...
Peterborough Chronicle: So Much Pain and Woe--and that's just the drink
14 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The barrage of William's assholery as he wrecks his own people, and the barrage of high Scoville agony as David wrecks Matt.
Richard the Redeless: Terrible Poem Terrible Drink
31 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Ex post facto fake news propaganda for Henry 4 with a purple ass-crap Nixonian cocktail.
Old English Daniel: Minds Destroyed - Belshazzar's and Matt and David's
17 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Tyrants resists dreams and a tiki exploding fire brain breaker
The Knight's Tale and a Tropical Planet: Canonical and Imperial Despite or Because its Art
20 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Is Chaucer out of control? Is the Canterbury Fails studio out of control? Is this whole thing completely out of control? With tiki drinks.
The Old English Verse Genesis: Shiny Satan and Apple Brandy Power
12 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
5 minutes after David gets home from a late flight and breaks into his own house, we have to answer the simple question: "Can a poem be both a ju...
The Trotula: Medical Cures for Women and a Murky Bilge Flower Drink
22 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Can a compendium of terrifying recipes for female health problems represent resistance to patriarchal authoritarianism? And can a violet brandy disast...
Cynewulf's Elene: Troubling True Cross and a Licorice-Lemon Quaff
08 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A bearded Coley and plain faced Hussey debate Cynewulf's ethnic ideological steamroller with special guest appearance by a demon, Judas (not the o...
Special Episode: Siân Echard and Alexandra Gillespie on Thomas Gascoigne's Precepts
27 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
CHAUCER'S DEAD. So dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dr. Gillespie and Dr Echard discuss this, plus John of Gaunt's decaying phallus, Gower's poseur...
Gower's Virginius and Chaucer's Physician's Tale: The Commons and the Creeps
17 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The rank and brutal foulness of the brown fizzy berry cruelty overwhelmed the judicial malfeasance and filicidal love of these Middle English moral ex...
Beowulf: Imperial Epic / Insurgent Poetry
27 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Matt and David freak the hell out about Beowulf after an exploding flaming cinnamon disaster / triumph, and one of us still has glitter in our teeth. ...
5ails 5ive: the Antifascist Middle Ages
12 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the first episode of season 5, Matt and David ask--and do not quite answer--whether we can read medieval English literature in terms of fascism or ...
Kalamazoo Fails 3
27 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Matt and David bring the Canterbury Fails roadshow to Kalamazoo with six amazing guests: Valerie Allen, Ruth Evans, Martin Foys, Jordan Zweck, and Jef...
Thre Prestis of Peblis: Threefold Bait and Switch with a Mid Whisky Sour
02 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The set up is so juicy: dissolution, gluttony, corruption--but no, it's a moral Scottish march through politics, ethics, and penance, with a 3x3 d...
Proverb from Winfrid's Time: A Macronic Prosimetric Shorty with a Burly and Surly Complexity of a Drink
17 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Buried in an eighth-century Latin letter from a monk who keeps his name a secret is a two-line maybe heroic nugget of juicy maybe heroic wisdom. We re...
Money, Money, Money: A Dour maybe-anti-Money poem and a gross drink you might have had stealing liquor from your parents
05 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Matt and David try to grapple with a late Middle English anti-money tract, but there isn't much to work with, and the cocktail is a citrusy paean ...
Ælfric's Mid-Lent Sunday: Stirring Metaphors and a Stirred Drink
15 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A reflective reading of Jesus and his loaves and fishes, chock full of allegorical goodness, and a world class Old Fashiouned (TM): thank you Canada!
Insta-Fails: Four Middle English Lyrics and Four Breweries
02 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A very special stunt episode where Matt and David read unseen (by them, but no doubt Furnivall has read them all) and give their gut reactions / hot t...
The Rime of King William: Chonky Anglais Fizz and Angry Rhyming Couplets
15 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A poem in Old English that is wildly ambivalent but brutally clever coupled with a vegetation-rich perversion of an English classic.
The Fraternity of Drinkers: Initiation Rites with Quarts of English Ale
18 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A gentle tail-rhymed parody about a brotherhood of drinkers that no one has every written about: a perfect Fail.
Ælfric's Homily on the Nativity: Invisible Wolf and Thicc-Dranks
30 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Ælfric gets all teacherly about Jesus's birth and Matt and David suck down 3000 calories in 5 minutes. It's great.
On the Corruptions of the Times: Bad Poetry, Matt Weeps, and a Pencil Shaving Cocktail
16 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The vaguest and most general milquetoast fifteenth-century poetry on how bad things are (they are bad people!) with a drink that makes Matt and David ...
A Voice Crying Out and a Fortified City: Old English Prose Psalm 30
01 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Alfred shouts out his sorrows while Matt and David (both the Biblical and the actual) knock back a Bob Dylan x vermouth fanfic love fest. With fire. A...
The Juggler and the Baron's Daughter: Dicey Magic Seduction and a Citrusy Gin Bomb
19 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A Middle English ballad about a sketchy juggler with bad intent and a potent bittersweet and floral ringer.
Old English Saint Pantaleon: Dumb Ways to Die
27 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
An inventive and violent life of a kid doctor with the citrusy and herbal Milk of a Lion.
How the Plague Was Ceased at Rome: Shoddy Sticky Bun and Fungal Bourbon
14 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Lydgate's anti-Plague miracle poem with pestiferous angels paired with a medieval medicine-infused citrus bomb.
Kalamazoo Fails II
30 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A live and in-person episode recorded in Kalamazoo Michigan at the International Congress on Medieval Studies featuring Usha Vishnuvajjala, Marty Schi...
Capture of the Five Boroughs: Political Lackeyism (or how to kiss Edmund's heroic ass)
05 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A mediocre and short (thankfully) Old English encomium for Edmund that confuses Danes and Vikings paired with a rich and potent New York transplant co...
Feast of Tottenham: Impossible Food in a Bad Parody
22 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A barrage of nonsense luxury food items coupled with a surrealist filmic stiff drink.
Wulfstan On Isaiah's Visions: David and Matt Wander East Van Breweries
10 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A very special episode we like to call Canterbury Fails Ales Trails: a pilgrimage to several imbiberies punctuated with discussion of a bilingual apoc...
Bird with Four Feathers: Flimsy Penitential Allegory and Repugnant HubbaBubba Juice
16 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A Middle English bird cries out for mercy, while we suck down the WORST potpourri vanilla chemical peach asscrap
Old English Hexameron: Creation and Libation!
03 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Ælfric lays out the first six days of creation--ecotheory, gender, epistemology (according to Coley)--and we have a stunning cocktail and IPA chaser....
Jack and his Stepdame: Explosive Farts and Compulsive Dancing
20 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A comic almost-fabliau about a boy, three wishes, and apocalyptic flatulence, with a layered cocktail that hides the darkness in the light.
Special Episode: The Pastons
08 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Margaret was both a medical and military rockstar. Do not mess with her.
Peri Didaxeon: How to make yourself blind
02 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
An Old English barrage of healing recipes--dung! venison! breast milk!--with a cozy medicinal hearth warmer.
Special Episode: Beetles, Buttholes and Bowel Movements
27 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Who'd have thought that the super classy and amazingly sophisticated Marie de France wrote poems on exploding ass and pregnant men?
Complaint Against Fortune: Meh
18 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
An anonymous Boethius-lite (TM) prison poem coupled with an opaquely frothy egg creme abomination.
Bede's Death Song: Library Superhero
03 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The short Old English death lyric embedded in an emotional Latin letter about an expiring superstar scholar, coupled with an explosive lemon and anise...
The Colkelbie Sow: Utter Insanity
21 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A poem so unruly and excessive that it cannot be summarized: unhinged bananas bull goose loony. With a trifecta of Penny cocktails.
Passion of Saint Maurice: Old English Carnage
07 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Ælfric's life (and death) of the saint Maurice and his 6665 friends, plus a potent bitter smoky and sweet masterpiece.
Tale of the Five Beasts: Scots Goodness
22 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A beast fable dream vision mirror of princes with a potent and delicious Scottish cocktail.
Enigmatic Cryptography Incest Riddle
09 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
An Old English prose riddle that many or may not be about incest, and a page of secret codes, coupled with a curdled hellscape of coconut, citrus and ...
A Very Special Episode Live from the International Congress on Medieval Studies
18 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Recorded live in front of a real audience in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the Canterbury Fails had six brilliant guest stars: Brian O'Camb and Mary Kate H...
A Delightful Rustic Burlesque Tournament
21 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A bunch of yahoos battle it out over a reeve's daughter, while we drink an oily peach-potpourri disaster.
An Old English Poem about Bones Cooked by Cooks in a Cooking Pan
07 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A degenerate and grotesque Old English psalm paired with a smoky golden delight.
A Description of Man's Members (really!)
04 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A wild and all too detailed description of male members; actually, no, it's a political allegory in verse, and a sevenfold rich whisky marvel.
The Old English Chrodegang
18 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A stultifying set of rules for churchmen with a flaming rum-blast of venom, scorpion-style.
Very Special Episode: Council of Trees and the Knight's Tale
29 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this stunt episode, David and Matt adventure downtown to a super fancy cocktail lab and--switching it up--attempt to match a medieval text to the d...
Rats Away! A Middle English Charm
14 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A broken-down shattered poeticalish charm against vermin with a swingin' big city celebrity tipple.
Excommunication! Curses! Woe!
10 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A fiery blast of excommunication ritual with a literally on fire tequila citrus blowout.
The Book of Quint Essence
19 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An alchemical slog in Middle English prose matched by a neoplatonically perfect cure-all.
Lorica of Laidcenn
28 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
God and his army protects every last one of your weird little body parts, while you sip a herbal smoky kick to the the triform brain (and liver).
WPHP Monthly Mercury x Canterbury Fails: MONKS !!!
15 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A late medieval music theory complaint and literally the best most bonkers depraved monk freak show mock-gothic novel paired with a gin-soaked tea (do...
Voice Crying in the Wilderness
30 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
An elegant and informed exposition of John the Baptist's birth paired with a cloudy red seafood drink.
The Babee's Boke
16 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A pedantic grind about table manners with a syrupy cocktail for babies.
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT plus two micro-fails and hotdogwater beer
30 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We interrupt summer hiatus to invite proposals for a live Canterbury Fails: do you want to be on the Fails? We want you to be on the Fails. We're host...
A wayle whyt as whalles bone
24 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A maligned Harley lyric about birds in a lady's underclothes paired with a whale-poop tinged concoction: a cetaeceous sazerac.
Whitsunday (Tongues of Fire and a Dove)
10 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A homely homily that keeps things very rote, with the BEST cocktail.
A Treatyse of Fysshynge with an Angle
27 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A fifteenth-century fishing handbook by a very chill nun, accompanied by a Herculean face-punch.
Adrian and Ritheus
06 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Wack-ass trivia in Q+A form, someone might call "Dylanesque" with the sublime nectar of the BVM's infinite glory.
Adam Davy's Dreams
15 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A dumb-ass political dream vision and kooky conspiracy theory with a potent citrus and herb concoction.
Old English Boethius Meter 30
01 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Homer and Virgil buddy-pic with a fizzy tree-licker.
A Talk of Ten Wives on their Husbands' Ware
12 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A parade of penis jokes with a disgusting double cocktail.
Old English Life of Saint Machutus
26 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A monotonous litany of fascinating miracles chased by a revivifying kick.
Quatrefoil of Love
12 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A droning dove sermon paired with smoky and herbaceous medicine.
Kentish Hymn
29 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A stultifying blanditude of Kentish verse paired with a trinitarian face-melter.
Wright's Chaste Wife
15 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A late Middle English not-fabliau with a whipped frothy refresher.
Pharaoh
22 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
An Old English "scrap of monkish experimenting" and a cumin-forward cocktail.