The two misfits ride a battered motorbike and trailer along the back roads of postwar Italy in search of meaning, love and, ultimately, redemption. As was the case with Chaucer’s great work, it was easy to get lost in the characters, the waiflike Gelsomina (Giulietta Masina) and her brutish antagonist, the circus strongman Zampanò (Anthony Quinn), and forget that the title of the film was “The Road,” a clear indication of the importance of that image. This background served quite well when some years later I taught a class on “La Strada,” Federico Fellini’s masterpiece of 1954. It’s a great trip, with fascinating companions, a few hearty laughs-many at our own expense-and, of course, the occasional moment of tragedy to remind us of the seriousness of our journey. As these wonderful characters travel from the Tabard Inn to Canterbury cathedral, each telling a story to pass the time, they reveal more of the human condition, and thus more about each of us as we travel from our earthly dwelling place to heaven. Two or three weeks into a study of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales in graduate school, I slowly began to appreciate that the pilgrimage itself held the key to the narrative.
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