The year of the millennium marks the 600th anniversary of the death of Geoffrey Chaucer. This first poet of the English language stands before the gateway of the early modern age at a time when the elite languages of French and Latin were giving way to the vernacular of the common people.

Richard West weaves a fascinating picture of a man whose own character has always puzzled lovers of his comic masterpiece, The Canterbury Tales. How did he remain so apparently cheerful and serene through one of the cruellest eras of history? As a child he survived the Black Death, later he fought in France during the Hundred Years War, served as a diplomat in Italy, and became an MP at the time of the Peasants' Revolt and the murder of Richard II.
Richard West sees Chaucer as the creator not only of English poetry, but of the national character and humour, the forerunner of Shakespeare and Dickens - in many ways, as the first Englishman.