Canard

Why put the tailplane in front of the wing? Firstly, in order to confer vital pitch stability, the foreplane must be set at a higher angle of incidence compared to the main-plane. In other words it is at a slightly more nose-up angle. One result is that the foreplane will stall before the main wing. The foreplane having stalled, losing lift, the glider pitches nose-down (a characteristic of any stable aircraft), thereby preventing the main wing ever from stalling.

Therefore a canard hang glider is, in principle, virtually stall proof. In practice there are a number of drawbacks to the canard configuration, not least of which is complexity. And there is one phase of flight when stalling the main wing helps greatly; the landing flare.

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