The Wife Of Bath Literary Analysis

To eat or not to eat. In this battle of concocted tales, this is where it all boils down to. Both the Pardoner and the Wife of Bath have surely produced fine stories, each with their own charm; however, it will not be a battle without a clear winner—only one can enjoy a free meal. Although the “Wife of Bath’s Tale” tapped into a strong topic—gender equality—it only stated that women want to be equal to men as well, but never delved in deeper. The story even disregards the problem at hand: a knight who raped a girl and got away scot-free, even finding himself a beautiful and loyal wife. If the story went differently, the “Wife of Bath’s Tale” has all the components of a great story. Meanwhile, the “Pardoner’s Tale”, although short, successfully showed the corruptness that humans have, as well as the consequences if ever one finds themselves stuck in greed’s vice grip. Therefore, the Pardoner’s tale is better than the “Wife of Bath’s Tale” because it delves into the darkness of humanity, the consequences when one has dug themselves too deep and shows how, despite people knowing the result of their misconduct, will still choose to sink further into darkness.

The Wife of Bath had five husbands, and she believes that women should have all the power in the marriage. This is very important to her tale, and the Wife of Bath shows just how smart she was, manipulating her

She believes that women should have absolute power over their marriage. Sovereignty is one of her significant values. Throughout the tale it is apparent that the storyteller still has those same beliefs. During the knight’s quest to acquire the answer, he finds an old lady. This older woman holds the answer he had been searching for. She will tell him the solution if, he promises her one thing. He is to do as she says, if she is ever to need anything. After presenting the answer that the old lady gave him, his life was spared. As a result the old lady asks the knight to marry her. Disgust filled the knight however, he had no choice. In this case the older woman had the power over the knight. The knight had to abide by her request. His negative attitude towards the old lady does not go unnoticed. A preposition if then offered to the knight. The old lady can stay old and loyal or become beautiful and treacherous. Power is rooted in the woman and not the man. The knight has the choice but no sense of ability to change her. The Wife of Bath’s made it clear that she believed women should be in command. It is decided that the old lady will turn beautiful and remain

that he never went to hell (272). She clearly valued sex as the most important attribute of a husband for, “…in our bed he was so fresh and gay….Heaven knows whenever he wanted it- my belle chose-, thought he had beaten me in every bone…”(272) Even though her final husband had beaten her, because he was good in bed with her she felt she loved him the best of them all (272). Clearly, The Wife of Bath valued three things in her marriages, sex, power, and money. In her tale we find that power is an important role to women in marriage. A knight, after raping a women is spared by a queen (282) but in order to save his life, he has one year (283) to find, “What is the thing that women most desire”(282)? After searching, he finds no answer but on his way home finds an old women who promises she will save him, he must promise to do what she asks of him after however, and he agrees (285). When he and the old lady meet with the queen, he exclaimed, “A women want’s the self-sovereignty over her husband as over her lover, and master him; he must not be above her” (286). This answer is perfectly inline with The Wife of Baths views, she always wants to be more powerful than her husband. When the old lady says he must marry her, he protests but soon she offers him two choices, he can have her be old and ugly till she dies, but loyal, or she can be young and pretty and take chance that she might not remain faithful (291). He gives his answer to be that she may choose, thus giving her the

The many references to emotional physical interaction between men and women was how the Wife of Bath justifies her marriages. She did what she needed to do for survival and get what she wanted for herself.

He does not submit to her at all,he fights with her for the control. She explains that she loved him the most out of all the husbands: “My fifth and last-God keeps his soul in health!The one i took for love and not for wealth”(272). This one she married for the love and admits to that because all the other four husbands were for the money. She also has this fact about her that she is partly deaf because of her fifth husband beating her with a book: “ Reading this cursed book, all night no doubt, I suddenly grabbed and tore three pages out/ Then like a maddened lion,with a yell he started up and smote me on the head”(279). The fact that she talks about how she loved him the most, but he abused her is interesting. Her fifth husband, Johnny did not let her be the master in their relationship. She liked this game they were playing on the fight for control. The book he was reading was talking about of biblical stories that had to do with women. These stories were diminishing women in a way. As the wife of bath comes off as the spokesperson for women this became very insulting to her. But she still says he was the one she loved the

Often at times people can feel disconnected from themselves, from the world, or even friends and families; Therefore, causing tension in relationships. Which was displayed in “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” when the knight searches all over the world to find out what women most desire in a man. Also in “One Amazing Thing” there are various stories from different characters that have had trouble with personal stories and how one gender or religious belief can be more dominate than the other.

In The Wife of Bath’s Tale and Prologue and The Franklin’s Tale, the central theme is the relationship between man and woman. There are different views of this relationship or marriage in these two tales: either the woman has the power in the marriage granted from her husband, or the husband and wife grant each other power in the marriage so neither dominates.

Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” is an important part of his most famed work, The Canterbury Tales. One of the most respected highly analyzed of all of the tales, this particular one is important both for its character development and its prevailing themes. It seamlessly integrates ideas on society at that time with strong literary development. This work stands the test of time both because of its literary qualities and because of what it can teach us about the role of women in late Medieval society.

In The Canterbury Tales, the Wife of Bath gives an in-depth look on her life and understanding on the world as she perceives it. During her Prologue, we learn that what she calls experience stems from her first three marriages, but during her last two there is a shift in power. The Wife of Bath demonstrates her understanding and power throughout her first three marriages both physically and emotionally and the contrast of her lack of control in her last two, thus revealing the true meaning behind what she believes is experience during these marriages. The Wife of Bath’s authority can be viewed as realist when paralleled to the chain of being because of the emotional control she has over her previous husbands and the simple fact that she

She gained control by using any and every technique she knew, which includes the withholding of “pleasure”, which we see in line 414 above. Instead of her husbands living a long life which her tale suggests in lines 1266 - 1268 by asking that Jesus take the lives of those husbands that are not controlled by there wives, the Wife of Bath gains sovereignty and they still die? Hardly, This parallel brings up the question of what really happened to husbands one through four, and is husband number five sitting at home or has he also found himself six feet under? Is it a coincidence that she came home from her last

In The Canterbury tales, Chaucer uses The Wife of Bath as a representation of what it was like for Women in the Middle Ages to be striped of equality and bow to the otherwise male dominated society. For the representation of women Chaucer uses the Tales of “The Scholar”, “The Second Nun “The Reeve’s”, and “The Franklin” and many others in a very dry, pretentious manner to steer readers into the view of how a women of the Middle Ages should be as a so called “virtuous” wife or woman. The concept of marriage plays a major part in manifesting the idea of the issues of inferiority of women. The perception rendered as women having to be obedient and inferior figure to their husbands or male counter parts. Chaucer

The Wife of Bath's greedy need for complete control over men reflects in most of her actions. She seems proud of this, and constantly describes women as cruel creatures that bring great sorrow to men. When talking about her first three husbands, she says that she "governed them" (193), and "chided them cruelly" (193). She makes life for her husbands a living hell, having no respect for their feelings. Just like the women questioned in her story, she cares only for "riches...amusement...rich apparel...," to be "flattered and pampered," and for "pleasure in bed" (225). When talking of her first three marriages, she says: "Since they had given me all their land, why should I take pains to please them, unless it be for my own profit and pleasure" (192). In her story, the moral is that all women want to hold the whip in a relationship, and it is in the man's best interest to let them do so. The Wife of Bath is not a woman to be admired and, worst of all, she insists all

The Wife of Bath contains three issues that were pretty extreme for the women of the time period. The negative connotation linked with the women and sex is the first one, the second is the position of husband and wife in marriages that leave the women submissive and the men in control, and third is the violence done by men to women. The seriousness of these issues were not discussed at all by men and most certainly not by women. The fact that the Wife of Bath brought up such issues and promoted the ideas of women in these situations was profound. The wife is smart in her delivery in both the Prologue and Tale. The Tale restates all of the subjects of marriage, violence, and sex that she first brings up in the Prologue, and

Another criticism of Alison's character as one representing feminist ideals is that she gains her power through acting out stereotypes of women as well as violence. The criticism of women began with Eve eating the apple, which caused the downfall of mankind (meaning solely men). Hereby, women were the downfall of men. Wives were thought to be nagging, vicious, and yet in complete subordination to their husbands. In the case of her first three husbands, Alison commands power by acting out these aged stereotypes. She tells the reader: