The Wife Of Bath's Tale '

“The life so short, the craft so long to learn” (Famous Quotes). The Canterbury Tales is enriched with humanistic merit that allows the reader to sharpen his or her own craft of life. Specifically, “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” and “The Clerk’s Tale” are embodied with multiple struggles of life that pertain to life in the present. Despite seven centuries of society constantly evolving, the two stories’ plots can still be further analyzed through similar themes about relationships that pertain to modern society and how rhetorical strategy allows the audience to relate to the narrative characters.

Who is superior, man or woman? In “The Wife of Bath’s Tale”, situated in the 14th century, at this point in time there was a big difference in society between man and woman. Woman used to be the housekeepers, and did not have any independence from men. This aspect has been changing over the time as we get closer to the 21st century, women have been gaining respect and equality similar to men, and nowadays women can have the same jobs that men have.

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

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.

The Canterbury Tales depict many characters that, although fictionally created by Geoffrey Chaucer, may give the reader the opportunity to analyze and interpret their tales as a way of determining their personalities. The Wife of Bath and her prologue accurately supports this statement, as her intentions become expounded due to her questionable actions. The Wife of Bath exhibits in her prologue that she lacks respect and gratitude towards the men she beguiles into marriage and does so by falsely claiming direction from God. She shows not only deceit towards her many husbands, but also does not possess the ability to care about others before herself.

The Wife of Bath’s Tale in the Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer is a very pivotal point in the text. It argues in favor of feminine dominance in marriage in a time where women were always under the skeptical view. The leading example of the medieval skeptical view of women is St. Jerome’s response against Jovinian. It shows how women were more restricted than men and thought to be in the fault for the wrong things that happen to them. Chaucer opposes that stereotype by introducing the Wife of Bath, a very radical character just like the other characters in the Canterbury Tales. The Wife is a very outspoken feminist and justifies her decision to remarry four times. She uses St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians and other arguments to undermine the traditional antifeminism arguments, such as St. Jerome’s, against her remarriages.

The Wife of Bath begins the prologue to her tale by boasting of her experience in marriage. She has married five men already, and ignores the idea that this is a reproach to Christian principles. She is merely adhering to the Christian principle of "be fruitful and multiply." She cites the case of King Solomon, who had multiple wives, and tells the group that she welcomes the opportunity for her sixth husband. She also points out that Jesus never lays down a law about virginity, and essentially states that we have the parts for sex and should use them as such. The Pardoner objects to the Wife of Bath's musings on marriage, but she decides to tell

The Wife of Bath 's Prologue and Tale is about female empowerment it shows strong protagonists. I believe Geoffrey Chaucer used The Wife of Bath’s Tale to advocate for feminism. Chaucer used a strong female character to expose female stereotypes. It was an oppressive time for women in male-dominated society. During the Middle Ages, Chaucer wrote from a woman’s point of view something that was not normal at that time. He set his feminist ideals through the characters of the Wife of Bath and the old woman. He used subtle methods like humor to show his ideals. During Chaucer’s time nobody was used to the idea of women being equal to men, this idea did not exist. Chaucer expressed his ideas in the Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale by being one of the first to understand and acknowledge a women’s struggle in society, through this tale he shows the difference between men and women and their positions of power. In the Wife of Bath’s Tale, feminism is showed by the knight recognizing and listening to his wife. Chaucer is a feminist for his time because he used humor to mask his unpopular ideas he used these characters to voice his opinions.

The tale of the wife of Bath or Dame Alison is well suited to her because of the following reasons, Through the prologue of the Wife of Bath, we learned that Dame Allison knows how to manipulate men with their ideals, in the prologue, she explained her ideals about man, and woman relationship, also, she used some characters from the bible and scriptures to prove her different point of view in her arguments. The same does the ugly wife in her tale when she is convincing he husband about loving her without carrying the fact that she is ugly and poor. For example, the ugly wife explained to her husband about how Jesus being the king of heaven came to earth and choose to be poor. also, she mentioned how the philosophers like Seneca said that you

In every story there is that one character that sticks out among the rest. In Chaucer’s The CanterburyTales, there are many different corrupt and flat out crazy characters. However, The Wife of Bath is one character that stands out the most. She is a strong, sexual being who does not care about obeying the rules. The Wife of Bath speaks highly of herself when it comes to pleasing her man sexually and does not believe that when one marriage ends that is it; she believes that more opportunities open. She marries five men, four of them for money and one for love. The Wife of Bath is not perfect in her tale but she keeps her audience on their toes, she is bold in her tale and stands behind her beliefs.

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

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 uses bible verses in “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue.” Further, she employs the verses as an outline of her life to find reason in God to justify her actions. Nevertheless, the purpose of the verses differs within each stanza of the poem. The Wife of Bath is a sexually promiscuous, lustful, and manipulative woman. She marries men one after the other as they get older and die. In order to combat and overthrow the speculation and criticism being thrust upon her by societal norms because of her marriages, the wife turns to specific bible passages to find reason in life and support for her actions (Article Myriad.com). When the wife is having sex quite frequently and with different men she is said to be fruitful and multiplying. According to the wife, this is what she is told to do in the bible passage, which she has misinterpreted. Ironically, The Wife of Bath is using a predominantly male dominated book to back up and support her reasons for women being equal to men (Article Myriad.com). Not only has she referred to the benefits of adultery through the bible, she has also attempted to undermine the power of men in the very same way she has attempted to prove that the genders are equal. From this, it can be interpreted that although the wife claims to be providing evidence for women being equal to men, she is actually saying that women are better than men. She misinterprets the readings of the bible and male written passages on purpose in order to suit her needs.

example of the complicated nature of Chaucer’s belief system. On the one hand, we have many strong female characters that despite still being extremely dependant on the men in their lives, know what they want out of life. From a contrasting point of view, readers see a group of men, including Chaucer as the writer himself, making fun of the very nature of women as a whole. Is this really how Chaucer felt towards women, or is the prologue of The Wife of Bath’s Tale simply a parody of the opinions of his time?

The moral of Wife of Bath is that happiness in a relationship is when a woman is able to have control over her husband against a backdrop of the submissive wives of the Middle Ages. The prologue portrays a jovial woman who introduces herself and her beliefs on marriage. She has never been fond of authority and attributes her expertise in relationships to marriages with five different men. The Wife of Bath’s tale depicts a knight who needs to learn women’s greatest desire within a year in order to avoid beheading. The knight learns that “women desire to have the sovereignty and sit in rule and government above their husbands, and to have their way in love” (Lines 156-8). In the end, the sovereignty the knight gives to his old wife transforms her into a young woman and, “they lived in full joy to the end” (Line 325). The tale is not only a reflection of one’s interest to dominate a relationship, but also a need