Essay On The Wife Of Bath's Marriage

Within “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale,” the Wife also uses manipulation to forward her desires while conforming to the patriarchal societal

The wife of baths tale takes place during a pilgrimage in the mid-14()0s, during such a time when not all women were ladies but being polite, noble and kind was fundamental at the time of this stories portrayment. The wife of bath's tale depicts a not so spoken element of a widowed women that's in an endless pursuit of pleasure. The first line of the first page states that "Experience, though no authority." Her many men she's wedded has given her a seasoning of knowledge that can't be learned from

The Wife of Bath pursued husbands in a way that did not benefit both sides of the marriage. She clearly admits that she does not show shame from having sexual relations with many different men, as she simply desires sex and riches from wealthy men. Medieval civilizations did not consider this behavior appropriate, as it conflicted with ideas of courtly love and God’s word. She states that, “I am dominated by the planet Venus in my senses, and my heart is dominated by the planet Mars” (Chaucer 626). This statement supports that her body and desires only seek pleasure, while her true soul remains conflicted, unable to truly love. At the end of each marriage she appears as the one who reigns victorious and still willing to remarry: “I boast of one thing for myself; in the end I had the better in every way” (430). The Wife does not have respect for her multiple wedded spouses, and would rather remain happy when they leave her than to flood herself with emotion of sadness.

The story the Wife of Bath’s Prologue is about this wife who has her own beliefs on a particular subject. According to the wife she has a lot of experience when it comes to marriage, the reason is she has been married five times. “And God be that I have married five” (l 44). She has seen ways of the world through love and sex. The wife says “Experience, though no authority Were in this world, would be enough for me To speak of woe that married affords; For since I was twelve years of age” (l 1-4). She explains how she is qualified to talk about marriage. Through her experiences with her husbands, she has learned how to provide for herself in the era where women had little independence or power.

The Wife of Bathe has married five men and has a completely different opinion of marriage than the Merchant. She enjoys being married and wants to have control over the marriage. This isn’t exactly what she finds in her life, therefore, in her tale, she creates the ending to her approval.

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

The fourth one was “bad” because this husband cheated on her. Her last husband Johnny, "the one I took for love and not for wealth…"(339), was bad because Dame Alice handed her power to her husband along with all of her money and land. He last husband also became abusive towards her, leaving her deaf in one ear. The Wife of Bath’s prologue proves that that she is only happy when she maintains complete dominance over her partner.

The Wife of Bath's actions also stem from her strong greed and need for control. That particular husband, her fifth one, was the only one she could not control. The desperate guilt he feels after hitting her, puts her in an excellent bargaining position. While lying on the floor she puts on a dramatic act of self-pity to make him feel even worse, and later describes: "He gave the bridle completely into my hand" (219).

reacted negatively towards her for it, but The Wife of Bath had no shame about displaying herself as she really was. She was not ashamed of the fact that she had been married five times, and was about to marry again and she hid nothing.

Beginning with the prologue, the Wife of Bath makes an argument for why she believes sexuality is the key weapon to use against men to achieve her goals. Doing such, she twists the typical gender roles of the time; that women are dependent upon their husbands and need a partner for protection and wealth. The Wife also shows in her stories how she was able to falsely accuse men and continuously hold the upper hand with them, which goes against traditional gender roles of the time of women being helpless without a husband.

The Wife of Bath is extremely hard working, successful, business women. She is also knowledgeable, the Wife has traveled all over the world and has lived with her many husbands. Every single person you meet teaches you something, with her traveling and 5 husbands she has learned quite a bit about the world. One thing that hurts the Wife is how much she loves her social status. Although the Wife is friendly and talkative, she is known to argue with those that do not respect her social status. If someone acts like they are above her, she makes sure they know they aren’t. Because of this quality, she would make a good principle. More often than not, a principle works very hard but gets little to no recognition for it. The Wife of Bath would not be able to handle people disrespecting her.

The Wife of Bath is a wealthy and elegant woman with extravagant, brand new clothing. She is from Bath, a key English cloth-making town in the Middle Ages, making her a talented seam stress. Before the wife begins her tale, she informs the audience about her life and personal experience on marriage, in a lengthy prologue. The Wife of Bath initiates her prologue by declaring that she has had five husbands, giving her enough experience to make her an expert on marriage. Numerous people have criticized her for having had many husbands, but she does not see anything immoral about it. Most people established negative views on her marriages, based on the interpretation of what Christ meant when he told a Samaritan woman that her fifth husband

In the stories of The Wife of Bath and Queen Guinevere from the tale of King Arthur, both women of nobility and are strong characters. The Wife of Bath is a woman who likes to be known in the upper class and enjoys and parties. Queen Guinevere “is more passionate and caring,” she takes her royal status for granted. In the Middle Ages, these two women did not fit the idea of how women were to act or think towards their roles as women in that time period.

The Wife of Bath spends most of the prologue explaining how she is dominant over her five husbands that she has had throughout the years. The Wife seems to get pleasure over the dominion and is not fully satisfied until she has complete control over her men.

The Wife of Bath was very loyal to her husbands in terms of not cheating, but was very manipulative, and acquisitive. Throughout the prologue she is never seen to be having or trying to have relations with other men besides her husband. She is very loyal to her husbands, as long as they’re around she continues to get what she pleases. Another trait is that she’s manipulative, she’ll make her husband feel guilty for things they’re not even doing so she can get them to buy her things as a ‘sorry’ from them. “What do you whisper with our maid? Ah, bless me! Sir Lecher, will you stop your treachery!” (lines 241-242), in these lines she’s accusing her husband of talking to the maid sexually, she’ll accuse him of these things when she knows that he’s not actually being disloyal. He’ll feel bad for things he’s not done and buy her gifts she pleases in order to gain her trust back. The Wife of Bath was very selfish, she would only do things for her benefit and if she knew she wouldn’t get anything out of it,