'The Wife Of Bath's Tale'

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.

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.

An inference that can be made about the Wife of Bath is that she is confident in herself and even her past. The Wife of Bath seems very knowledgeable in love and confident in her beliefs. In “The Tale of the Wife of Bath” she says “If anyone should rub us on a gall, That will not kick because he tells the truth.” This sentence shows how the Wife of Bath is unapologetic when it comes to love and who she is. At the end of her story, she takes the time to ask God to send women a particular type of husband. She says “and Jesus to use send meek husbands, and young ones, and fresh in bed, And good luck to outlive them that we wed.” This quote shows the Wife of Bath is confident in her knowledge of men and love because she believes every woman wants

The Wife of Bath starts by explaining herself as “Experienced, though no authority”. She considers herself as experienced because since the age of twelve she’s been married but not with the same husband. She’s had five husbands throughout her lifetime. The reason why I think she’s been married so many times is because the men didn’t have what she wanted. They may have been good to her but they may have not met her needs. The Wife of Bath looks at life in a different way. God says women are supposed to make more life such as children. This may be another reason why she has had so many husbands. God try’s to explain to her “that only once in life” should she be wed. Instead of listening to God & taking his authority she ignores his authority. This is an example of her acting as if she as no authority. When explaining the Wife of Bath she can be explained as a knowledgeable person that’s does what she can do find happiness in a man that is wealthy,

During this time, the church ultimately established the rules and beliefs of society and women became even more marginalized. The wife in the tale is everything the church would be against for roles of women. Women were traditionally seen as needing to be fully subservient to their husband for a home, children, and financial security. The wife in this tale challenges her societal status set by the church by mainly having multiple husbands and knowing/justifying her actions biblically (even if information is exaggerated or fabricated), such as when she incorrectly described the encounter of Jesus and the Samaritan woman beside the well. (ll. 15-22).

Additionally, The Wife of Bath utilizes biblical and classical mythology allusions to justify why women should be relieved from the expectations of sexual purity. In fact, she makes over 30 references to the Bible, or to Greek and Roman mythology to help expound on her point. At first glance, her arguments are persuasive and seem quite substantial, but upon deeper reflection, almost all of them lack a trustworthy and foundational basis. One interpretation of this, might be that the Wife of Bath is intentionally twisting scholarly information and biblical texts out of context, to deride and parody religious scholars, like the Friar, who may twist and convolute texts in their own favor. Even without approval from external sources of authority,

We meet the Wife of bath in the general prologue, she was introduced as one of three women in the pilgrimage. Unlike the other two she is not a nun, but a married woman,line 445- 455 "A good WIFE was there of besidè BathBut she was somedeal deaf, and that was scath. Of clothmaking she haddè such a hauntShe passèd them of Ypres and of Gaunt.In all the parish, wife ne was there none That to the offering before her shouldè gon.2And if there did, certain so wroth was sheThat she was out of allè charity. Her cover chiefs full finè were of ground; durstè swear they weighèdèn ten pound" this lines is basically referring to how She shows off her Sunday clothes with evident pride, wearing ten pounds of cloth, woven specially by her. She wears heavy

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

In Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, he introduces a character known as the Wife of Bath. It is her turn to tell the stories, and her tale begins discussing her past marriages in the prologue. Married five times, the Wife of Bath tells us about her own marital issues, and the way she was able to manipulate the gender roles to her own advantage. As interesting of a character as she is, I find Chaucer created the Wife of Bath to deliberately introduce the issues gender roles play in our society. I believe that the role the of the Wife of Bath in the tale was purposely written by Chaucer to twist the traditional gender roles of the time, satirizing how gender plays in society.

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 Wife of Bath’s tale suits her prologue because it exhibited her views on marriage and matches her personality. The wife of bath is a self –proclaimed expect on marriage due to her experience. She ignores Jesus’ disapproval of having five husbands, but prefer the command of to go forth and multiply. In her prologue, she recounts how she gained control over her past five marriages and this display that happiness will follow when the women have control. Then her tale further enforces her ideal of this.

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.

The Wife of Bath, emphasizing “The Prologue of the Wife of Bath’s Tale” and the “The Prologue” in Geoffrey Chaucer 's Canterbury Tales, is an example of the Middle English concept that male authors reflect misogynistic ideals of society onto female characters.With the Wife of Bath, she is a fictional character, as told by Chaucer, going on a Pilgrimage, with constant ridicule for her sexuality and multiple marriages. Chaucer portrays her as a previously battered wife who uses her sexual promiscuity as a way of control. He uses his progressive views to give the Wife of Bath power, but also reflects societal views from the period through responses and actions taken during her life. Although the abilities of women progressed in the Middle

The Wife of Bath's crusade to prove the worth of women does open the prologue to modern interpretations that reconfigure the Wife of Bath as a feminist

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