Appearances In The Wife Of Bath's Tale

“Seeing is not always believing.” -Martin Luther King Jr. ("Seeing"). In life, what people see is not always what they get. Appearances can be deceiving and keeping up with expectations does not always occur. Topics like these can consistently be seen throughout “The Wife of Bath’s Tale.” In “The Wife of Bath’s Tale”, Chaucer uses irony to teach characters that appearance can be deceiving as well as knowing that there is more value to a person than just physical qualities. King Arthur and his knights were held to a very high standard. The knights had to live up to the Code of Chivalry. Everyone would look up to these knights and thought very highly of them. However, while reading “The Wife of Bath’s Tale”, the audience can see a knight who did not live up to the Code of Chivalry. A knight is supposed to be loyal, generous, brave, modest, caring, and strong. This knight in particular commits a vile crime where he rapes a young woman. In the Middle Ages, a woman’s virginity was extremely sacred. If a woman and a man are not wed, and they have sex, even if it is not consensual, no one will want to marry that woman. The woman would become shunned by the society in which she lives. Knights set out to help

Physical appearances are not everything, this is something that people neglect to see in today’s society. People are too focused on having this perfect body when perfection is a mere figment of the mind. Perfection does not exist, so the wife shows the knight that even the ugliest beings can have value. Think, can one be happy with a person who is rude and hateful, but yet are physically attractive? In some aspects maybe, but to like such a person is difficult. A person can be loved for more than just their physical qualities. "Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder" –Plato (“A Quote”). Most of the time, life is about perspective and it is important to keep in open mind as one make their way through this significant