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The Women of Chaucer
The Women of Chaucer
The role of women in the time of Chaucer
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Chaucer characterizes The Wife of Bath as controlling and powerful. The Wife of Bath was a complete contradiction of the typical female, during this time. The average woman was submissive and reserved. Whereas, The Wife of Bath possessed character traits that one would associate with men. Chaucer emphasizes this trait by describing her in such ways one would describe a man.
Austin Jolley English 110 8-10 AM Analytical Essay Wife of Bath Throughout the stories of Wife of Bath and in the prologue she touches on main points for how a female should be and act. As she is talking about her life, she was wed to five different men and was the example of what you don’t want to be. For example, she was going through and saying how she was only wed to the first 4 for money, power, and greed. But the fifth one was for the love of the man.
The wife of bath is an admirable woman. She thinks about herself and the love she deserves. The wife of bath encourages women of today to not let men control us a property and to be treated equal. The wife of bath doesn’t understand why women are treated differently in Bible and society. Wife of bath still marries five men to find the perfect one she only finds money and looks.
In the Canterbury Tales two characters that have different personalities is The Wife of Bath and The Pardoner. These two characters have some differences throughout the stories that helps people see where they are different. They both believe in love but one believes in homosexuality when the other believes in one man one woman. Another difference in the stories she believes that people can be married as many times as they want to be and she has five husbands. His work is having sinners give him money to make him rich.
Webster’s dictionary define trust as “firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, a strength of someone or something. As I read this story this word continues to come to my mind in The Wife of Bath not so trustworthy. To me it doesn’t seem as though she being truth about anything. In Geofrey Chaucer short story “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue” the main theme is how this one woman says she loves and take control over her husbands.
One of Chaucer’s Tales called the Wife of Bath displays remarkable diversity in the genre such as showing the social norms, sex, and money. The underlying theme of “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” is that women should be allowed to decide for themselves. Furthermore, men are better off allowing women to make this decision. The main character of the Tale “the Wife” or Allusion is a beautiful, intelligent, and young woman that attempts to justify her being remarried five times all of which for different reasons.
The Wife of Bath is a modern woman living in the 1400’s. Back then it was very taboo to be married more than once or have control in the marriage. For example, in the story it says “Christ went only once to a wedding.” Yet the Wife of Bath was married five times looking for a man to let her be in charge of him and the relationship. She was the type of woman who would be very mean and vulgar in bed in exchange for money for her submission in the relationship.
In The Wife of Bath's Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer, the knight have assaulted a lady by a stream, which drummed up a buzz. The knight was requested to discover what "ladies wanted most," so he had conversed with each lady in the town, while some say "Fun in bed," and "To be oft widowed and remarried" (99-103). As the year passes by, the perusers perceive how the knight gets frantic as he willing acknowledge to do any demand the old woman need, without asking her what was it (185-188). The knight was indiscriminately controlled by the old woman, as she utilized this as an approach to wed the knight. He gave the ruler the appropriate response she was searching for, yet then requested to be hitched, "it was done secretly" (254-256"), this demonstrate
The Wife of Bath exudes confidence while embracing her desire for control. Additionally, it is stated in the story that she had been married five times before and was said to be proud of the experiences. To further illustrate, the article “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue” written by Emma Lipton states, “... She is proud of her marriage experience and believes the more she marries, the better she is… .” The article also states that The Wife of Bath believed men used power, money, and religion to control women, so in exchange, she would use her body and sexuality to control her husbands (Lipton).
Gender role refers to those behaviors and attitudes that are considered to belong to one sex. Gender role is based on femininity and masculinity that differentiate women and men by giving men some roles and women which results to gender inequality. There some work in society that is regarded to belong to women such as cooking, taking care of children and other less important roles while men are given roles that makes them superior than women. Most of the gender roles associated with women makes them inferior and creates a room to be oppressed. Gender roles are constructed by society and attributed to women or men.
In the Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer, one of the most significant characters is the Wife of Bath. She has radical views about women and marriage in a time when what is expected from a woman is to be passive and submissive in a relationship. She is one of the story tellers of the book. Besides her story, there is also another part of the book where we can learn about Wife of Bath herself, the main prologue. When a comparison is made between these two parts, one can see not only some similiraties but differences, as well.
As the Wife of Bath is introduced into “The Canterbury Tales”, her prologue and tale serve as two key pieces of information for understanding who this character is, and what her motives are. In the Bath’s tale, we are introduced to a knight that, overcome by lust, rapes a young maiden. King Arthur’s Queen and the other women in the court tell him that he has a year to figure out what women want most in the world. If incorrect, he will be beheaded. After a year of searching for his answer, the Knight had completely given up on the quest, finding too many differing opinions.