The Wife of Bath's Tale
It provides insight into the role of women in the Late Middle Ages and was probably of interest to Chaucer, himself, for the character is one of his most developed ones, with her Prologue twice as long as her Tale.
She calls herself both Alyson and Alys in the prologue, but to confuse matters, these are also the names of her 'gossip' (a close friend or gossip), whom she mentions several times, as well as many female characters throughout The Canterbury Tales.
By tradition, any knight or noble found guilty of such a transgression (abuse of power) might be stripped of his name, heraldic title and rights, and possibly even executed.
[6] Scholarly work reported in October 2022 refutes this, stating that the court documents from 1380 have been misinterpreted and that mention of "raptus" were related to a labor dispute in which Chaucer hired a Cecily Chaumpaigne, before she was released from her previous employer.
In the beginning, the wife expresses her views in which she believes the morals of women are not merely that they all solely desire "sovereignty,” but that each individual woman should have the opportunity to make the decision.
[10] The Wife of Bath's tale, spoken by one who had been married five times, argues that women are morally identical to men who have also had more than one spouse.
The Queen tells the knight that he will be spared his life, if he can discover, for her, what it is that women most desire, and she allots him a year and a day in which to roam wherever he pleases and return with an answer.
[5] The Wife of Bath ends her tale by praying that Jesus Christ bless women with meek, young, and submissive husbands and the grace to break them.
The Wife of Bath's Prologue simultaneously enumerates and critiques the long tradition of misogyny in ancient and medieval literature.
As Cooper notes, the Wife of Bath's "materials are part of the vast medieval stock of antifeminism",[11] giving St. Jerome's Adversus Jovinianum, which was "written to refute the proposition put forward by one Jovinianus that virginity and marriage were of equal worth,” as one of many examples.
[15] [clarification needed] While Chaucer's Wife of Bath is clearly familiar with the many ancient and medieval views on proper female behavior, she also boldly questions their validity.
[6][clarification needed] Both Carruthers and Cooper reflect on the way that Chaucer's Wife of Bath does not behave as society dictates, in any of her marriages.
(III.204–08) "hem" = them; "swynke" = work The Wife of Bath's first three husbands are depicted as subservient men who cater to her sexual appetites.
(III.179–81) The image of the whip underlines her dominant role as the partnership; she tells everyone that she is the one in charge in her household, especially in the bedroom, where she appears to have an insatiable thirst for sex; the result is a satirical, lascivious depiction of a woman, but also of feudal power arrangements.
In her Tale, the old woman tells her husband: "I prey to God that I mot sterven wood,/ But I to yow be also good and trewe/ As evere was wyf, sin that the world was newe."
In her essay "The Wife of Bath and the Painting of Lions," Carruthers describes the relationship that existed between love and economics for both medieval men and women.
Love can, in essence, be bought: Chaucer makes reference to this notion, when he has the Wife tell one of her husbands: Is it for ye wolde have my queynte allone?
(III.444–49) "tooth" = taste, pleasure The Wife appears to make reference to prostitution, whereby "love" in the form of sex is a "deal," bought and sold.
Hence, while the point that Carruthers makes is that money is necessary for women to achieve sovereignty in marriage, a look at the text reveals that love is, among other things, an economic concept.
I can well understand that noble text"[9] to bear fruit, not in children, but financially through marriage, land, and from inheritance when her husbands die;[25] Chaucer's Wife chose to interpret the meaning of the statement by clarifying that she has no interest in childbearing, as a means of showing fruitfulness, but the progression of her financial stability is her ideal way of proving success.
The Wife's "emphatic determination to recuperate sexual activity, within a Christian context, and on the authority of the Bible [on a number of occasions throughout the text] echoes one of the points made in the Lollard Twelve Conclusions of 1395".
[28] Author Alistair Minnis makes the assertion that the Wife of Bath is not a Lollard, at all, but was educated by her late husband, Jankyn, an Oxford-educated clerk, who translated and read aloud anti-feminist texts.
Further, Minnis explains that "being caught in possession of a woman's body, so to speak, was an offense, in itself, carrying the penalty of a life-sentence",[29] showing a perception that in Medieval Europe, women could not hold priestly duties on the basis of their sex and no matter how flawless her moral status was, her body would always bar her from the ability to preach the word of God.
[1] Wilks proposes that through the sovereignty theme, a reflection of women's integral role in governance compelled Chaucer's audience to associate the Wife's tale with the reign of Anne of Bohemia.
[30] By questioning universal assumptions of male dominance, making demands in her own right, conducting negotiations within her marriages, and disregarding conventional feminine ideals, Chaucer's Wife of Bath was ahead of her time.
The Wife of Bath's Tale reverses the medieval roles of men and women (especially regarding legal power), and it also suggests a theme of feminist coalition-building.
Zadie Smith adapted and updated the prologue and story for the Kiln Theatre in Kilburn in 2019 as The Wife of Willesden, a play which ran from November 2021 to January 2022.
