The Wife of Bath

1
The Wife of Baths Tale
2
Prologue

• Contention The Pardoner mocks the wife
• I was about to take a wifeTherell be no wife
  for me this year
• This is in response to the Wifes mentioning her
  desire for a sixth husband

3
Prologue continued

• Shows that not all members of the group get along
• Underscores Chaucers admiration for the Wife by
  the Pardoners opposition

4
The Tale

• Theme marriage
• Theme What women want
• Character Chivalry (the knight)
• Comments on the general treatment women received
  from other men, especially their husbands

5
Background

• Religion is set up to fall
• Friars have displaced spirits. Women had been
  ravaged by spirits, but the wife suggests that
  friars are even worse
• Scathing commentary on the morality of the
  friars

6
Background

• Chivalry is set up to fall
• There was a knight who was a lusty liver.
• By very force took her maidenhead
• These examples are directly contrary to the
  values espoused by chivalry

7
Irony

• The knight was to be beheaded, but Fate
  intervenes the queen
• The knight is saved by the queen and her court
• His next task is Herculean discover what women
  most desire in a year

8
What Women want

• Honor
• Jollity and pleasure
• Gorgeous clothes
• Fun in bed
• To be oft widowed and remarried
• Pampered and flattered

• The variety of answers suggests that there is no
  answer
• Suggests that women are impossible to please

9
Midas Wife

• vicious we may be within/ We like to be thought
  wise and void of sin.
• Women have an image to keep up
• Pertains to men onlywomen know their true
  natures among themselves

10
Midas Wife

• Vicious though Midas loved her best, his
  wifes vicious nature superceded her own love
• Of Midas ears transforming she thought she
  would have died keeping this secret bottled up
  inside
• Wife must gossip

11
The Secrets Out

• The Midas story prefaces the secret to what women
  want
• The knight finds fairies who disappear, leaving
  an old hag
• Note that fairies are mentioned favorably

12
Secret

• The hag gets the knights promise to give her
  whatever she asks in exchange for the difference
• And then she crooned her gospel in his ear
• Crooned suggests intimacy gospel means truth

13
Secret Revealed

• A woman wants the self-same sovereignty/ Over her
  husband as over her lover,/ And master him he
  must not be above her.
• Women want equality in the relationship

14
The Bargain Met

• The old hag takes he knight to be her husband
• This is the woman in sovereignty
• This is ironic for the knight, who ravaged a
  maiden at the beginning of the tale

15
The Bargain Met

• He takes his ancient wife to bed
• At this point, the old woman teaches the knight
  chivalry

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The Arguments

• Old
• Ugly
• Poor
• Low-bred

• These are the Knights reasons for not loving his
  wife
• They reinforce his character as not chivalrous

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Rebuttal Low-bred

• The hag says that the idea of noble birth
  guaranteeing gentility
• The hag claims that deeds make a nobleman
  (gentleman)

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Rebuttal Poverty

• Hag mentions that God approves of poverty
• This appeals to Chaucers audience, who would
  have been familiar with this Christian concept

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Rebuttal Poverty

• Claims that poverty is not shamefulindulgence
  and avarice are
• The poor are not missing what counts being happy

20
Rebuttal Old and Ugly

• The hag claims that these two attributes ensure
  that she is chaste
• The old hag will still satisfy the knights
  worldly appetites

21
Submission

• The knight finally submits
• He has a loyal, true, and humble wife
• At the time of submission, he finds his wife
  young and beautiful

22
The Moral to the Story

• cut short the lives of those who wont be
  governed by their wives
• Request by the Wife for all husbands
• The wife displays her real world intelligence