The Wife of Bath

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The Wife of Baths Tale
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Quick Discussion

• Do you agree or disagree with the following
  statement a promise should never be broken? 
  Explain.
• What is more important faithfulness or beauty? 
  You have to pick one, explain your choice.
• How far would you go to save your life?
• Do the wealthy live above the law? Explain.
• Does the class a person comes from make a
  difference in their character?  Explain.
• What is the most important factor in a happy
  marriage?

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What do women want most?
What do women want most?
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Frame Narrative/ Envelope structure

• The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer 29 pilgrims on
  their way to
• Each Tale occurs within The Canterbury Tales
• The Pardoners Tale
• The Wife of Baths Tale
• Tale within Wife of Baths Tale

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Setting

• Thomas Becket Murdered 1170
• Time and Place of the Story The Canterbury Tales
• Spring time Sometime after the Murdersome say
  as early as between 1171-1173 some say much
  later 1381
• Time and Place of the Tale The Wife of Bath
• During the reign of legend King Arthur
• Long before 1170

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Wife of Bath

• An early Feminist
• Churchs anti-feminine tendencies
• Conflict b/t bookish male auctoritee
  (authority) and female experience
• Knowledge of books
• Knowledge of the world

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Overview

• In Part 1, the Wife defends marriage (as opposed
  to virginity)
• In Part 2, the Wife describes her married life
• In Part 3, the Wife describes her final husband
  Jankyn and their arguments over the Book of
  Wicked Wives
• In the Tale itself, the Wife tells us of a rapist
  knight who must answer a riddle to save his life
  What is it that women most desire?

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Geoffrey Chaucers CT The Wife of Baths
Prologue and Tale

• Dame Alice's justification of her attitudes
  toward sex and marriage (Lines 1-198)
• Lines 26-50 God bade us to increase and
  multiply
• Lines 65-78 A woman may be counseled to be pure,
  but counsel and commandment arent the same.
• Lines 111-134 Speaking of reproductive organs
  I mean to say that they were made for both--
  That is, both for relief and for our ease To
  procreate, so God we not displease.
• Lines 145-156 And in the flesh his troubles will
  be grave As long as I continue as his wife For I
  will have the power all my life Over his body, I
  and never he.

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Geoffrey Chaucers CT The Wife of Baths
Prologue and Tale

• In the Middle Ages, women were portrayed in a
  terrible light.
• Many laws existed concerning sexual relations
  between married people.
• How do you prevent men (in this male-dominated
  society) from sinning in sexual matters?  Portray
  women as terrible creatures.
• This is the kind of society the Wife of Bath
  would have lived in.

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Geoffrey Chaucers CT The Wife of Baths
Prologue and Tale

• Lines 199-222 The first three husbands were
  "goode, and riche, and olde" (203)
• Lines 225-29 Alice likes her first three
  husbands because they were easy to dominate and
  control
• Alice got what she wanted from her husbands
  money, possessions, love (though she didn't seem
  to love them), sexual satisfaction.

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Geoffrey Chaucers CT The Wife of Baths
Prologue and Tale

• Dame Alice's Fourth and Fifth Marriage (Lines
  459-834)
• Digression showing Alice's more tender side
• The fifth husband, Janekin, is the only husband
  Alice married for love, not for money
• Dame Alice struggles to gain dominance over
  Janekin

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The Churchs Hierarchy

• Virgins
• Widows who dont remarry
• Married women
• It was felt that God must love virgins most and
  that married people came a very poor third in his
  affections.
• --------------------------------------------------
  --------
• God
• Men
• Women
• Animals

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• In the course of her Prologue she seems to
  confirm as many stereotypes as she confronts.
  There's no question at all, though, that she gets
  your attention.
• In the late classical period, a lot of authors
  wrote treatises about the disadvantages of being
  married, particularly for men who hoped to have
  careers as scholars and thinkers.

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• 1. Wives would talk your ear off, preventing you
  from getting any work done.
• 2. Wives would demand that you make lots of money
  to pay for their extravagant lifestyle.
• 3. They would spill your secrets to anyone who
  happened to walk by.

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(No Transcript)
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What Men Say About Women

• Nature has given women so much power that the law
  cannot afford to give her more. Samuel Johnson
• No trust is to be placed in women. Homer
• A woman, a spaniel, and a walnut tree, The more
  theyre beaten, the better they be. - Thomas
  Fuller
• Can you recall a women who ever showed you with
  pride her pibrary? Benjamin Decasseres

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• Girls began to talk and to stand on their feet
  sooner than boys because weeds always grow up
  more quickly than crops. Martin Luther
• A very little wit is valued in a woman, as we are
  pleased with few words spoken plain by a parrot.
  Jonathan Swift

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Wife of Bath Reflection Question

• In todays society, where might you find
  individuals who would agree with the Wife and the
  philosophy she illustrates with her story? Who
  might argue against such opinions?