Sovereignty, Supremacy, and Dominance in The Wife of Bath When reading the wife of Baths prologue and then her tale one can not help but to see the parallels present. Marriage’s association with sex in contrast to the ostensibly superior practice of clerical celibacy was one of the ways that clerical superiority was asserted over lay people in the religious texts of the period (Lipton 4-9). This passage has been central to the assertion, famously made by George Lyman Kittredge as early as 1915, that the Wife of Bath seeks to rule over her husbands. In particular, the Wife of Bath is insulting another of Chaucer’s pilgrims, the Friar. “Sexual Economics, Chaucer’s Wife of Bath and the Book of Margery Kempe.” Minnesota Review 5 (1975): 104-115. She considers herself an authority on the subject, since she was first married at age twelve and … Although this definition of marriage as consent applied to all medieval women, historians have shown that in practice, women in the middle sections of society (whom we would now identify as “middle class” including cloth merchants like Chaucer’s Wife of Bath) exercised the greatest choice of marriage partners. However, a wife could operate a business separately from her husband and, depending on the nature of her husband’s will, a wife could inherit property after her husband’s death. The Wife of Bath is referred to as “ancient,” making this a hyperbole because of the great exaggeration of her true age. This explains why Chaucer’s Wife’s celebration of sex is linked to her challenges to clerical authority. We know from the general prologue that she is an accomplished weaver, one of the most lucrative occupations in England at the time. Chaucer’s Sexual Poetics. When the Wife speaks of her fourth and fifth husbands, however, the Prologue becomes more personal, like a modern autobiography, exploring the role of love in marriage and its relationship to gender hierarchy and domestic violence. The Wife is acquisitive, admitting proudly to marrying for money and exhorting land from her husbands before she is willing to sleep with them (WBP 210-214). Why do you think the Wife is depicted without children? The Slipping Slope of Sovereignty: Hamlet by William Shakespeare 1222 Words | 5 Pages. How can the ending, with its fairy-tale language of happy ending, be reconciled with the depiction of her relationship to Jankyn as “dangerous” to her, a position validated by his reading misogyny to her and by his acts of domestic violence? The Wife of Bath’s Prologue provides an introduction to medieval ideas about marriage and love. How can the. She also challenges the view that sexual pleasure is problematic. This idea that wives should be controlled by their husbands was integral to medieval legal practice. The Open Access Companion to the Canterbury Tales. The Wife of Bath claims female “experience” as her authority, but then goes on to imitate male preachers in her interpretation of the Bible.    The Wife of Bath, with the energy of her vernacular and the voraciousness of her sexual appetite, is one of the most vividly developed characters of 'The Canterbury Tales'. She is very well situated, because her first three husbands were old and wealthy. Many modern feminists see sexuality as a form of agency and female empowerment, but the Wife’s Prologue engages with paradigms of clerical teaching that associate sexuality with sin. The Wife of Bath’s Prologue manipulates existing conventions of marriage in innovative ways, providing a model for social change that is not radical but provisionary and partial. How does the juxtaposition of love and hierarchy in medieval marriage sermons help us think about the ending? / And eek I praye Jesu shorte hir lives / That nought wol be governed by hir wives”(281.1266-1268)*. Basing his analysis in the biblical example of Mary and Joseph, St. Augustine argued that the essence of marriage was the “affections of the mind” rather than sex. Susan Porter Benson, Stephen Brier, and Roy Rosenzweig In this passage, the Wife not only threatens masculine prerogative, she also challenges clerical authority on marriage both by her experience and her command of the tools and strategies of marriage sermons. After tearing the pages and a violent skirmish between the two of them, Jankyn gives the Wife “the governance of hous and lond” (WBP 814) and grants her the “maistrie” and “soveraynetee” over him that she had over her first three husbands. In her prologue The Wife of Bath says she gained sovereignty over each of her husbands, Development of Setting and Suspense in The Withered Arm by Thomas Hardy, Integrating New Technology Into The Classroom - The Interactive Whiteboard, Women During The American Revolution Essay. Let’s pause to think about some general questions before moving on: Can you think of ways that the meaning of marriage is contested in our world today? 41 The old hag and the rapist-knight understand "gentilesse" in different ways. Chaucer was certainly aware of this tradition since his Parson’s Tale is structured like a confessor’s handbook. Unfortunately, just at the time she gains complete mastery over one of her husbands, he dies. By limiting the scope of the desired sovereignty here, this passage is more in keeping with St Paul's behest that a husband and wife should have sovereignty over one another. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996. A similar theme is expressed in "The Wife of Bath's Tale." In asking that the knight marry her, the hag really has asked for his body since, as we learned in the Wife of Bath's Prologue, a wife has sovereignty over her husband's body for his entire life. “Marriage sermons, Polemical Sermons and the Wife of Bath’s Prologue: A Generic Excursus.” Studies in the Age of Chaucer. . First, in obedience.” (ParsT 927-29). Edited by Robert P. Miller. Navigation. To your own reading of the biblical text? This kind of writing typically painted a picture of the “woe of marriage,” a phrase used by Chaucer’s Wife of Bath in the opening lines of her prologue. Women were frequently identified by marital status in contrast to men, who were often defined by their jobs. The characters presented in the Canterbury Tales each depicts a stereotype of the kind of person Chaucer would be familiar with in the 14th century England. Her prologue is by far the longest in the Canterbury Tales and she says if her husband had so much as pissed against a wall she would have told her “gossyb” (WBP 533-544). Nonetheless, the first part of the Wife’s Prologue resembles a marriage sermon in its use of Biblical quotations and interpretations to defend marriage. Although the Wife of Bath challenges masculine and clerical authority, she does not challenge a conventional association of marriage with sexuality in the late medieval period. At 856 lines her prologue, or 'preambulacioun' as the Summoner calls it, is the longest of any of the pilgrims, and matches the General Prologue but for a few lines. But God made womman of the ryb of Adam, for womman sholde be felawe unto man. In the series Critical Perspectives on the Past, Chaucer’s Queer Nation. Mann believes that "The Wife of Bath's Prologue" diminishes the antifeminism that Alisoun finds so demeaning, while "The Wife of Bath's Tale" condemns a rape of a young woman, by a knight, so effectively. TEAMS Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute, 1995. As the information in the “Tools” section below will demonstrate, marriage teachings and practices in late medieval English culture were far from homogeneous, despite a persistent modern idea that medieval marriage exemplified patriarchy at its most extreme. Chaucer and the Subject of History. In this view, the limited virtue of marriage lay in its ability to protect the spouses from sex outside of marriage. Edited by V. A. Kolve and Glending Olson. Throughout her marriages she has a sense of authority and uses it to her advantage to gain satisfaction within her relationships. As her marriages progressed, there is a shift in power both physically and emotionally. The Canterbury Tales: The Wife of Bath's Prologue Quotes. We are reminded that she claims to have married this last husband “for love and no richesse” (WBP 526). Instead, medieval marriage was represented in complex and contradictory ways that combined, for example, an insistence on marital sexuality with a definition of marriage that did not require sex and a demand for both mutual love between the spouses and the rulership of husbands over wives. Woman Defamed and Woman Defended. The Wife of Bath, then, seeks sovereignty through a combination of experience and independent wealth. All land and goods owned by a wife, including property inherited during her marriage, was legally controlled by her husband. Although no woman or lay married person could be a preacher in the Middle Ages, the resemblance of her prologue to a sermon is recognized within the text by the Pardoner (also a preacher), who interrupts the Wife to say “Ye been a noble prechour in this cas” (WBP 165). Questioning the superiority of celibacy over marriage is one of several ways that the Wife challenges the superiority of clerical over lay authority. Patterson, Lee. For it is better to marry than to be burnt” (I Corinthians 7:9).   Once he proves himself by discovering the answer to the question of what women want and then by answering the old woman’s question correctly (that is, by letting her decide), … Affections of the Mind: The Politics of Sacramental Marriage in Late Medieval English Literature. Building on the association of marriage with undesirable sexuality, anti-matrimonial writing depicts wives as sexually voracious, unfaithful, vain, acquisitive, and unforgivably talkative. [1]In George Lyman Kittredge, Chaucer and His Poetry (Cambridge, Mass. Sovereignty "I have the power duringe al my lyfUpon his propre body, nd noght he." The only reason that she is freer than other women is that she is not beholden to anybody. Do you think Chaucer’s text perpetuates or criticizes these stereotypes? Medieval sermons were critical of widows who chose to remarry, especially those who had already had children, suggesting that they were motivated primarily by sexual appetite. St. Paul specified that marriage was not sinful (“if thou take a wife, then thou hast not sinned”) but, he said, married people will “have tribulation in the flesh” (7:28). Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2007. edited by The knight recognizes this and asks the hag to 'lat my body go!' Medieval preachers interpreted this to mean that because there were acceptable reasons to have sex in marriage, being married required constantly resisting the enjoyment of sex. Analysis. When Chaucer's short poem addressed to Bukton, who is about to marry, recommends. First of all, the Wife is the forerunner of the modern liberated woman, and she is the prototype of a … Where does the Wife cite “the Apostle”? The Wife of Bath is a five-times married woman of strength and backbone, which is not normally seen in the 1400s. How does the Wife use her status as a widow to gain power? Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003. By Geoffrey Chaucer. Blamires, Alcuin, ed. The Wife of Bath's Prologue makes the Wife one of the best-developed characters in the entire Tales. / Now how that a womman sholde be subget to hire housbonde, that telleth Seint Peter. “The povre man, whan he goth by the weye, Bifore the theves he may singe and pleye.” 350Of my povert na-more ye me repreve. The Wife of Bath then relates tales about her former husbands and reveals how she was able to gain the upper hand ("sovereignty") over them. Not only did the medieval legal system treat wives as inferior; there was a colorful genre of “anti-matrimonial” writing that advised men not to marry on the grounds that wives were intolerable. She reports that she cannot keep secrets. In asking that the knight marry her, the hag really has asked for his body since, as we learned in the Wife of Bath's Prologue, a wife has sovereignty over her husband's body for his entire life. The Wife of Bath begins her lengthy prologue by announcing that she has always followed the rule of experience rather than authority. In what ways do modern political concerns shape our private experiences of marriage? The Bridling of Desire: Views of Sex in the Later Middle Ages. Critics, such as Sheila Delaney, have argued for reading the Wife’s Prologue as a lesson on the ways in which wives were limited by marriage law and for seeing Chaucer’s Wife as a victim of “sexual economics.” Others, such as Laurie Finke, have emphasized the ways marriage laws allowed the Wife to gain power by using marriage to make money, locating her prologue and tale in the mercantilism of fourteenth-century England. 1. implore someone for a favor 4. bequeath a legacy 2. cackle like a crone 5. everyday temporal concerns 3. the king’s sovereignty 6. rebuke someone for a mistake Complete the activities in your Reader/Writer Notebook. — “‘Experience woot well it is noght so’: Marriage and the Pursuit of Happiness in the Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale.” In The Wife of Bath: Geoffrey Chaucer, 133-54. Chaucer’s Parson instructs: “God ne made nat womman of the foot of Adam, for she ne sholde nat been holden to lowe; for she kan nat paciently suffre. Why do you think Alison of Bath is identified as “the Wife” instead of as a cloth merchant in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (another male figure in the tales gets the name “the Merchant”)? The Wife of Bath is one of the most popular and well known characters of “The Canturbury Tales”. Following St. Augustine’s notion that sin was determined by intention rather than by the act itself, preachers taught that sex was only sinless if undertaken in an effort to have children or to save one’s spouse from fornication but not if experienced as pleasurable (Payer 84-110). In this way the Wife of Bath is able to gain sovereignty over her fifth husband. On our ongoing political debates about the definition of marriage? The Wife of Bath for example, had five husbands and three out of, Lucas in her articles regarding Australian masculinity presented in cinemas suggests that the themes of social perception and presentation of masculinity and maleness have been repeatedly used in Australian cinemas (Lucas Page 138). A widely circulated example of this kind of writing is by Theophrastus who is named as a source for the Book of Wikked Wives that Jankyn reads to the Wife in her prologue (Theophrastus, Blamires; WBP 671). How do the complex and contradictory ideas about medieval marriage outlined in the “tools” section help to understand the contradictions at the end of the tale? Having already had five husbands "at the church door," she has experience enough to make her an expert. This meant that widows could potentially be financially and legally independent from men in ways not possible for married women or women still living under paternal control. The Wife of Bath's tale is funny. The Wife’s Prologue has, indeed, charted the “wo that is in marriage” (WBP 3), but it also acknowledges the importance of marital affection. Brundage, James A. Then she … Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992. Burger, Glenn. Unlike many contemporary societies, which often place marriage and family values at the center of religious practice, in the Middle Ages marriage was associated with sexual activity and, thus, was considered less spiritual than celibacy, which was required for the clergy. Next Marriage. The double sense of what constitutes gentility that we see in the instructions of the deportment-book writers is the Wife's starting point and the fulcrum of her jest. The Wife of Bath gives up sovereignty right after she get it, and the Prologue ends with an image of marital harmony and partnership. H ISTORY She adds that images of masculinity in cinema may reflect and maintain the dominant hegemonic masculinity, but as well may also challenge the dominant concepts of masculinity (Lucas 139). In this scheme, a woman’s virtue was tied to the degree to which she rejected sexuality. The Prologue begins like a sermon and then takes on the terms of misogyny and misogamy as the Wife describes her first three marriages, demonstrating her success in manipulating the marriage system to her own advantage as a means to consolidate money and power. Sheehan, Micheal M. Marriage, Family and Law in Medieval Europe: Collected Studies. Political structures of oppression seldom reach that extent of personal domination. In her tale, at the end, the Wife of Bath is making clear that the knight must submit to the authority of a woman. Just as the Knight in her tale must reject misogynist answers to the question of what women want, such as riches and pleasure in bed (WBP 925), the Wife’s act of tearing of pages out of Jankyn’s Book of Wikked Wives is a symbolic rejection of misogynist stereotypes, invoked earlier in the Prologue in the repetition of “thou seist.”. How does Chaucer’s Wife challenge the hierarchy of the Three Grades of Chastity? The section on lust juxtaposes the importance of mutual love between spouses with the need for a wife to obey her husband. Boston and New York: Bedford Books of St. Martin’s Press, 1996. Love and Marriage in Late Medieval London. St. Paul allowed that those who were not able to abstain from sex were better married than not: “but if they do not contain themselves, let them marry. Lisa M. Fine, The Story of Reo Joe: Work, Kin, and Community These paradoxical views were often expressed at the same time in sermons and in handbooks that instructed priests on how to perform confession. Do you think the Wife’s manipulation of the marriage market promotes social change or reinforces misogynist stereotypes? TWENTIETH-C ENTURY The Wife of Bath's personality, philosophy of sexuality, and attitude toward sovereignty in marriage obviously are offered as comedy. The unnamed knight in the Wife of Bath’s tale is a foolish, overly lusty bachelor who breaks the code of chivalry when he rapes a maiden in the woods. Can we take this ideal of marital love seriously? To understand the Wife’s Prologue, then, we need to consider contemporary teachings about marriage and sex. The idea that marriage was defined by mutual love was juxtaposed in medieval sermons with a seemingly opposite view that husbands should rule over their wives (Galloway, Sheehan 262-77). Medieval church courts upheld this sacramental definition of marriage as the consent between two parties as expressed in the exchange of marriage vows (McSheffrey, Helmholz). Given that the Wife is the embodiment of misogynist clichés, is it still possible to see her—or the Prologue—as feminist? As we will see, this idea of marriage as grounded in mutual love and mutual choice helps us understand the end of the Wife of Bath’s Prologue. Provide Website FeedbackAccessibility Statement. Because of the church and their limiting and previous religious thought, “man see none elves mo”. He is sent by the queen on a quest to learn his lesson. Politics and Culture in, Sovereignty, Supremacy, and Dominance in The Wife of Bath Essay examples, Sovereignty, Supremacy, and Dominance in The Wife of Bath. This obligation was known as the “marital debt” (or “conjugal debt”) and was often justified in an interpretation of St. Paul: “Let the husband render the debt to his wife, and the wife also in like manner to her husband” (I Corinthians 7:3-4; Payer 89-98). When the marriage sacrament was formally defined in the twelfth century, the mutual love between spouses (expressed in the exchange of marriage vows) was determined to be the substance of the marriage sacrament; this love in turn was both the sign and substance of God’s grace. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974. Is it possible to love in a relationship that has not always been mutual? If they had given the wife dominance, according to the hag, their lives would not have ended as they did. Delaney, Sheila. This last phrase, “so was he to me” marks the marriage as one of shared roles and shared affection. Historically the man is portrayed as the head of marriage, but the Wife of Bath shows that is not, Masculinity in The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale The Wife of Bath is intriguing to almost anyone who has ever read her prologue, filled with magnificent, but for some, preposterous statements. Perhaps, as Lee Patterson suggests, the Wife “is willing to abandon maistrye once she learns that he cares enough to grant it” (Subject of History 310). In medieval courts, wives were represented by their husbands (and by their fathers before marriage). Alisoun’s sovereignty over Jankyn encompassed what he said, what he did, and even what he read. Edited by Peter G. Beidler. The major parallel that exists is the subject of sovereignty. New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 2005. The Prologue begins like a sermon and then takes on the terms of misogyny and misogamy as the Wife describes her first three marriages, demonstrating her success in manipulating the marriage system to her own advantage as a means to consolidate money and power. The Wife of Bath takes great pride in the fact that she has had sovereignty over all her five husbands. The Wife of Bath's Tale The tale itself is set in King Arthur's Court , giving it the air of a fairy tale or legend. Edited by James K. Farge. After the Pardoner’s interruption, the Wife’s description of her marriage to her first three husbands invokes the stereotypes of misogynist and anti-matrimonial literature (Patterson 141). Who has it, which wants it, which deserves it and what will you do to get it? He also goes so far as to describe … Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, Mission Statement, Goals, and Editorial Principles, Reference: Everyday Life in Late Medieval England, Reference: Manuscripts of the Canterbury Tales, To what extent should we understand the ending of the, Chaucer’s Wife fulfills negative contemporary medieval stereotypes about wives and women. The Wife of Bath is sarcastically referencing to the “charitee” of the “limitours” who are missionaries of the church. Others, such as Elaine Tuttle Hansen, emphasize the ways in which, despite the fullness of her characterization, the Wife is not a person but a fictional construction of male misogynist discourse, “a dramatic and important instance of woman’s silence and suppression” (29). The Wife celebrates marriage and links it to sexual pleasure, to love, and to her sense of selfhood. In her "Prologue," she tells the other pilgrims about the techniques she used to gain control over her first three husbands. Evidently Chaucer is infatuated with Alisoun, as he plays satirically with both gender and class, E SSAYS ON Even within marriage, preachers taught that sexual pleasure was “lust” and considered sinful. She reports: “God helpe me so, I was to hym as kynde, / As any wyf from Denmark unto Ynde, / And also trewe, and so was he to me” (WBP 823-25). “The Roman poet Juvenal tells us of the virtues of being poor. Here, she refutes St Jerome’s interpretation of this passage as condemning marriage, insisting that St. Paul supports marriage. Misuse of St Paul saying that married couples have claim over each other's bodies by claiming he said that only she has claim over her husband's body 'I have the power duringe al my lyf/ Upon … The prologue of the Wife of Bath begins with her telling her beliefs and how she feels like women shouldn't have to live to please a man. The knight recognizes this and asks the hag to 'lat my body go!' in Autotown, U.S.A. Despite its bad reputation, sex was considered an obligation in marriage if requested by either the husband or the wife in an effort to avoid fornication. The wife of Bath suggests, rather, that womenshould be in charge, and explains that they want sovereignty and power over the men intheir lives, an opinion which is expressed explicitly in his tale.Confidence: The wife of Bath is in total control of her life, despite the patriarchalsociety. Throughout her five marriages, the Wife has learned a great deal. Thus, the Knight gives himself freely to his wife and gives her control because he trust her with his life. Van Gosse and Richard Moser, eds., The World the Sixties Made: . Her logic in this passage is similar to the one that shapes curriculum in many English departments with classes by female authors: the idea that the gender of authors plays a fundamental role in the stories they tell. [1] This is certainly the Clerk’s view of the Wife and “all hire sect” (ClT 1171). Chaucer's view on women, demonstrated by the “Wife of Bath’s Tale” and the Wife’s belief that all women desire sovereignty, is welcomed by William Shakespeare but not achievable by Hamlet’s female protagonists, Gertrude and Ophelia. Read More. The hag prays at the end of the Wife’s tale that Jesus cut short the lives of those who’ll not be governed by their wives, “And grace t’overbide hem that we wedde. The Wife shows that the same passages from St. Paul (whom she calls “the apostle”) most often used in contemporary sermons to promote the superiority of celibacy over marriage can be turned on their head and used to defend marriage and justify marital sexuality. The wife of bath is a women who thought more like people do in today's society rather than they did in the past. Smith, Warren S. “The Wife of Bath Debates Jerome.” The Chaucer Review 32.2 (1997): 129-145. When the Wife speaks of her fourth and fifth husbands, however, the Prologue becomes more personal, like a … The Wife of Bath's tale is a brief Arthurian romance incorporating the widespread theme of the "loathly lady," which also appears in John Gower's Tale of Florent. 14 (1992): 3-30. To what extent do you feel she shares familiar values? Boston and New York: Bedford Books of St. Martin’s Press, 1996. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993. Marriage Old Age Sex Literature and Writing Power Wealth Love Women and Femininity. Galloway, Andrew. A large number of Australian cinemas display standard perspectives of masculinity, Canterbury Tales, The Wife of Bath gives the reader an understanding of her stance on marriage and how she perceives the world. The denigration of marriage was tied to the low valuation of sex in medieval clerical teaching. Do you think the text validates experiential or textual authority? In this passage, marriage combines two seemly incompatible virtues: mutuality in love and the rule of husband over wife? Refuting a possible practical reason for marriage, this text asserts that wives are inferior managers of the household compared to male servants. According to "The Wife of Bath's Tale" women most desire sovereignty in marriage and over their husbands. Lipton, Emma. The Wife of Bath holds a favorable view of marriage. The Age of … The Wife of Bath: Sovereignty, supremacy, and dominance When reading the wife of Baths prologue and then her tale one can not help but to see the parallels present. Medieval sermons and theologians often cited St. Paul First Corinthians 7, which recommended continence and linked abstinence from sex to a greater reward in heaven. The Wife boasts that she rules over her first three husbands, inverting the conventional hierarchy of husband over wife. In this passage, the Wife depicts her husband as serving her pleasure, rather than seeing the marital debt as a mutual obligation designed to protect against fornication.

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