My group chose to read the tale of the Wife of Bath. In the beginning of the tale, a knight takes advantage of a maiden that he sees while he is riding. He is condemned and sentenced to death, but the queen saves him from the king, on the condition that she won't kill him if in a year, he is able to find out the thing that woman most desire. The knight asks every woman he finds, without luck, but just when the year is up, he comes across an old lady. She says that she will give him the answer if he agrees to do one thing that she wants after he is pardoned. In front of the queen, the knight tells her that the one thing that women most desire is to be in charge of their husbands, to be independent. The queen and her court accepts this answer, and the old lady tells the knight that her bidding is for him to marry her. On their wedding night, he tells her that he is acting weird because she is old and foul. She gives him the choice of having either an obedient, chaste, but old wife, or a young and fair wife that will attract other men from around the country, and not be as obedient. She also presents arguments for why her low social standing and state of poverty should not affect his opinion of her. His response was that she should choose whatever pleased her, and that would please him. She then told him that she would be both good and fair, changed her looks to a young and beautiful maiden, and they lived happily ever after.
1. The knight is very impulsive through the impromptu way that he decides to take advantage of a girl alone on the side of the road, and through the way he quickly agrees to the old lady's arrangement without thinking of the consequences of the debt he will owe her. The knight is ungrateful and selfish because instead of effusively thanking the queen for saving him from immediate death, and providing him with an opportunity to live, he sighs grievously and reluctantly gives his word that he will seek out the answer she desires. The knight is noble and dedicated to keeping his word because he searches so ardently for the answer and for his life. It is described that he visits every household he can to find the answer to the queen's question. The knight is also very shallow because he refuses to see past the old wife's age, wealth, and social status before forming an ill opinion of her. In the end, however, he is clever because he realizes that the answer the old lady is looking to hear from him when she gives him a choice between two types of wives is the answer she told him to what all women desire: power in their husband's lives.
2. I believe that Chaucer's purpose in writing this tale was to challenge the demeaning attitude of society towards the poor and lower classes. Near the end of the tale, he has the old lady explain how gentility shouldn't be affected by social standing, "that he is noble who does noble deeds." This contradicts the popular conception that people of a higher social status are automatically considered gentlemanly, despite their actual actions, while those of a lower social status aren't considered gentlemanly, even if their actions are nobler than those who are considered to be nobles. Chaucer, through the words of the old lady, also opposes the stigma that poverty is a shame to those who are in it. He does this by having her present an appeal to authority saying, "The High God, in Whom we believe, say I,/In voluntary poverty lived His life." This is intended to provoke the question, why is poverty despised in marriage and social standing when the God we look up to chose was poor also?
No comments:
Post a Comment