During the medieval period women were limited in life choices. They are either to be marry off by their father or to be a priestess. Marriage was a contract between two families and that women were treated as objects. They were to be the perfect maidens and “the emblem of all man 's strivings for self-perfection and self-fulfillment-for his ‘joye’ and ‘solas’ (Hanning, 580).” In the Canterbury Tales, Wife of Bath’s character presents a different perspective of what the audience believe a medieval woman is like. The Wife of Bath is a unique character, one might even say that she is a feminist because she was able to use her feminine power to acquire so much wealth and have her husbands at her command. Although some critics argue she is an anti-feminist, the way she uses what she has to obtain all that power at the end, say otherwise.
Starting from the age of twelve she was married to her first husband, by stating that she basically tells the reader that she is very much experienced. From the prologue, the skills to gain power over her husband was handed down from Wife’s mother:
I made pretense that he enchanted me
I dreamt of him all night, I also said,
And dreamt …show more content…
With women like Wife running their mouth around town telling secrets are just disagreeing not only the household but also herself in the process. That Wife would go around flirting with men even though her husband is still around. One might say that Chaucer talk about the Wife of Bath is to ridicule her actions. That she put her household in shame. But we also have to think about the fact that this whole story is written from a male perspective. So of course judging by a male point of view she is nothing more than someone that causes trouble and reject her duties. Instead, she should be proper and be doing good indeed to show her female power, which a good deal of might say true
Starting from the age of twelve she was married to her first husband, by stating that she basically tells the reader that she is very much experienced. From the prologue, the skills to gain power over her husband was handed down from Wife’s mother:
I made pretense that he enchanted me
I dreamt of him all night, I also said,
And dreamt …show more content…
With women like Wife running their mouth around town telling secrets are just disagreeing not only the household but also herself in the process. That Wife would go around flirting with men even though her husband is still around. One might say that Chaucer talk about the Wife of Bath is to ridicule her actions. That she put her household in shame. But we also have to think about the fact that this whole story is written from a male perspective. So of course judging by a male point of view she is nothing more than someone that causes trouble and reject her duties. Instead, she should be proper and be doing good indeed to show her female power, which a good deal of might say true