Examples Of Courtly Love In The Wife Of Bath's Tale

Courtly Love in The Canterbury Tales Courtly love can be described as a medieval conception of love that emphasizes nobility and chivalry. "The Wife of Bath's Tale" from Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales depicts some criteria necessary for true courtly love; however, not in a traditional sense. This allows us to compare it to today's society since courtly love still exists, but in a non-traditional way mainly through media instead of actual relationships. The media is perhaps one of the greatest influences in today's time as it sets the tone of one's thoughts and beliefs. Through the use of non-traditional courtly love between the characters, Chaucer shows the beginning of a new kind of love that has evolved into what we see now. One of the common aspects of courtly love is the submission of a knight to his lady. The story begins with the "knight in shining armor", however, it strays from tradition when the knight is accused of raping a woman. This shows that he is not a brave or courageous knight as seen in other texts. This is still portrayed in many ways today. For example, in the well-known animated movie, Frozen, Prince Hans meets Anna, the princess, and …show more content…
In “The Wife of Bath's Tale”, the knight saves his own life by telling the queen the answer she wants: women want sovereignty. Ultimately, the old woman is given the sovereignty to decide her own fate and turns into a beautiful young women. When the knight chooses her instead of the beautiful woman, he is rewarded when he marries her and she becomes young and beautiful. One could see a similar situation in the movie Shrek. Towards the end of the movie, Shrek and princess Fiona take a love potion and Shrek allows her to decide if she wishes to remain a princess in a beautiful human state or in an ugly ogre state, which is her true self. She gains sovereignty through being given the choice and chooses to be an ogre with