Geoffrey Chaucer

4.8 ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’

Canterbury Tales: ms. EL 26 C9, fol. 72r: Wife of Bath: det., Ellesmere Chaucer

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Individual activity: The Wife of Bath

If you have not done so already, listen to Chaucer’s description of the Wife of Bath in Middle English at the Luminarium website.

‘The Wife of Bath’s Prologue’ and ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’

The Wife of Bath is a fascinating character who seems to leap off the page and into life. She is frank, outspoken and has a dauntless spirit. Her prologue (longer than her tale) dares to place experience of life over scriptural authority based on theory and inflexible rules, and to tell a story in which the man, a knight, defers to the will of a woman.

Optional activity: Notes

Read some notes on ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’ at Harvard’s Geoffrey Chaucer website, and from Bruce Magee and/or the introduction to ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’ at the website of Brooklyn College, City University New York.

Group activity: ‘The Wife of Bath’s Prologue’ and ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’

Read the prologue and the tale (with interlinear translation) at Harvard’s Geoffrey Chaucer website. You can also to listen to the recording of the whole Tale in Middle English on Professor Corey Olsen’s website.

Then post some thoughts about the following to the Chaucer I forum and respond to others’ ideas.

  • The Wife of Bath cannot be a feminist, but what does she have to say about forms of patriarchal authority?
  • How does the Wife of Bath counter ‘the vast medieval stock of antifeminism’ (Cooper, H., ‘The Wife of Bath’s Prologue’ in The Oxford Guides to Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996)?
  • How does the Wife of Bath use knowledge of scripture to further her argument?
  • What is the significance of the interruptions to the Wife of Bath’s narratives by other pilgrims?
  • If you have read ‘The Clerk’s Tale’ (of Patient Griselda), could ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’ be seen as a riposte to the moral of that story?

Optional activity: The Wife of Bath and gender

You might like to read one or more of the following articles on the Wife of Bath and gender roles.

‘The Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale’, ‘The Parson’s Prologue and Tale’, and the Retractions
Chaucer, ‘Canterbury Tales, ‘Wife of Bath’s prologue and tale’