Wife Of Bath Character Analysis

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In Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, Chaucer opens describing twenty-nine people who are going on a pilgrimage. Each person has a dissimilar personality that we can recognize from the way people behave today. He creates The Wife of Bath to stand out more compared to the other characters that are involved in these stories. In Chaucer’s “General Prologue,” the Wife of Bath was described as a woman who was intentionally described in an obvious way to provoke a shocking response. The Wife carries a lot of experience with things; she is a worldly person and has experience in the ways of the world in a sense of love and sex. Her clothes, physical features and references to her past are intentionally discussed by Chaucer causing the reader to wonder how well she is such a flamboyant and extravagant character. She shows off her clothes with evident pride, her face is wreathed in heavy cloth, her stockings are a fine scarlet color, and the leather in her shoed is soft and fresh. Her clothing symbolizes to the reader that she is not fearful or shy, and also shows off her expertise as a weaver.
In “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue” the Wife of Bath discusses marriage, virginity, and most importantly the question of dominion. In the “Wife of Bath's Prologue,” it opens with a quote “I have the power, during all my life over his own body, and not he.”(Norton 164-165) This quote proves how much dominion and power she desired and took by default. She is a strong-willed and dominant woman who gets what she wants when she wants it. She cannot accept downfall no matter how it is presented to her. She senses that this is the way things should be and men should submit her. She should not be controlled or told what to do by others, especially by a man. She displa...

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...etends to be dead trying to make him feel guilty for what he did. Her way of making him feeling guilty, turns into her gaining ultimate power once again.
The wife of bath is not a feminist fighting for the rights of all women. She claims to know what pleasures men because she is experienced in love and sex. She believes in giving men what they desire, which is sexual pleasure from her. This proves that she is not fighting for freedom of women. This is definitely an antifeminist view. She is using sex to manipulate men just as men do to. Giving in to the man's desire goes against feministic beliefs, she had a choice of not giving in to man, but she lets men attain sexual pleasure and power for his own desire. At first I would believe that she is trying to win women freedom and liberation, but in reality is not. She is an extremely selfish and an authoritative woman.

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