Girls Just Wanna Have Fun-damental Rights

Post date: Jan 29, 2017 7:08:39 AM

I opened The Canterbury Tales to read the Wife of Bath while working the desk shift and a written note at the top of the section said, "since age 12, the wife of bath has been married 5 times" and I naturally went "ew" really loud, freaking out some freshmen who thought I cared about their conversation about laundry.

Please save me from McCandless Desk shifts. Please.

Reading the Wife's backstory about her 5 husbands was fascinating in an "it almost put me to sleep way". At first, it read like a typical "omg look at me I'm a scandalous woman who dominates her husband and wrongly uses allusions and references to back up my points". I could get behind her idea that a women's sexuality shouldn't be policed by men and that men themselves demonize women for various reasons (pg.327-329) I'm more ambivalent about the idea that women too would "have written of men more wickedness / than all the mark of Adam could redress" (695-696). On the one hand, women do and will generalize and demonize men, especially in a society where women are oppressed by a patriarchal society. On the other, if women had more of a voice from the get go, equality of the sexes would have been more easily achieved due to everyone's* voice being heard.

Her pride in her sexuality is something to be lauded, especially in an era where it was demonized heavily, but it is also connected heavily to the idea that her sexual activity is attached to looser morals and a need for domination over her husband. Instead of being a morally upright person who is on equal footing with her husbands, she nags them, manipulates them, and uses her sexual appeal to trick them into giving her money and things. She also makes sweeping claims about women "we women can't keep secrets" (950) and "forbid us something, and that desire we" (519). It plays into the stereotypes of women as horrid gossipers and people who chase after the aloof and unattainable instead of settling. Men and non-binary folk like a good gossip as much as the next person and every human wants what they can't have (see: Prohibition).

The Wife is complex. She seems bitter about the societal restraints that make her seem sinful but also more than willing to play into society's own prejudices. Her story reflects this. The premise, a knight needs to find out what women most desire in order to save his own life (even though in my opinion he should still have died because he, y'know, raped someone.), is something unique. We don't normally see that as a legitimate quest, and yet it is one. He talks to women and we get to see the diversity of opinion. Some say riches, some say sex, some say flattery. It's hard for the knight to find out what women actually want because *SPOILER* women are all individual beings.

The official desire given that wins the knight back his life as well as a new wife is that "women desire to have sovereignty as well over their husbands as their loves and to be in mastery them above" (1038-1040). This reflects the Wife's own want of always dominating her husband. It's later in the story though that I think the true desire comes out. Women don't want mastery over men but they want the ability to choose and have their voices heard - they want to be equal. When the knight allows his wife to choose beauty or faithfulness, they gain both. I think that's the important part of the story, let women decide their own fates, and both men and women will be happy.

*by everyone I mean of course those who could write and those allowed access to writing, namely the upper class. Sorry peasants, you still don't have a voice.