The Wife of Bath: a Symbol of Antifeminism

The married woman of bath A figure of Antifeminism Evelyn Cunningham, feminist advocate and journalist states, Wo workforce are the only crush meeting in our clubhouse that lives in intimate association with their oppressors, this abduce was said by Evelyn Cunningham a feminist advocate and journalist. This quote static holds unbent non only in todays society save in publications are well. It is no secret that women in literature are seen as less than equal to men. This is especially true slightly The married woman of privy of Geoffrey Chaucers The Canterbury Tales.The Canterbury Tales tells the story of a group of people making a pilgrimage and tell stories to pass the time. The characters in The Canterbury Tales comment on society through the descriptions they tell. One of those characters is The Wife of bath whose extended prologue is a fictional autobiography. The Wife of Baths prologue and tale display Chaucers antifeminist idea to society Chaucer, the author behi nd The Wife, uses her to drop women internally, mentally, and socially.Chaucer writes The Wife of Bath to have no boundaries when talking about sex, and in the halfway ages this was very oft frowned upon. The Wifes sexual zeal nookie be seen in the prologue, Chaucer writes, Experience, though noon auctoritee / Were in this world, were effective y-nough to me / To speke of wo that is in marriage(). The experience she is referring to is of course sex. Chaucer has her bumbleing about how much sexual experience she has. How much sexual experience one has is passing inappropriate for a woman of any time era to boast about.By showing off how experienced she is in the bedroom, Chaucer makes the Wife of Bath sexually objectify herself. Thus, Chaucer is making the statement that women should only be seen as sexual objects and should be placed submissively to men, and thus demeans the fe antheral race in a sexual manner. Chaucer has the Wife misquote the Bible in her prologue. During the middle ages the Bible was not translated so it was not widely known. The fact that Chaucer has The Wife misquote the Bible is making women into a joke because there is no way she would even have this information. Makes her look stupid and single minded. seek to come up with arguments why its ok to have sex and conjoin multiple times. Twists it around to defend herself. Quotes half verses, distorts what little she knows. However, Chaucer writes so that The Wife of Bath completely misinterprets the Bible and therefore is humiliating women in a mental way for instance, Chaucer writes, besides this word is nat take of every wight, / tho ther as God list give it of his might. I woot wel, that thapostel was a mayde / But natheless, thogh that he wroot and sayde, / He wolde that every wight were swich as he, / Al nis but conseil to virginitee Because The Wife is publically announcing her misconception of the Bible it shows that Chaucer considered women to be mentally below men and shows that he used The Wife of Bath to spread his antifeminist ideas to society. Chaucer uses The Wife of Bath to show women in a promiscuous light. In her prologue, The Wife of Bath says that she has been married five times and hopes to be married a one-sixth for example, general prologue promiscuous quote.Wants to get married again for sex not companionship Chaucer wirtes, For, lordinges, sith I twelf yeer was of age, / Thonked be God that is eterne on lyve, / Housbondes at chirche-dore I have had fyve The Wife of Bath does not marry for love, she marries so she can have sex. This can be seen as promiscuous behavior because she is nervelessly marrying to casually have sex. Chaucer uses the Wife of Bath to socially demean women because he makes The Wife of Bath take part in promiscuous behavior.Throughout literature and history women have constantly been seen as less equal to the male race. This is evident in Geoffrey Chaucers The Canterbury Tales. Chaucer uses The Wife of Bath a s a symbol for the female race and through his story he displays his antifeminist views sexually, mentally and socially. Whether women are better than men I cannot say but I can say they are certainly no worse, this quotes should be kept in mind while reading The Canterbury Tales because Cahucer imposes his antifeminist views on his readers.Talks about husbands as being in control of them and brags about her faults of stereotype of women. accuse husbands of cheating when it was really me. Spent all their money. Fourth husband cheated on him. Fifth husband younger. &8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212 1 . lines 4-6 2 . Golda Meir feminist activist