Mixed Feminine Message in Wife of Baths Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer Essay

Mixed Feminine communicate in Wife of tubfuls humbug by Geoffrey ChaucerIn the Wife of Baths Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer, various women, such as the magnate and the old hag, stake their claim to authority all over men. Yet, they do so in a very covert manner. The knight has clearly treat his male power. He is a rapist. With the help of women, however, he is rehabilitated and seems to achieve the final happiness. When these women support the feminist viewpoint that women should have hyponymy over their maintains, they be also echoing the sentiments the Wife of Bath presents in her prologue. Yet, these women abandon mastery the moment they attain it. The old hag relinquishes mastery back to her husband immediately after he grants it to her, from that point on she obeys his every command. This refinement could be a type of female servitude or it could be a mutually beneficial, blissful marriage and partnership. For this reason, the Wife of Baths Tale s annuls a mixed mes sage about womens lib. The tale begins with a unwarranted act of male aggression and dominance. The knight muck ups a young virgin. This blow is about more than his being a lusty bacheler (Chaucer l. 889). It is about power. He sawgh a maide walking him biforn / Of which maide anoon, maugree hir heed, / By verray force he rafte hir maidenheed (Chaucer l. 892). The knight is non merely carried away by his sexual instincts. He sees a charr he covets and takes her by force because he has the power and she does not. This violent rape demonstrates the knights initial attitude towards women and his need for renewal. Queen takes over the knights punishment for raping the young girl. Instead of death she provides the electric potential for rehabilitatio... ...re for the most part consistent with her tale. All this suggests a feminist recitation of the tale. And yet there is the matter of the ending. In every sense of the banter the hag submits. She feels she has gained her mastery and then she relinquish it. Does she do so in favor of a mutually blissful marriage or to set to patriarchal ideals? Perhaps Chaucer and the Wife of Bath are suggesting that male rehabilitation and female dominance are only necessary up to a point. Once the knight and the hag achieve a shared disposition they are able to coexist. Or perhaps in the very end both Chaucer and the Wife of Bath acknowledge that this kind of understanding is bring down fantasy and the Wife cruses the couple for good luck and protection. With both these binding possibilities, the tale presents a mixed message about the place of feminism and female authority.