Talk:The Wife of Bath's Tale

Minor

Minor edits of the prose, added and corrected plot details. DigitalMedievalist 22:00, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC) Lisa

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Significance compared to other pilgrims? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.210.147.33 (talk) 11:42, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Antifeminism?

"Chaucer was taking inspiration from a significant amount of antifeminist literature around at the time but it is far from clear whether he is copying these sentiments or slyly lampooning them."

I'm mildly bemused by this - can medieval literature really be described as "antifeminist" before the existence of a definable "feminist" viewpoint? It seems anachronistic at best, and patent silliness at worst... perhaps "misogynistic" would be more correct? Shimgray | talk | 16:40, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, in a manner of speaking. "Antifemnist" is the current term in the criticism, and refers to a tradition of clerical misogyny. Notcarlos 16:41, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

I had a similar reaction to Shimgray's upon first encountering the term. In any case, I think the current phrasing, which states that "it is critical to understand" that the tale was working within the tradition of antifeminism, is too strong.

This is a modern critical interpretation; while to me it appears more defensible than, say, a 19th-century critical opinion, it is nevertheless merely an interpretation. It should be qualified and attributed to modern critics. --Saforrest 18:00, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

All interpretations -- our own and others -- are "merely" interpretations! The "antifeminist" moniker dates in fact to the 1950's, hardly the age of Gloria Steinem. What it designates is a vein of early medieval thought which took as its given that women were lesser beings than men -- many of which, with and without irony -- are among the Wife's sources (e.g Adversus Jovinianum). Clevelander96 03:19, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

This section on "antifeminism" is, at best, sloppy scholarship. First of all, it seems to reduce a complex mediaeval culture, with many layers of gender ideology, to a simple dichotomy in which "misogynist" men "oppress" women. While such terms may be helpful political devices, they have limited use in cultural and literary studies of the mediaeval period, in which mediaeval men and women understood themselves, the world, and their place in it as radically different than we do today. If we want to call them "antifeminists," well, fine then, but it does not seem to accomplish much. The real problem here is the language of this section: i.e., "It is crucial to understand." According to whom? Modern literary discourse takes no such absolutist position, and, frankly, this is an argument (not-so) cleverly disguised as an exposition. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.229.184.26 (talk) 15:58, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

I would agree that the discussion of the role of the antifeminist sourcetexts and traditions could and should be more nuanced. I would emphasize, however, that the role of an encyclopedia is not to evaluate critical interpretations of a work, but rather to describe them in neutral terms. The term "antifeminist" has been common parlance among Chaucerians for fifty years and more, and should be used here for that reason, whether or not the article's contributors think it's ideal (but of course if one can offer an external, sourced critique of the term by a Chaucer scholar, then that certainly could and should also be represented). As for "is crucial to understand," I feel that this statement is an accurate one; many times in the twenty years I've taught Chaucer, I find that students are unaware that when the Wife of Bath makes what seem blatantly misgynistic remarks that she is drawing from, quoting from in fact, a pre-existing tradition, and attribute these remarks to her individually. This is an error, as much as it would be if, unfamiliar with Paul's letters to the Corinthians, we attributed the "better to marry than to burn" remark to the Wife herself. In this sense, the source is "crucial" -- or let's just say "important," since no knowing this fact could lead to significant misunderstanding. Clevelander96 (talk) 17:19, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

All 'interpretations' are merely 'interpretations,' but this is Wikipedia, which needs sources. When you don't have sources, this sort of terrible, terrible analysis occurs. The entire first half of the paragraph on how the Wife of Bath is antifeminist is shamefully incorrect. Oh, wait! It backs itself up by saying "...it is quite obvious that Alisoun is an embodiment of antifeminist beliefs." Nevermind, then!

But seriously, this is flagrantly incorrect. Anyone, please: observe the evidence it uses. Why in hell would her marrying five men make her an antifeminist? Or her misusing biblical quotations? I think the writer of this article has a skewed view of feminism-- it seems he thinks feminism is only Amazon Feminism or some even more extreme kind, where a woman must feel superior to men and never marry. This is absurd and incorrect. I am changing it soon, but for now I have no time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chicopac (talk • contribs) 16:33, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The claims in this section are more than amply sourced; I have converted the parenthetical references to end-notes to highlight this. At the same time, parts of this section are rather clumsily worded, such that they seem to be making extreme and contradictory statements; I have done my best to nuance these so that they accurately represent the sourced material. This section should reflect current thought and knowledge in this field. Clevelander96 (talk) 17:18, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

What's unclear to me is whether we mean "antifeminist" as in "opposed to the feminist movement," which is what the wikilink points to, or "antifeminist" as in "opposed to the feminine," which seems to be the origin of the term being quoted from the Chaucerian scholars. The article should make that point more clear.Lawikitejana (talk) 17:49, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

The Chaucerian tradition has been to use antifeminist to mean texts which attack or belittle women as a group; it actually dates back to at least 1960, predating the modern U.S. feminist movement (see David Daiches' 1960 treatise, A Critical History of English Literature in Four Volumes, p. 113, which shows the term in this use and can be sourced via Google Books). The confusion seems to arise from this term's being mixed up with the later use of "feminism" to describe a political movement; perhaps an aside, or a note indicating this would be helpful if added to the main entry somewhere? Clevelander96 (talk) 21:08, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Strange phrasing in "Themes" section

First off, this reads like someone's research or an early 20^th-century introduction lifted from somewhere. If it's not cited or ref'd, it needs to be rewritten.

Second, what's up with "Throughout the Catholic Middle Ages"? Was there a "protestant" Middle Ages of which I'm not aware? Granted, not every culture sees 400-1500 as a "middle ages," but wouldn't "European Middle Ages" make more sense? If no-one disagrees, I'm going to fix it (eventually). Notcarlos 16:46, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Suggest "translating" many Chaucerian quotes

Lines such as “that for syk unnethes myghte they stonde” are illegible to me, and I am an English teacher. Given that many readers of Wikipedia are not native speakers of the language, along with many native speakers who find it difficult to unravel the language of Chaucer's day, it seems wise for us to provide explanations of the lines whose spellings are so different from modern language as to confuse the average unfamiliar person. For example, if only the word "myghte" were in this quote, I venture to say most people could decipher the word, but what I see in this line as a whole looks like "that for six / sick [unintelligible word] they stood / stoned," which makes no sense. Lawikitejana (talk) 17:46, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Themes section

Sorry if I'm wrong, but this section leaves me with the impression that nobody has every analyzed the Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale but Mary Carruthers, Helen Cooper, and Carolyn Dinshaw. Are there any, er, male viewpoints on this material?

Also there are currently two summaries of the tale, one before and one after the Themes section. --thezeus18 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.179.24.46 (talk) 03:54, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I thought the very same thing when reading that section. The amount of text devoted to analysis by those scholars is undue weight. Switzpaw (talk) 06:27, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

The reason that Carruthers, Cooper, and Dinshaw are cited is that their criticism has been, by far, the most influential in Chaucer studies the past 25 years or so, and doesn't have anything to do with their gender, per se. All the same, the most recent of their work is now some years past, and the section could use updating; I'll have a look at recent Chaucer bibliographies and see if we can add some more current citations, of whatever gender. Clevelander96 (talk) 15:12, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I see that there has been some confusion in the headers and summaries -- the first section should be "Themes of the Prologue" and the second"Themes of the Tale." I've renamed them as such, and deleted the redundant summary. The current summary was very poorly written, a kind of bit-by-bit crib which gave uneven weight to parts of the narrative, and was rhetorically awkward. I've revised in a clearer way which I hope will meet the consensus here. Clevelander96 (talk) 15:47, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Cleanup

I've now done considerable cleanup to the article, and invite further work, revisions, and comments. The summaries are now much clearer, and are confined to plot elements (someone, apparently reading line by line and summarizing as they went, included numerous non-plot details). The small section discussing sources and analogues of the Tale is moved into the Tale section, and all "Themes" are treated together, as the Prologue and the Tale have very similar themes and conclusions. Some of the subsections might need to be retitled -- perhaps a section on "Themes" and one on "Critical Views" or "Criticism" -- this will take more work. I've also added a few more recent articles to the bibliography, and cleaned up many odd formatting elements, unattributed quotes, and awkward sentences. Clevelander96 (talk) 14:38, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

The Marriage "Debt"

Debt, or Dett, is the middle English word. It should probably be thought of as equivalent to the modern "obligation," thus, there is no necessary economic connection to it. It was also thought of in medieval theology as mutual, that is to say, sex is the obligation of both partners to one another. It was thus spoken of in confession manuals issued to help parish priests deal with their parishioners, and therefore should not be construed as implying that it is owed only by the wife to the husband. It was an equal obligation.