We discussed earlier in class the practice of romanticism and how it was incorporated into the knightly tales of arthur within Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. With Chaucers Canterbury Tales, I found the Wife of Baths Tale in particular to be an interesting take on romanticism.
When I think of romanticism I think of the type of TV dramas my mother would watch when I was growing up; storylines with lots of tension and dramatic one liners. However, in the Wife of Baths tale, the thing that caught my attention was that the romanticistic view of the story was more focused on the role of gender and how each achieves their means. While men are more in charge when it comes to certain aspects such as money and education, it's women who use their wits to deceive and manipulate men with their sex appeal. Nobody does this better than the Wife of Bath.
It's this type of relationship between deceit, money and power that I think the Wifes tale uses as a type of romanticism because at one point in time it was the wife who held all the power and her love for former husband Janekin left her giving him all the power. "And to him yaf I al the land and fee that evere was me yiven therbifore-But afterward repented me ful sore." It's this type of struggle between genders for power that Chaucer impliments with the Wife of Bath that give an interesting view on what romanticism could be.
Women seem to only play two roles in literature: first is that of the heart of the home, the innocent while second is a deceitful seductress. Men can be anything, they can be celebrated adventurers, kings, humorous peasants, politicians etc. However, women are not known by the social role, but rather the emotional role that they play. I know this doesn't correlate too much to the topic of romanticism within your post, but it was while I was reading your post that made me think of this issue. I do like your post by the way!
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree more. To me, the Wife of Bath story is a very early example of a romantic comedy!
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