End of Week 2/ Begining of Week 3

In class today I decided that I'm pretty sure I didn't do nearly enough in my last post! So I'm here now to take a deeper look into women in the 14th century. Checking out a website I googled I found
http://www.unc.edu/depts/chaucer/zatta/14thcent.html
which contains some interesting background to the time in which Chaucer was writing. England was at war for almost the whole century. King Richard was 28 when he married the princess of France, who was daughter of King Phillip the VI. This was a political move to help end the French Wars. Sounds fine until you find out that she was eight years old! Perhaps girls were more chattel than children. That is supported by the Wife of Bath's prologue where she tells that she was married by 12.

I got to wondering also if it was custom to marry and remarry. Was it necessary at the time for a woman to be married? Was it dishonorable to be a widow? http://www.jstor.org/view/07382480/ap030043/03a00130/0
This website was exactly what I was looking for! It even posed the same question in the first sentence. The conclusion the author offers is that it was more profitable politically for the woman to stay widowed rather than remarry, but if she wished to have a family and run a business, or perhaps just liked being married, she could certainly marry again. If she did marry again she would be giving up her equal rights with men again and handing them over to her current husband. The author also brings up the point we discussed briefly in class today, namely that if a woman was widowed her reputation would be very vulnerable. It was much better to be married and have an affair than to be unmarried and have relations with any man. The Wife of Bath seems to like being married, having sex, and using it as her power. I believe she may have liked the thrill of sex because she played a game with her husbands so often. I think I'll read up on that and use it as a topic for a discussion board post.

Wow, I'm really actually quite surprised at how cool the story turned out to be. I didn't realize it would be so short and easy to read. I liked the fact that after she dissed men in her introduction she made an example of a proper man in her story to show that if everyone just behaves in a way they would want to have reciprocated, a marriage can be a good experience.

If you take a look at this link http://www.universalteacher.org.uk/poetry/wifebath.htm#portrait the author looks at the portrait on the front of the book and makes some interesting comments about Chaucer's description of The Wife of Bath. I thought it was cool how he pointed out how she might be on the journey in the first place to scope out for new husbands. It makes sense, because she has done it before and seems to like looking for new ones while the current one is still living.

I found the picture above on this website
I think it would be really interesting to see this as a play. I'm a pretty visual person so i get a lot more out of watching something after I read it. I always pick up on new stuff after I go over the reading again! Romeo and Juliet was much more clear after I'd seen it performed. But then it is subjected to the point of view of the director. I guess Chaucer just needs to come back from the dead and make a movie of how he really wants his tales told.

Oh, this has been really useful for me for translation to modern english http://www.courses.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/teachslf/wbt-par.htm
Its helped clear up a few hard passages.

Ok, so I spent a lot more time today reading through the prologue again. Man, that old English is killing me! But anyway... I really think this woman is just smart. She mocks the men's points of view, showing how silly and unfair most of the restraints they put on women are. Several times she points out how the husbands demand perfection and lust after vain women but then mock their wives for being simple and consumed by appearances. I think I was reading mainly lines 200-500. Just some things I was thinking about today.

I don't like Chaucer. He expects his audience to supply too much. I really wish he would just say out and out what he means and not be so subjective. I admit I am still reading through the story so I cannot say for sure whether I like the story itself or not, but I'm pretty sure that Chaucer's style of prose annoys me greatly. Just a thought so far...