The wife of Baths tale

Vocabulary part: definitions

1. bequest: property/money belonging to someone that say that, after their

death, they wish to be given to other people
2. concede: to admit, often unwillingly, that something is true; admit that you
have lost;
3. extort: get something by force or threats, or with difficulty
4. implore: to ask for something in a sincere and emotional way
5. lineage: the members of the persons family directly related to that person
and who lived a long time before him/her
6. pestilence: serious and growing problem; a disease that spreads quickly and
kills a lot of people;
7. prowess : great ability/skill
8. suffice: to be enough
9. temporal: related to physical things rather than spiritual ones
10. void: 1. noun- a large hole or empty space; 2. A feeling of unhappiness
because someone/something is missing

THE PARDONERS TALE

1. abominable: very bad and unpleasant
2. absolution: the act of forgiving someone, especially in the Christianity, for
something bad that they have done or thought
3. avarice: an extremely strong wish to get/keep money or possession

4. blasphemy: something you say or do that shows you dont respect God or
religion
5. carouse: enjoy yourself by drinking alcohol and speaking and laughing loudly
in a group of people
6. covetousness: wanting to have something too much, especially something
that belongs to someone else
7. pallor: the state of being very pale
8. saunter: to walk in a slow and relaxed way, often in no particular direction
9. superfluity: something more than is needed or wanted
10. transcend: to be more important or better than something, especially a
limit; to go further; rise above;

II DESCRIBE EACH CHARACTER OF THE STORY:

THE PARDONERS TALE:
1. PARDONER (NARRATOR):
Pardoner has been described in The Prologue as a man with bulging eyes and
receding hair; his voice resembles goats; he is probably born without testicles;
He is a good spokesman, his frauds are believed by everyone, even priests and
vicars; he cites Latin proverbs such as: Radix malorum est Cupiditas ( the root of
all evil is love of money). Chaucers Pardoner is a highly untrustworthy
character. He presents himself as someone of ambiguous gender and sexual
orientation, further challenging social norms. The narrator is not sure whether
the Pardoner is ahomosexual or a eunuch (castrated male). Like the other
pilgrims, the Pardoner carries with him to Canterbury the tools of his tradein
his case, papal indulgences and a sack of false relics, including a brass cross filled
with stones to make it seem as heavy as gold and a glass jar full of pigs bones,
which he passes off as saints relics. Since visiting relics on pilgrimage had

become a tourist industry, the Pardoner wants to cash in on religion in any way
he can, and he does this by selling material objectswhether paper that
promise forgiveness of sins or animal bones that people can string around their
necks as charms against the devil. After telling the group how he gulls people
into indulging his own avarice through a sermon he preaches on greed, the
Pardoner tells of a tale that exemplifies the vice described in his sermon.
Furthermore, he attempts to sell pardons to the group!
2.KNAVE, AND 3.PUBLICAN, personify DEATH! THEY know exactly who has died.
The tavern-knave tells the three brash young men that Death has taken a friend
of theirs. He goes on to warn them that they should be wary of Death because
he is such a strong adversary. The publican goes on to say that Death lives
around a village and that he might dishonor the young men if they aren't
careful. The publican is the one who tells them which village to go to in order to
find Death. The tavern-knave and the publican clearly know more about death
than ordinary people would. Later, when the three men encounter an old man
whom they verbally abuse, he, too, is Death personified. Death is leading the
three young plotters to him and he is successful by taking advantage of their
greed.

4.WICKEDEST RIOTER As soon as the youngest rioter is gone to town, the sly
plotter turns to his friend and suggests that they should take the gold and
divide it in two, by killing their friend: when their friend returns from town, they
will kill him and therefore receive greater shares of the wealth. The second
rioter agrees, and they prepare their trap. Unfortunately, both of them drink
from the poisoned wine that the youngest one had bought from the town and
die. He is the wickedest since he comes up with the plan of killing their friend;
however, his behavior is not much different from the other two friends.
5.YOUNGEST RIOTER: the youngest rioter is having similar thoughts as the two
of his friends. He could easily be the richest man in town, he realizes, if he
could have all the gold to himself. He goes to the apothecary and buys the
strongest poison available, then puts the poison into two bottles of wine,

leaving a third bottle pure for himself. He returns to the tree, but the other two
rioters leap out and kill him.
*****All of them are greedy and hypocrites; their love for gold and money
transcends their humanity. They mock the elderly man; they mock his looks and
life;
6.DEATH killed their friend and continued to kill other people in the village.
The rioters set out to kill the death but their mission stops the moment they
find out gold under the oak tree; ironically, they look for the death, but they
found the gold, which stands for death! DEATH=GOLD! Death becomes the real
person that becomes the root of their undoing.
THE WOBS TALE:
THE WIFE OF BATH (NARRATOR) she has lived with five husbands. She is worldly
in both senses of the word: she has seen the world and has experience in the
ways of the world, that is, in love and sex. Rich and tasteful; Her face is
wreathed in heavy cloth, her stockings are a fine scarlet color, and the leather
on her shoes is soft, fresh, and brand newall of which demonstrate how
wealthy she has become. Although she is argumentative and enjoys talking, the
Wife is intelligent in a commonsense, rather than intellectual, way. Through her
experiences with her husbands, she has learned how to provide for herself in a
world where women had little independence or power. The chief manner in
which she has gained control over her husbands has been in her control over
their use of her body. The Wife uses her body as a bargaining tool, withholding
sexual pleasure until her husbands give her what she demands.
KNIGHT : young and lusty; he rapes one of the beautiful maidens he comes
across one day; the punishmenat for rape is death penalty; the queen gives him
an option: she would spare his life if he could answer her question about what
women desire most; he sets out on a journey and eventually finds out the
answer to her question; an old ugly woman tells him the answer and spares his
life, so he has to fulfill the promise he has given to her: to marry her. He is sad
and disappointed due to his marriage with such a loathsome old woman;

eventually, the wife offers him a choice: either he can have her be ugly but loyal
and good, or he can have her young and fair but also coquettish and unfaithful.
He replies that he would rather trust her judgment, and he asks her to choose
whatever she thinks best. Because the knights answer gave the woman what
she most desired, the authority to choose for herself, she becomes both
beautiful and good. Although the old hag becomes a beautiful young woman in
response to the young knights well-timed response, it is unclear whether he
truly had enough respect for the old woman that he allowed her to choose for
herself, or whether he had simply learned how to supply her with the correct
answer. *****It is unclear whether he is respectful and tolerant husband who
cares about his wifes choice or he is a man who has just learnt how to twist
things and situations into his own benefit.***
MAIDEN a young beautiful girl who got raped by the knight; she accuses him for
rape and asks the king to help her that the knight gets a proper punishment.
KING wants to execute the knight who raped the young girl; however, his wife,
the queen, interferes and asks the king to give the knight one chance to save his
own life. We see the king as obedient to his wife;
QUEEN presents the knight with the challenge: answer to the question what
women desire most. The queen has an influence over her husband; the king
listens to her proposal to spare the knights life if he finds an answer to her
question; she is a dominant character.
CRUSTY HAG: The old woman supplies the young knight with the answer to his
question, in exchange for his promise to do whatever she wants. When she tells
him he must marry her, the knight agrees, and when he allows her to choose
whether she would like to be beautiful and unfaithful or ugly and faithful, she
rewards him by becoming both beautiful and faithful. She stresses out that the
beauty lies within. The old hag might be intended to represent the Wife of Bath
herself, at least as she would like others to see her. Though the hag has aged,
she is capable of displaying all of the vigor and inner beauty of her youth if the
right man comes along, just as the Wife did with her fifth and favorite husband,
the youthful Jankyn.

III literary terms:

SATIRE: A GENRE OF LITERATURE IN WHICH IT IS REPRESENTED THE WAY OF
CRITIZING PEOPLE/IDEAS IN A HUMOROUS WAY, OR A PIECE OF WRITING OR
PLAY THAT USES THIS STYLE;
VERBAL IRONY: A LITERARY TECHNIQUE IT IS AN IRONY IN WHICH A PERSON
SAYS OR WRITES ONE THINGAND MEANS ANOTHER, OR USES THE WORDS TO
CONVEY A MEANING THAT IS THE OPPOSITE OF THE LITERAL MEANING;***
Verbal irony is a statement in which the meaning that a speaker employs is
different from the meaning that is expressed. The ironic statement usually
involves the expression of one attitude, but with indications that the speaker
intends a very different, and often opposite, attitude.verbal irony is produced
INTENTIONALLY by speakers!
SITUATIONAL IRONY: A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE EXPECTED RESULT AND
ACTUAL RESULTS IN A CERTAIN SITUATION.
COUPLET: A PAIR OF LINES OF METER IN POETRY;IT USUALLY CONSISTS OF TWO
LINES THAT RHYME AND HAVE THE SAME METER.
iV PLOT SUMMARY/MORAL
THE PARDONERS TALE:
1. THIS IS A STORY ABOUT PERJURY AND GAMBLING, GLUTTONY AND
HIPOCRISY; THE PARDONERS TALE IS A SATIRE OF A MAN WHO PREACHES TO
PEOPLE ABOUT THE EVILS OF MONEY, CLAIMING THE MONEY IS THE ROOT OF
EVIL., THE PHRASE THAT IS TAKEN DIRECTLY FROM THE BIBLE. THE PARDONER
IS GUILTY OF HIS OWN GREEDY ACTIONS, WHICH MAKES HIM THE WORST KIND
OF HYPOCRITE. THE MORAL IS THAT THE MONEY IS EVIL.
2. Irony of the rioters quest to kill the death: THE RIOTERS WANTED TO KILL
THE DEATH BECAUSE THEY BLAMED IT FOR THE DEATH OF THEIR FRIEND.

HOWEVER, WHEN THEY FOUND GOLD UNDER THE OAK TREE, THEY FORGOT THE
REVENGE AND PLOTTED TO KILL EACH OTHER SO THAT THEY COULD GET THE
MONEY ALL FOR THEMSELVES.
3. Ironic thing about the pardoners telling his tale is his own greediness and
love of money. He is a hypocrite who preaches about the evils of money; at the
same time, he is guilty of his own greedy actions;
4. The Pardoner is a hypocrite ( misbalance between his thoughts and actions:
speaks about one thing and does another, a totally opposite)

THE WOBS TALE

1. The moral of the story is that the true beauty lies within. This can be inferred
from the folk tale of the loathsome hag. However, the wife of Bath arrives at
such conclusion only incidentally. Her message is that, fair or ugly, women
should be obeyed by their husbands.
2. ironic about the knight going on a quest to find out what women want: the
knight was rewarded when the ugly old woman who supplies him with the
answer in exchange for marriage is transformed into a beautiful and faithful
young wife. Thus, the knights quest to discover womens desires concludes,
ironically, with the fulfillment of his own appetite.
3. Alyson as a person: she is manipulative; she wants to dominate in her
relationship with her 5 husbands; first three husbands are old and rich, other
two are easy to play with;s he cares about material stability (wealth) ; all her
husbands were in her own shadow; she cheated on her 4th husband when under
the influence of wine (he cheated on her, though), she loves gossiping with her
female friends (while her 5th husband was engrossed in books); she favours
marriage but claims for herself that it is not meant for her. She enjoys control
over male.
4. satire: the idea of marriage and women in Medieval times: Alyson doesnt
behave as she should in any of her marriages; even though Alyson shows

nonconformity to the expectations of her role as a wife, we are shown what

proper behavior of girls in marriage is following: wife should be -obedient, in
the males shadow, chaste, fair, faithful, honest; she should preserve her
husbands public honour; husbands deserves the control of wife since he owns
the estate; ). Young women should be taught how to be model wives; it is clear
that the Alyson is the one who controls her husbands in her various marriages;
The major feature of marriage, for the Wife, is the marriage debt, or sex, which
seems to be why she is so strongly in favour of marriage. Another reason for it
seems to be the ability to gain property, wealth, and a comfortable living
situation through a husband. We can argue that she portrays marriage as a
great idea for women and a terrible for men. On the other hand, we have a
character Jankyn, who also fails to conform to expected behavior in marriage;
the blame for an unsuccessful marriage is behavior of both, man and woman.