Physical details also reveal a great deal about the characters. The wife of Bath is vividly characterized through her body. In her prologue, she herself calls the gaps between her teeth a sign of her amorous nature. She has broad hips and a rubicund face. When Chaucer emphasises these details, it tells us a lot about how he wishes us to evaluate her. Chaucer clearly loved her vigorous, extrovert and sociable nature.
The Wife of Bath is not characterised through her profession, because it is of no importance in her case, although it is mentioned that she is a weaver. More important is the fact that she has had five husbands. This tells us more about her than her profession could.
4. THE WIFE OF BATH’S PROLOGUE
Summary
“The Wife of Bath believes in experience over authority, and since she has been married five times, she certainly considers herself an authority”[26] on marriage and sex.
She (ab)uses several biblical passages that cite marriage - and thus also sex - as the right thing to do. If virginity is commanded, she believes, then why do we have genitals?
The Wife goes on to talk about her five husbands. The first three were old and died before she could gain control over them. The fourth one also died, but she gained control over him. She met her fifth husband, Jankyn, while burying the fourth. He was a clerk, who appeared more interested in his books than his wife, and this upset her. During one of their arguments, the wife and Jankyn fought, and she pretended to be dead. Upset over her death, he promised anything to bring her back to life. This is how she took control over her fifth husband.
Characterisation
“The Wife of Bath's Prologue is in the genre (…) of the apologia, an explanation and defence of one's occupation and life (…) [- in her case, love life.] (…) [The wife of Bath] explains the tricks of her trade and defends a life style that might be shocking if it were not presented with such energy and (…) good humour. ”[27] Modern psychology would say the wife of Bath is not only trying to convince the others but also herself.
The wife is a fully credible figure. She emerges as a real person drawn from life, not as a type of person, like most of the pilgrims in The Canterbury Tales are. She is attributed with common English which supports her appearance as a real character.
Chaucer clearly found her fascinating. It is significant that he gives her a lot more lines to tell about herself than he allowed the other pilgrims: her prologue is twice as long as her tale. Chaucer also gave her his knowledge of the scriptures and other literatures[28]. Such a woman as she is could not have had the education nor the time to read and understand everything she quotes. Even if she believes experience to be of greater value and rejects the value of textual authorities, she uses these textual authorities if it suits her, and she even uses antifeminist authorities, which are in contrast with her mentality. She uses authorities and turns them upside down, but this does never effect blasphemy as for example the pardoner embodies.
The wife of Bath is clearly a rebel: she does not wait for the host to introduce her and invite her to tell a tale and she says that marriage is misery. Her obsession is ‘maistrie’, not only over husbands but in fact over all authorities.
