An Examination of Authority and Experience in The Wife of Bath's Tale

This essay provides a detailed analysis of Geoffrey Chaucer's The Wife of Bath's Tale, focusing on the themes of authority and experience as presented through the character of the Wife of Bath. The essay explores the Wife's perspective on marriage, her struggles within a patriarchal society, and her attempts to assert control and dominance within her relationships. It examines the contrast between the Wife's claims of authority based on her experiences and the societal limitations placed upon women in the 14th century. The analysis delves into the Wife's interactions with her five husbands, her views on gender roles, and her use of manipulation to gain power. The essay highlights the complexities of the Wife's character, her self-awareness, and the contradictions inherent in her pursuit of both material gains and a sense of authority. Ultimately, the essay argues that while the Wife gains experience, her authority remains limited by societal constraints, leaving the gap between genders unresolved. The essay also discusses the Wife's entrepreneurial activities, her relationship with her fifth husband Jankyn, and her understanding of money, and its role in her independence. The essay concludes by emphasizing the Wife's contradictory nature and her limited ability to achieve true authority within the context of the tale.

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Authority and Experience in The Wife of Bath’s Tale
The Wife of Bath's tale was written by Geoffrey Chaucer in 1386. The Wife of Bath is
aware of her position in the male-dominated society. She is a victim of the patriarchal world in
the Prologue, and in the Tale, she is a woman who has assumed authority due to her arrogant
assertion. As she cites her experience in the patriarchal society, she reveals the psychic costs as
he survives in the male-dominated culture. Even though the Wife of Bath acquires material
gains, she does not gain societal authority as she does not feel free to express herself without the
risk of retribution. Ultimately, the ongoing pursuit of bridging the gap between genders to
achieve a universal meaning of authority and experience is unsuccessful.
The Wife of Bath's Prologue shows a struggle between genders. While men are
economically powerful and more educated, women are confined to marriages and domestic lives.
They are able to control and trick men only on because of their desire for sex and status. The
Prologue is about the Wife of Bath’s experiences of love and marriage. Chaucer’s Wife of Bath
claims” Experience, though no authorityWere in this world, is right enough for me To speak of
woe that is in marrïage;(476). Thus, she starts her prologue by contrasting “auctoritee” with
“experience” and states that it is her life experiences alone that give her the authority to talk on
the subject of marriage. Throughout the Prologue, The Wife of Bath expresses her views on her
status, marriages and her need to dominate and enjoy an authority. Her narrative begins with a
defense of her many marriages, and she makes it a point to point out that all her marriages are
legal and recognized by the Church. As she has been married numerous times and successfully,

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she deems to have experience and authority on that subject. Chaucer states “She was a worthy
woman all her life… Husbands at churchè door she had had five”: The Wife of Bath enjoys some
authority and worth here as she has been married five times and all her marriages have been legal
(459-460). The Wife of Bath is undeniably the most complex character. She is comfortable on a
fourteenth-century pilgrimage as well as juxtaposing this by being actively involved with the
carnal pleasures of life. She tends to believe that her number of marriages and greater
experience of married life gives her a superior stance. She feels that she has the authority to
speak on marriages and sexual lives because of her experiences in marriage and bed. She feels
more in control over her husband while in bed, however, she seems to only have full authority
when it comes to sex.
Moreover, she tries to exercise her control over her husbands by denying them sexual
pleasure unless there was pleasure in it for her too: “Upon his flesh while that I am his wife. I
have the power during all my life Upon his proper body, and not he” (155). Thus, she made them
work hard to please her at night in bed. “But since I had them wholly in my hand, and since that
they had given me all their land” indicates that as the husbands had already given her their love
and wealth, she need not make an effort elsewhere (210). She advises her audience to not to take
her too seriously as whet she has to tell them will make them laugh” As taketh not a-grief of
what I say, For my intent is not but for to play (190). Chaucer depicts the Wife as a woman with
self-righteous attempts who is about to admit her deceptive tactics in her marriages and how she
looks at them with a satire. She wants the women to pay close attention to what she is about to
say and comments that they should be strict with their husbands and even tell convincing lies to
put them in their place. According to her, women are better liars than men and should use the
skill to their advantage “For half so boldly can there no man Swear and lie as a woman can”

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(225). Thus, the Wife feels that she has always enjoyed an upper hand in her marriages. One can
say that while she is being honest about her scrupulous skills, she is playfully critical of female
society.
The Wife of Bath’s five marital experiences allows her confidence on the subject of
marriage and sex. She has plenty to tell about how women can get the upper hand in marriages
and control their husbands. However, it is uncertain where she stands regarding personal
freedom and womanhood. As a small-time entrepreneur in the textile trade, she carries an
essential skill of making clothes. Despite her skills with textiles and weaving, her choice of
fabrics mars her reputation. Her choice of profession is seen as an unimportant woman’s work as
it is a profession filled mostly by women. While the husbands possess financial wealth helping
them establish authoritative figures in society, they do not have that same authority in the
bedroom. Conversely, while the Wife does not earn massive amounts of wealth, her authority
lies in the bedroom. Herein lies the difference in meaning for authority for men and women. This
indicates that irrespective of experience, the aforementioned domination within the bedroom
does not directly translate externally into power and authority within society for the Wife.
The Wife of Bath finds husband number five Jankyn to be domineering and dislikes his
love of books. He hits her hard for tearing a page out of his beloved book. “For that I rent out of
his book a leaf, Because I tore That of the stroke mine earè waxed all deaf” (635). The Wife of
Bath shows her dislike for the book that Jankin loved to read, Valerius and Theophrastus. The
book talked about the evils of women, and she felt that unless and until a woman was a saint, no
man could write good about her. She wonders if women had written these books, “They would
have writ of men more wickedness” (695). Her husband reads to her about evil women who
murdered their husbands as they slept. Her husband comments that it is much better to be with a

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lion or a ferocious dragon than such women who are evil and nag all the time. “Bet is,' quod he,
`thine habitatïon It's better Be with a lion, or a foul dragon… Than with a woman using for to
chide”'(775). For the Wife of Bath, those words were very awful and hurtful, as she expresses in
the following lines. “Who couldè weenè, or who could suppose c. think or estimate The woe that
in my heart was, and the pine!” (780). When she can no longer bear such things, she gets angry
and rips off three pages out of the book as he is reading and punches him in the face. Jankin
punches her back, and she falls and doesn’t move as if dead. “And with his fist he smote me on
the head That on the floor I lay as I were dead”. (795). The incident shows that The Wife of Bath
is aware of her position as a woman in society. She is standing up for all those women in the
society who have been painted and described the way men have wanted. She looks for equality
in marriage and tries to settle things only on her terms. Despite having five marriages, she is still
not confident about her role and position in society. She can think only in terms of marriages,
sexual relations and how to control the husband.
Although is not clear if she became a widow, but she seems quite prepared to marry for
the sixth time. ”Welcome the sixthè when that ever he shall, shall (come along) For since I will
not keep me chaste in all (45). Still, she is well aware of the value of money as she has worked as
a small-time entrepreneur. She is in control of her monetary affairs that she has inherited from
her former husbands. Despite the money, she feels reduced to a sexual object in her marriages.
The Wife of Bath wants to change the worldly systems around her and demonstrates a need for
greater tolerance and accommodation for the women in society,
In Chaucer’s Wife of Bath, it is apparent the wife displays contradictory elements when
the subject of ‘authority’ with ‘experience’ is analyzed. She needs men and marriages but is
continually criticizing them and trying to control them with her own tricks. She tries to establish

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a female authoritative figure but only within the domestic realm. In all her experiences of
married lives with her five husbands, she portrays herself as a victim. Moreover, thus, as a
victim, she justifies her ways of dominating the men in her life. She may have experiences but
has limited authority, outside of domestic affairs, over men and in society.

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Works Cited
Academic Brooklyn. “The Wife of Bath and her Tale.” The Canterbury Tales, vol. 1, no. 1,
2018, pp. 1-50.