The Wife of Bath is an interesting character, both by the tale she tells and who she is. She tells
her tale of a knight who had been given the quest for his life - to find what women desired most. Though
she was known for not being a pure nor descent woman, due to the fact that she had had five husbands
and many lovers on the side, she may have told her tale to help people to see that she was not a completely
horrible person, but had her reasons for the things that she had done.
Her interesting thoughts were shown through her tale about the knight whose punishment for his
crime was to seek and find what women desired most. Told mainly to entertain, it had a good lesson to be
learned, that women desired equal rights, privileges, and respect. In her story, the knight had been
convicted of raping a maiden.
From the first page of Canterbury Tales: The Wife ...
A poem entitled "It won't be my fault if I die an ...
The Canterbury Pilgrims Copper engraving printed o...The king had granted the life of the knight to the queen; thus, showing that
the king respected his wife, the queen, her thoughts, wishes, and gave her the right to prosecute the knight
as she saw fit. The queen gave the knight one year and one day to find what women desired most. After
seeking diligently for one year, the knight found an old maid was willing to give the answer to him for the
queen if he would grant her one wish afterwards. The old maid told him that all women desired equal
rights, and this he spoke before the queen, and not a woman disagreed. The knight was given his life, and
the old maid asked for her wish before the queen. The wish of the old maid was that the knight would
marry her. The knight begged that he be...