Chaucer's Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale

Chaucer's Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale: An Annotated Bibliography 1900 - 1995

Peter G. Beidler
Elizabeth M. Biebel
Series: Chaucer Bibliographies
Volume: 6
Copyright Date: 1998
Published by: University of Toronto Press
Pages: 426
https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3138/j.ctt2ttwkh
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  • Book Info
    Chaucer's Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale
    Book Description:

    The Chaucer Bibliography series aims to provide annotated bibliographies for all of Chaucer's work. This book summarizes 20th-century commentaries on Chaucer's "Wife of Bath's Prologue" and "Tale."

    eISBN: 978-1-4426-7292-5
    Subjects: Language & Literature

Table of Contents

  1. Front Matter
    (pp. i-vi)
  2. Table of Contents
    (pp. vii-viii)
  3. General Editor’s Preface
    (pp. ix-xiv)
  4. Preface
    (pp. xv-xviii)
    Peter G. Beidler and Elizabeth M. Biebel
  5. Abbreviations
    (pp. xix-xxiv)
  6. Introduction
    (pp. xxv-lxiv)

    Why has the Wife of Bath been the subject of more scholarly debate than any other pilgrim in theCanterbury Tales?The reasons are not hard to find. First, she is a woman, one of the first female characters of any depth or seriousness in British literature. Second, Chaucer has given scholars more to consider in her portrait and her performance than he has in those of any other pilgrim. We know about her clothes, her occupation, her husbands, her travels, her beliefs, her learning, her combativeness, her irreverence, her peculiar brand of feminism. Third, the close connections between her...

  7. Editions and Translations
    (pp. 1-28)

    TheWife of Bath’s Prologueand theWife of Bath’s Taleare among the most frequently edited and anthologized works of Chaucer — along with the tales of the Knight, the Nun’s Priest, and the Pardoner. There are several reasons for the popularity of the Wife of Bath narratives. The most important is the sparkling vividness of Alisoun herself, but it is also significant that her tale is seen as a charming representative of the medieval romance. Because both prologue and tale treat sexual matters with comparative decorum, they have been seen as appropriate for students.

    The standard scholarly edition...

  8. Sources and Analogues
    (pp. 29-54)
  9. The Marriage Group
    (pp. 55-66)
  10. Gentillesse
    (pp. 67-72)
  11. The Wife of Bath in the General Prologue
    (pp. 73-98)
  12. The Wife of Bath’s Prologue
    (pp. 99-240)
  13. The Wife of Bath’s Tale
    (pp. 241-320)
  14. Index
    (pp. 321-358)