Power Flashcards
Carter
“By giving women authority… The consequences can be rewarding and even lead to joy”
Evidenced in the tale
Strohm
“her simple but commanding “abide” secures his silence”
Aers [monster]
“If she is a monster she is Frankenstein’s monster. It is the men who have made her so aggressively masculine”
Refuses D. W. Robertson’s “carnal monster” description
Aers [structure]
She “merely inverts the traditional positions within the structure of domination”
Cockburn
“At each stage of the tale, it is the women who decide the knight’s fate”
Cockburn [strength]
That she survives five husbands is “A real measure of her strength”
Isn’t it more they survive her though?
Context: ‘The Goodman of Paris’ says…
A wife should be like a dog which “Even if his master whip him and throw stones at him, the dog followeth, wagging his down and lying down before his master to appease him”
How sickening, medieval male dominance. ‘Le Ménagier de Paris’ is a French medieval guideboom from 1393 on a women’s proper behaviour in marriage and running a household. Central theme is wifely obedience. Due to French, upper class and church only could read it
Prologue: 215
“I sette hem so a-werke”
Prologue: 199
“In which that they were bounden unto me”
Power terms used include…
“Governance” “maistrie” “soveraynetee” “my lawe”
Prologue: 175
“Myself have been the whippe”
Prologue: 158
“I have the power durynge al my lyf
Upon his propre body, and noght he”
Prologue: 432 [one word]
“Sheep”
Making fun
Prologue: 202
“I laughe whan I thynke
How piteously a-night I made hem swinke”
Prologude: 425
“I ne owe hem nat a word that it nys quit”
Monosyllabic, proud of dominance
Prologue: 813
“The bridel in myn hond
To han the governance of hous and lond
And of his tonge and of his hand also”
Makes Jankyn renouce power and written authorities, also innuendo
Tale: 888
“By verray force he rafte hire maidenhed” “oppressioun”
Chain reaction of power
“Graunted” “I grante thee lyf” “I grante”
King passes power to queen to knight to hag
Tale: 1218
“I shal fulfille youre wordly appetite”
Odd, like rewarding him although she’s just lectured him on his vices. Contrasts WoB’s language.
Tale: 1231
She gives him power “chese now” and he gives back “I put me in yore wise governance, cheseth yourself”.
Tale: 1253
“His herte bathed in a bath of blisse”
Equality of power gives genuine happiness
Tale: 1255
“And she obeyed hym in every thyng”
Although equal, she still conforms to the idea of relationships presented in the Knight’s Tale where in return for subservience, a husband will not hit his wife
Tale: 1261
“Eek I praye Jhesu shorte hir lives
That wol nat be governed by hir wyves”
Has WoB missed the point? Ends tale on word “pestilence” - disease, curse!
