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Obed Salazar

Ms. Figueroa

Senior English 2

15 December 2018

Loyal Crone

During the Medieval times, Roman Catholic was a powerful institution in the Western

Europe. Chaucer was the first to write in English, and he is known as “Father of literature”. The

Wife of Bath is about a noble knight is sent to find out what women most desire, if he fails to do

so he will get hanged. The knight gets answers from random women but they were not giving

him good answers to keep him away from punishment. The knight finds an old crone and tells

him she will give him the answer if he promises to marry her, the knight agrees to the offer. At

the day of the wedding he was having bad feelings about the crone, then he changed his mind

and ended up marrying her the crone. She became young and they lived in happiness. Chaucer

shows love in the tale with relationships and the theme beauty lies within the human.

It is not all about looks, personality is what matters the most. Chaucer defines love that

beauty lies within the human, not just physical attributes. The old crones in the tale says, “Would

you rather have me old and poor and homely and come of common folk, but a faithful, loving

wife… But careless of your love and maybe false to you?” (Chaucer 3). The old crone is

explaining that even though she is old and ugly, she is loyal and has a great personality. Chaucer

also defines loved by showing that the couple end up living happily ever after. “The knight

obeyed; and when he had drawn up the curtain and turned eyes upon her in the full sunlight,

behold she was young and charming… he kissed her a thousand times and unto the last day of

their lives they lived in peace and happiness”. (Chaucer 4). The old crone’s looks did not bother
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knight anymore because she became young. Therefore, love was an important value in the Wife

of Bath.

Chaucer was able to express love in the tales he wrote. True Beauty lies within human

nature and not appearance. Chaucer’s belief was that women cannot keep secrets. Women had

sovereignty and men were less superior than women. In the Wife of Bath women cared more

about money and looks rather than the personality. For example, the old crone was ugly and the

knight didn’t want to marry her because of her looks, the knight ends up giving her a chance

even though she wasn’t good looking she had a great personality. Chaucer shows a great

example that an individual should not be judged base of their looks, personality is what makes a

great human being.

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Work Cited
Chaucer, Geoffrey. “The Canterbury Tales.” 1392