Fave extracts from "The Wife of Bath"

"As in a noble household, we are told,
Not every dish and vessel's made of gold,
Some are of wood, yet earn their master's praise."

"In wifehood I will use my instrument
As freely as my Maker me it sent.
If I turn difficult, God give me sorrow!
My husband, he shall have it eve and morrow
Whenever he likes to come and pay his debt,
I won't prevent him! I'll have a husband yet
Who shall be both my debtor and my slave
And bear his tribulation to the grave
Upon his flesh, as long as I'm his wife.
For mine shall be the power all his life
Over his proper body and not he,
Thus the Apostle Paul has told it me,
And bade our husbands they should love us well;
There's a command on which I like to dwell..."

"No one can be so bold - I mean no man -
At lies and swearing as a woman can.
This is no news, as you'll have realizedm
To knowing ones, but to the misadvised.
A knowing wige if she is worth her salt
Can always prove her husband is at fault,
And even though the fellow may have heard
Some story told him by a little bird
Shw knows enough to prove the bird is crazy
And get her maid to witness she's a daisy,
With full agreement, scarce solicited."

"You say that some desire us for our wealth,
Some for our shapeliness, our looks, our health,
Some for our singing, others for our dancing,
Some for our gentleness and dalliant glancing,
And some because our hands are soft and small;
By your account the devil gets us all."

"Wherever I take wine I have to think
Of Venus, for as cold engenders hail
A lecherous mouth beges a lecherous tail,
A woman in her cups has no defence,
As lechers know from long experience."

"I think I loved him best, I'll tell no lie.
He was disdainful in his love, that's why.
We women have curious fantasy
In such affairs, or so it seems to me.
When something's difficult, or can't be had,
We crave and cry for it all day like mad
Forbid a thing, we pine for it all night,
Press fast upon us and we take to flight."


"Now that I felt provided with a mate
I wept but little, I need hardly state."

"I gave my whole heart up for him to hold.
He was, I think, some twenty winters old."

"I ever followed natural inclination
Under the power of my constelation
And was unable to deny, in truth,
My chamber of Venus to a likely youth,
The mark of Mars is still upon my face
And also in another privy place."


"Nor would I rebuke at any price;
I hate a man who points me out my vice,
And so, God knows, do many more than I."


"Mercury stands for wisdom, thrift and science,
Venus for revel, squanding and defiance."


"Lucilia out of lecherous delight.
For she, in order he might only think
Of her, prepared an aphrodisiac drink;
He drank it and was dead before the morning.
Such is fate of husbands, it's a warning."


"He spoke more harm of us than heart can think."


"Sir Knight, there's no way on from here.
Tell me what you are looking for, my dear,
For peradventure that were best for you;
We old, old women know a thing or two."

"The poor can dance and sing in the relief
Of having nothing that will tempt a thief."


"May I go howling mad and take my life
Unless I prove to be as good and true
As ever wife was since the world was new!
And if to-morrow when the sun's above
I seem less fair than any lady-love,
Than any queen or empress east or west,
Do with my life and death as you think best."