CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2015
| Author | Tebenev, Konstantin |
|---|---|
| Title | Chaucer's women in history: Non-Passive Submissiveness and the Voices of the Oppressed in the Canterbury Tales |
| Summary | It has been long accepted that submissive and passive women in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales have no voice and are subjected to men. However, in his portrayal of three such seemingly voiceless women, Constance, Grizeld, and Virginia, Chaucer’s tales display inconsistencies and ruptures in the images of these women. I argue that these three characters show non-passive submissiveness, which means the internal resistance and desire to change their lives. This resistance remains hidden however, due to the character of patriarchal society. The main goal of my thesis is to reveal women’s emerging subjectivity and agency exposed through such ruptures and distortions of their portrayal by Chaucer. I outline the medieval moral values and ideals regarding women’s role in society, imposed mainly by the Church. The Church preached that women should be under male control because women were believed to be inherently wicked and evil. In marriage, all power should be attributed to the man whereas the woman must be silent and subjected to him. Then, I describe the possibilities and positions held by real women of Medieval England in London. Women had numerous inheritance and property rights, which allowed them to secure their positions in society and confront their husbands’ authority. They actively participated in the economic life in England. Women were not only equal partners of their husbands, but they also ran their own businesses independently. Thus, they were not only able to resist male power, but also became increasingly visible in public space as prominent social actors. Chaucer, who had various social experiences and performed many social roles, such as soldier, royal official, Member of Parliament, or judge, was deeply connected with contemporary social life. Therefore, I argue, that his work is inspired by women’s visibility and public presence, which is reflected in his writing. I argue that the non-passive kind of submissiveness of these non-submissive women can be directly related to their high visibility in the public sphere as reflected by Chaucer. His language, using accepted moral values and ideals, proved insufficient to accommodate these visible and entrepreneurial women. I focus on the tensions between social reality and the language used by Chaucer. Hence, it is important to focus on these tensions and ruptures. Seemingly passive Constance uses many subtle ways to change her life, such as complaints, indirect actions, and manipulations of the religion. Her active attitude destroys her image as a holy woman, who is ready to suffer for the sake of male will. Grizeld creates her agency and autonomy by the active performance of duties, which were assumed to be done by her husband. In such a way, she is able to develop her autonomous subjectivity. Finally, Virginia, by demanding her own participation in decision making regarding her life, ruptures the image of a saint woman, seen as always ready to die in order to preserve her chastity. She creates a discourse of her feminine otherness that threatens masculine domination. Language contains fixed ideals and norms, which are hard to change, which is why problems arise in describing actual life. Chaucer wrote his Canterbury Tales by using this language at his disposal. However, the tension between active women seen everywhere in the street in almost equal positions with men create the situation where Chaucer’s submissive women are hardly passive. His reflection upon feminine agency and autonomy serves as an example of the ways of how oppressed and marginalized women could influence male writing in such a way that Chaucer accepts not only their existence, but their personalities, agency, and autonomy. |
| Supervisor | Vera Eliasova |
| Department | Gender Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2015/tebenev_konstantin.pdf |
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