The Wife of Bath's Tale Quiz

What is the author's purpose in including "The Wife of Bath's Prologue" with "The Wife of Bath's Tale"?

• To maintain the frame story by showing interactions between characters

• To explain the historical context of the long narrative that is to come

• To entertain the reader with constant shifts in the main plot

• To inform the reader about challenges the travelers face

Which phrase best describes the Wife of Bath's perspective in her discussion of fairies and friars in lines 29-54?

When good King Arthur ruled in ancient days

(A king that every Briton loves to praise)

This was a land brim-full of fairy folk.

The Elf-Queen and her courtiers joined and broke

Their elfin dance on many a green mead, 33

Or so was the opinion once, I read,

Hundreds of years ago, in days of yore.

But no one now sees fairies any more.

For now the saintly charity and prayer

Of holy friars seem to have purged the air;

They search the countryside through field and stream

As thick as motes that speckle a sun-beam, 40

Blessing the halls, the chambers, kitchens, bowers, 41

Cities and boroughs, castles, courts and towers,

Thorpes, barns and stables, outhouses and dairies, 43

And that’s the reason why there are no fairies.

Wherever there was wont to walk an elf 45

Today there walks the holy friar himself

As evening falls or when the daylight springs,

Saying his matins and his holy things,

Walking his limit round from town to town. 49

Women can now go safely up and down

By every bush or under every tree;

There is no other incubus but he, 52

So there is really no one else to hurt you

And he will do no more than take your virtue

• Deeply nostalgic

• Naively idealistic

• Playfully irreverent

• Highly superstitious

Choose the phrase that uses correct subject-verb agreement in the underlined section in the sentence below.

Cold were the days in the depths of winter.

• Cold were the days

• Cold was the days

• Cold be the days

• correct as is

What theme does the narrator develop in lines 320-338?

“But gentleness, as you will recognize,

Is not annexed in nature to possessions. 321

Men fail in living up to their professions;

But fire never ceases to be fire.

God knows you’ll often find, if you enquire,

Some lording full of villainy and shame. 325

If you would be esteemed for the mere name

Of having been by birth a gentleman

And stemming from some virtuous, noble clan,

And do not live yourself by gentle deed

Or take your father’s noble code and creed,

You are no gentleman, though duke or earl.

Vice and bad manners are what make a churl. 332

“Gentility is only the renown

For bounty that your fathers handed down,

Quite foreign to your person, not your own;

Gentility must come from God alone.

That we are gentle comes to us by grace

And by no means is it bequeathed with place.

• Gentlemen tend to behave badly because they are full of pride.

• Men often rise to nobility through shameful and villainous deeds.

• True gentility cannot be inherited but comes from living virtuously.

• Noble titles are corrupting because all people should be treated equally.

Which quotation from the selection best supports the answer to Part A?

True gentility cannot be inherited but comes from living virtuously.

• But gentleness, as you will recognize, / Is not annexed in nature to possessions. (lines 320-321)

• Men fail in living up to their professions; / But fire never ceases to be fire. (lines 322-323)

• . . . You are no gentleman, though duke or earl. / Vice and Bad manners are what make a churl. (lines 331-332)

• That we are gentle comes to us by grace / And by no means is it bequeathed with place. (lines 337-338)

Which quote from the selection expresses a stereotype about women?

• . . . A man can win us best with flattery. / To dance attendance on us, make a fuss, / Ensnares us all, the best and worst of us. (lines 106-108)

• There sat the noble matrons and the heady / Young girls, and widows too, that have the grace / Of wisdom, all assembled in that place . . . (lines 200-202)

• . . . even if my ancestors were rude, / Yet God on high-and so I hope He will- / Can grant me grace to live in virtue still . . . (lines 346-348)

• But truly poor are they who whine and fret / And covet what they cannot hope to get. (lines 361-362)

How does "The Wife of Bath's Tale" fit into the structure of The Canterbury Tales?

• It is the central tale told within the frame story.

• It is one of many tales connected by the frame story.

• It establishes the frame story's theme about chivalry.

• It introduces the important characters of the frame story.

Which two sentences show the strongest connections between "The Wife of Bath's Tale" and "The Wife of Bath's Prologue"?

• The Friar laughs at the Wife of Bath, and at the beginning of her tale she hints at the immorality of friars.

• The Wife of Bath reveals in the prologue that she is old, and the wife in the tale takes the form of an old woman.

• The Host says in the prologue that the Friar and Summoner must be drunk, and the knight drunkenly attacks a maiden in the tale.

• The Summoner says in the prologue that the Friar has no patience, and the knight in the tale is impatient to learn what women most desire.

The knight has an internal conflict when his wife asks him to decide whether she will be -

• wealthy or wise

• beautiful or faithful

• submissive or loving

• honest or talented

According to the Wife of Bath, why can't people see elves or fairies anymore?

• They lack the imagination that they had in days of yore.

• They were all imprisoned in The Tree of Sleep by Morgana Le Fay.

• The prayers of holy friars have purged the air of elves and fairies.

• The fairies and elves long ago migrated to the Far East, where life is "brighter."