Talk:The Reeve's Tale

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Strother[edit]

The village the two students come from is called Strother, said to be in the north, and the narrator know very little about it. I'm not going to do any original research, but I believe Strother is a corruption of Westruther, over the Scottish frontier. It would make sense. 98.221.141.21 (talk) 16:45, 18 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Rape in the Reeve's Tale[edit]

First Alan got up and, without any complaint from the miller's daughter, joined her in bed.

While this summary is technically correct, it strongly implies that the miller's daughter made no complaint because she was willing, which is misleading. The relevant passage, ~~from the original~~[1], makes it clear that she was unable to complain:

And up he rose and to the girl he crept. This wench lay on her back and soundly slept, Until he'd come so near, ere she might spy, It was too late to struggle, then, or cry; And, to be brief, these two were soon alone.

Likewise, that "the cradle had been moved" bit - the original makes it very clear that John moved it, to trick the miller's wife into his bed. The sensibilities of the Reeve's Tale are very much contrary to modern attitudes; we shouldn't obscure that point by obscuring issues of nonconsent & deceit. --Calair 00:51, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree on your first point that the previous summary is misleading, but I think the rewrite goes too far in the other direction. There just isn't enough in the text to indicate either consent or lack of consent; only surprise. --Sneftel 23:14, 30 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. I've added the mention of struggling, though, since that is in the original, and removed the quote marks because this isn't actually a direct quote from Chaucer. --Calair 04:53, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hm... where do you read that? The lines in question: "Til he so ny was, er she myghte espie, / That it had been to late for to crie, / And shortly for to seyn, they were aton." --Sneftel 19:12, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have no idea how I managed to miss the blindingly obvious fact that the version I quoted above was a modernised one and not the original text, but somehow I did. Ugh. I beg your pardon, and have reverted to your version minus the quote marks. --Calair 23:29, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No prob; modernized versions are the only way to stay sane while reading The Canterbury Tales. Article looks great now. Thanks! --Sneftel 23:42, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, just thought I'd add some of my own thoughts to this. Discussions about if it was rape or just a seely young girl should realy be on the main page as it is fascinating and greatly alters how we read the story. Too many lits articles here are dominated by long plot summaries at the expense of analysis and discussion of themes. I know analysis is more difficult to write and make POV or less original research but plot summaries simply mean people don't have to read it and they don't give people any clues to interpretation. Oh well I sould probably solve it myself but it is good to find other people arguing over 14th century literature. MeltBanana 23:32, 1 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Since literary analysis is original research, it's not really appropriate for us to do it. What IS useful is analysis which is sourced and (ideally) generally agreed upon by scholars in the field. If you have some of that, you should definitely add it to the article. --Sneftel 02:43, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The subject of historical attitudes towards rape is probably worth an article in itself. AFAICT, folk of Chaucer's time had a much more lenient attitude towards rape than we do today. There are plenty of stories and songs from that era which which seem to see nothing very objectionable in the idea of tricking a woman into sex. In the Wife of Bath's tale[2] the hero of the tale is condemned to death for rape, but the queen and her ladies all plead for innocence; in Tirant lo Blanc, the title character - presented as a paragon of chivalry - spends much of the book courting a princess and ends up forcing himself on her with the connivance of the queen, and after about five minutes of "how could you?" she ends up more in love with him than ever. I agree that Wikipedia's not the place for original research, but if somebody else has done the research it would make a worthwhile article for this and others to point to. --Calair 05:50, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, it's a very interesting subject. --Sneftel 18:37, 2 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Pfft. What does "too late to struggle, then, or cry" mean, for pity's sake? I say you can't really rape a woman if her parents are sleeping in the same room without their knowing. I've tried. Oh, call it "original research" if you want. I call it science. --Tysto (talk) 04:28, 18 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think some people editing this text are imposing modern sensibilities on a Middle English text. What I read in the Reeve's Tale doesn't seem like rape, and by using this word the editors of Wikipedia are misleading potential readers. The Reeve's Tale is a story within a story and must be presented accurately. Calling the sex in the story "rape" imposes a judgment that isn't there in the original story. Indeed, I would contend that it's not a topic for dispute. Regarding the mother, the Reeve says "it was the merriest fit in all her life". And the daughter refers to Alan as "my sweet." Whether a person thinks that sex achieved via trickery is automatically "rape" hardly seems like a fair question. As presented in this story, the women are not raped.RickDesper (talk) 02:28, 29 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed - I didn't know the story when I came here, and found the use of the word 'rape' confusing, as it seemed to present John and Alan as the villains of the piece, when that doesn't clearly isn't the intention of the poem. I've tweaked things to refer more explicitly to the stealthiness of Alan's approach on Malyne, and to both 'having sex with' the respective women, avoiding the implications of consent that might come from a 'make love to' or a 'they had sex with each other'. I'm still worried that this might come across as being accepting of their behaviour, but in theory at least those questions of consent are left open to the interpretation of the reader. 86.27.181.73 (talk) 01:44, 15 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You people must be joking right now. With not even 20% of the Wikipedian population being owmen. You are harrasing the select few that a brave enough to stand-up for themselves and make a contribution to the world's knowledge. You are an absolutely barbaric group of douchebags who have no realy world experience when it comes to today's world. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Invictus 1234321234 (talk • contribs) 17:30, 26 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

First of all, "sex achieved via trickery" is not a reality. There is no such thing as sex through trickery. It is rape, and that is the only thing that "hardly seems like a fair question" in this story regarding Aleyn and John's interactions with the women. To bring it up again, the story states that Malyne is asleep when Aleyn goes to rape her; and when he attacks her, it "had been too late for to crie," in essence saying that Aleyn leaps upon Malyne without giving her the chance to either consent or not consent. Either way, Aleyn performs sexual acts on a person without their verbal consent, which is by the very definition rape. John tricks the miller's wife into bed with him and then pounces on her, too. Neither of these women give the men their consent, and so they are both raped. Portraying John and Aleyn in a darker light does not, in fact, taint the reader's judgement of the two in the original story as the man who wrote it obviously had it in mind that the women were to be taken without consent. The whole play on the 'lovebird's farewell the morning after' heavily implies that the two were lovebirds, with Malyne even going as far as referring to Aleyn as "lemman." In fact, John and Aleyn are so good in bed that both women seem to fall for them! This just shows Geoffrey Chaucer's very own fantasies, that if one rapes the girl he will get away with it because he is so great and wonderful. Do not be fooled by this implication. Just because the story says that the women enjoyed getting raped, does not make it sex. Aleyn and John did not "have sex with" anyone. Tartkeys (talk) 23:00, 26 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I think this might be simply a dispute over terminology. You say that what occurred was not sex. But rape is, by definition, non-consensual sex. Calling an act 'sex' does not imply consent, or imply that it was not *also* rape. Since it doesn't take a stand on whether there was consent or not, I think it makes the most sense to use when describing Chaucer's prose (given that Chaucer/the reeve didn't take a stand on whether there was consent or not either). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sneftel (talk • contribs) 13:03, 27 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Malyne knows she will not see Allyn again-the only reminder being that she will be pregnant [her comment of bread in the mill [modern slang of a bun in the oven i.e slang for pregnancy] ruining her parents plans of social climbing; To say that Allyn will have a long term relationship with Malyne does not square with the fact that in the morning all he can think of is the revenge on the Miller and the double humilitaions of the wife and daugther...there is no evidence that he cares what happens to either Malyne or their future child...if his career is in the Church {members of which were not supposed to marry]..and if its secular he looked for an advantage marriage with a rich widow/heiress with money to further his career....there is a discussuin as to weather Malyne willingly consented --the fact that Allyn prevented her from crying out...shows it was indeed rape... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.5.89.217 (talk) 17:16, 13 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Tense[edit]

Also, it just occurred to me that the synopsis is given in past tense. I could've sworn I remember reading something in WP:Style about putting it in present tense, and other articles seem to follow that convention, but I can't find it now. Do you think it matters? --Sneftel 22:31, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I always have trouble keeping track of Wikipedia conventions - I wouldn't be surprised if that was correct. But it probably isn't a big issue; if anybody really objects to past tense, I daresay they'll fix it one of these days. --Calair 23:29, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Works for me. Editing tense is not my idea of a good time either. --Sneftel 23:43, 31 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]