More Than Just a Pretty Face: What Women Most Desire

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In Geoffrey Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” he creates a unique character for his time. This person is not only flamboyant with their sexuality, manipulative in mind, and abundantly wealthy, but is also a woman. The ideal woman who is assumed to be graceful, meek, and humbly intelligent is stomped to the ground by the Wife of Bath’s tightly laced scarlet stockings and “sharp spurs” (Chaucer line 475). This dominatrix prowls the pilgrimage to Canterbury in search for husband number six and flashes her beauty. Unlike the Wife of Baths, the fairy queen in Marie de France’s lais, Lanval, portrays a different kind of demeanor. She is elegant, beautiful beyond measure, and is rich to the highest degree. Although she sounds like the Wife of Baths at first, she does not say anything about herself. While the Wife of Baths proudly flaunts her appearance, the fairy queen lets others do the talking for her. Although both women are powerful beings, one is greater than the other due to the differences between them on how they use their power: one is an over extravagant sex machine, and the other has unworldly beauty and grace. The fairy queen in Lanval knows full well that she is unimaginably beautiful, however rather than voicing it, she presents it and lets the minds of others be enthralled by her. When she first meets Lanval, she wears “a precious cloak of white ermine, /covered with purple alexandrine/ but her whole side was uncovered [along with], her face, her neck and her bosom” (De France lines 102-105) Just like that, Lanval can safely assume that she is wealthy and of noble birth just by the purple embroidery on her cloak. The openness of her attire permits his eyes to assess that she is extremely attractive. However, when she speaks to Lanval, she does not say that she is beautiful nor does she state how many lovers have fallen for her. Instead she says “sweet love;

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