Wife of Bath [Tale]

Wife of Bath was very familiar to me, because I remember reading an "online-wit" about it. It has an exact same plot as Wife of Bath, and the only difference is that the "joke version" was written in a funny way. Therefore in spite of reading in old English, the tale was easy to understand.

To relate my experiecne of the story with Wife of Bath, I will have to explain briefly what the original tale is about.

King Arthur

In the era of King Arthur, a lusty knight rapes a maiden ["By utter force, he took away her maidenhead." (888)]. The knight is taken to the court, and King Arthur sentences him to death by decapitaion. However, Arthur's wife suggests him to spare the knight's life, only if the knight brings an answer to a riddle in a year. Arthur, loving his wife so much, grants her suggestion. The riddle was "what do women most want from the world?" Since the day, the knight roams around the country and asks every women he meets about the riddle ["He seeks every house and every place Where he hopes to have the luck." (919-920)]. Disputing his hope, most women had different answers to the question. Going through such hardships, he almost gives up and heads home. Fortunately before he even gets to his house, he sees a group of women dancing and singing, so he decides to ask them about the riddle. When he approaches, the group vanishes but an old ugly woman emerges. The woman claims she can help with the riddle, but she needs to get something in return from the knight ["Pledge me thy word here in my hand" (1009)]. The knight agrees, and the woman supplies him with an answer: "women want to be in charge of their husbands and lover." The knight presents the answer in the court, and he is set free.

Old Woman

Shockingly, the ugly woman proposes the knight to marry her. The knight becomes extremely confused, and tells her to take something else away from him. However despite his desperate plead, he eventually marries her. Asking the knight one day why he is so sad, and he replies "I am embarrased because I have an ugly wife." Instead of taking offense, the woman offers him two options: she could be pretty but not loyal, or stay ugly but become very loyal. The knight thinks, and he tells her that the judgement is up to her ["Choose yourself which may be most pleasure..." (1232)]. Thanking the knight, the ugly woman decides to become pretty and loyal at the same time, because the knight let her choose her own destiny ["That she so was beautiful, and so young moreover..." (1251)]. 

The joke and the tale both have the same theme: men should respect women, and should not take a full control over them. However, the joke version ended up more funny because it was related to sex, and the way the ugly woman offered the options was satiric. She said something like "If you want to have a good sex with me, I will stay pretty and sexy. Yet, if you dont' need sex because you are busy with your own work as a knight, I will stay loyal, but ugly." I took this as a metaphor to where most men are now busy with their work and return home late. I don't know why this phrase pops up in my mind: "Boys are stupid, girls are evil."