“Inside many a fat middle-aged man is a randy little thin one trying to get out,” the scholar Derek Brewer wrote in his 1978 book “Chaucer and His World,” referring to what he called the “strange case” of Chaumpaigne. “Perhaps he” — Chaucer — “sometimes did.” (NY Times)
In some legal papers they used the phrase "raptus" which is taken to mean rapist. But unsealing some ancient documents from 1379 that we stored in a salt mine in Cheshire, the documents seem to indicate that he was trying to stop the poaching of a servant during a plague.
Much of the feminist writing about misogyny isn't touched by the removal of this fact, but we now don't know that he was a rapist, indeed, he probably wasn't based on what we know now.
The story goes that The Wife of Bath is perhaps the first feminist writing, in a way prompted by sexual misconduct, Chaucer perhaps examined his beliefs and became more open minded about women and empathetic.
Removing rape from his bio makes that story false, but it doesn't make The Wife of Bath less revolutionary. And it's always good when rape doesn't occur even if it's in the 14th century.
I remember fondly reading The Canterbury Tales, quite enjoying it.
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