Thisbe - One of Chaucer's "Good" Women Quiz

Answer: True

"The Legend of Good Women" was written around 1386 and consists of nine individual legends about women, all of which derive from classical mythology. The legend of "Thisbe" follows that of "Cleopatra", and is the second legend to be told. The order of the remaining legends are "Dido", "Hypsipyle" and "Medea", "Lucree", "Ariadne", "Philomela", "Phyllis" and "Hypermnestra". All are women who suffered and died for love. The theme is simple; women are "trewe of love for oght that may byfalle", a message which is constantly replayed in the "Prologue". Men, on the other hand, "don nat but assayen/ How many women they may doon a shame".

Yet despite claiming to be a defence of women, close examination reveals "The Legend" to be a palinode, an ancient literary tradition which most commonly concerns itself with the slander or ironic praise of women. For in the "Prologue" to "The Legend of Good Women", Alceste and the God of Love demand propaganda. They desire the "makyng of glorious legende/ Of goode wymmen, maydenes and wyves" who "weren trewe in lovyng al hire lyves". But Chaucer does not provide it. On the contrary, what he does in the legends themselves is mock the catalogues' attempts to define an abstract ideal by using concrete examples that repeatedly fail to fit it.

Answer: Neither of their fathers would allow it

Chaucer starts by telling the tale of two young lovers; the "yonge man was called Piramus/ Tysbe hight the maide", and she was "the fayreste/ That estward" dwelled, and he was of "al that lond oon of the lustyeste". Both "in love ylyke sore they brente" and there "myghte have ben bytwixe hem maryage", only "that here fadres nolde it nat assente".

Indeed it is their fathers who prevent the lovers from marrying, and thus sets their tragic tale in motion. For passion has an important role in Chaucer's legend of "Thisbe". Privately "som tyme yit they mette/ By sleyghte" to speak "of here desyr". For as "wry the glede and hotter is the fyr/ Forbede a love, and it is ten so wod". Thus at odds with the orders of her parents and companions, (for "non of alle hyre frendes myght it lette"), Thisbe continued to meet with Pyramus in secret.

Answer: A wall

The wall which divides the two lovers is highly significant:

This wal, which that bitwixe hem bothe stod,
Was clove a-two, ryght from the cop adoun,
Of olde tyme of his fundacioun;

Chaucer uses the stone wall as a symbol of division, which causes the lovers to curse it for refusing to "cleve or fallen al a-two". For the "wikkede wal" itself is flawed in its structure. As a result, its "clyfte", although "narw and lyte", enables passion to penetrate obstructions. Although the wall is a cause of separation, it is also simultaneously a source for union. Thus the "colde wal they wolden kysse of ston,/ And take here leve and forth they wolden gon". To add to this, it also provides a channel for speech, enabling the "swote soun of other to receyve". This is how the relationship is sustained, for over a "longe tyme they wroughte in this manere". The wall is highly significant. It unites them through separation, for as an obstruction the wall only serves to increase their passion, which is also allowed to transfer itself onto the other side of the stone.

Answer: At Ninus' tomb

Pyramus and Thisbe agree "to mete in o place at o tyde"; they "sette mark" where "kyng Nynus was grave under a tre". Incidentally Ninus (the male founder of Babylon), is Semiramis' (the current ruler of Babylon) husband. Therefore the lovers actually fail in their attempts to escape the civic structures of their home town, for Ninus' tomb is a clear reminder of its constraint.

Answer: A lioness

While Thisbe is waiting for Pyramus, she sees a "wilde leonesse" come "out of the wode", "with blody mouthe, of strangling of a beste/ To drinken of the welle, ther as she sat". Fearing for her life, "in a cave with dredful foot she sterte", and "her wimpel leet she falle". Once the "leonesse hath dronke her fille", "right anoon the wimpel gan she finde" and "with her blody mouth hit al to-rente", before disappearing back "to the wode her wey than hath she nome".

Answer: He thinks that Thisbe is dead

Thisbe's torn "wimpel" is the symbol that triggers Pyramus' suicide. For he sees "the steppes brode of a leoun" and mistakenly believes that Thisbe has been killed by it. He blames himself for this, for he should not have "bidde a woman goon by nighte/ In a place ther as peril fallen mighte". He misinterprets the signs, and presumes that Thisbe is already dead. Thus he "smoot him to the herte" with his sword, so violently that the "blood out of the wounde" resembled "water, whan the conduit broken is".

Answer: True

Having escaped the lioness, Thisbe is finally moved from her hiding place by the thought that Pyramus might think her "fals and eek unkinde" if she does meet him. So "out she comth, and after him gan espyen", determined to tell him "of the leonesse". She is, however, met with a grisly scene, of Pyramus "Beting with his heles on the grounde/ Al blody". Seeing "her wimpel and his empty shethe/ And eek his swerd, that him hath doon to deathe", (unlike Pyramus before her), Thisbe not only registers the signs, but also reads them correctly. Thus she vows that "love shal yive" her "strengthe and hardinesse/ To make" her "wounde large y-nogh" to follow Pyramus.

His "swerd she took as swythe", and "to the herte she her-selven smoot".

Answer: Pyramus

Despite the fact that the focus of this legend is supposed to be Thisbe, it is actually Pyramus who is praised in its final lines. Unlike Thisbe, who is (arguably) portrayed as rather foolish and forward, Pyramus is attributed no faults that might make him seem counterfeit in any way. His only indiscretion appears to be his delay in reaching Ninus' tomb, which subsequently leads to the lovers' suicide:

And at the laste this Piramus is come;
But al to long, allas, at hom was he!

This is the only negative comment that is ever made about Pyramus, and this is as close as he ever gets to betraying Thisbe. Few men are true, "save this Piramus", which is predominantly why Chaucer speaks "of hym thus". He in love has "been trewe and kynde", and is as hard in books, as in life 'to fynde". Therefore if a "woman dar and can as wel as he", she must ultimately be as rare as he is.

Answer: Ovid

Publius Ovidius Naso was born in 43 BC at Sulmo in the Abruzzi region during the civil war that followed the assassination of Julius Caesar. The author of many great works such as the "Fasti" and "Tristia", he successfully turned his back on a legal career, soon gaining a reputation as a poet of considerable merit. "The Metamorphoses" was completed around AD 8, (the date of his exile). Although this is Ovid's most recognised work, it is one of many poetic achievements which earned him a permanent place in the literary hall of fame. Not only a success in its own day, it also influenced the work of Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower, William Shakespeare, John Dryden, Alexander Pope, and the more contemporary Ted Hughes. Like many of his predecessors, (including Chaucer), Hughes transformed Ovidian myth in order to appeal to the current public imagination. The poets of the Middle Ages also performed similar adaptations on parts of "The Metamorphoses". Like Ovid, they too manipulated source material in order to achieve their own ends.

This point is made particularly obvious in Chaucer's "Legend of Good Women". 'In "The Metamorphoses", "Pyramus and Thisbe" is the first tale to be told by one of the daughters of Minyas. However what is interesting is that having named three possible tales that could be narrated, the daughter refers to it not as the tale of "Pyramus and Thisbe", (as one might suppose), but rather as "how the mulberry-tree, which once had borne white fruit, now has fruit dark red". For the transformation is meant "for mourning, as a memorial of" the tragic double death of the two lovers, which it is, for it keeps the marks of their death. This is one particular aspect of Ovid's version that is absent from Chaucer's legend of "Thisbe", for unlike Ovid, Chaucer's attention was clearly set on the character of Thisbe and not the metamorphosis of the mulberry.

Answer: Gower moralises his tale

Completed around 1393, the third recension of "Confessio Amantis" consists of a prologue and eight books, which, with the exception of Book VII, deal with each of the seven deadly sins. Displaying a conversational and yet encyclopaedic structure, "Confessio Amantis" draws each of the seven deadly sins together, and includes all of their subdivisions. Most of the conversation takes place between the penitent, Amans, and his confessor, Genius, who vows to show "he vices on and on" until Amans has been "chewen everychon". Consequently Amans "myht take evidence" and "reule with" his conscience. Genius' purpose is to judge and instruct, so that Amans "schalt knowe and understonde/ The pointz of shrifte how that thei stonde". This instruction leads on to the telling of tales, and provides Gower with an opportunity to use exempla, which is integral to the overall structure of "Confessio Amantis". For each tale has a moral, which exclusively warns against the sins that are committed against love.

One thing that ultimately separates John Gower's version of the "Pyramus and Thisbe" myth from those of Ovid and Chaucer is his role as a moralist and a critic of corruption. Love "is of a wonder kinde", although it "hath hise wittes ofte blinde,/ That thei fro mannes reson falle". To illustrate the moral, Gower's "Pyramus and Thisbe" is given as an example of that which "is behovely forto wite". The myth stands as a warning against acting in foolhaste, for the root of human sin lies in allowing passion to overcome reason.