The Merchant's Wife's Tale: Language, Sex, and Commerce in Margery Kempe and in Chaucer

Author / Editor
Ellis, Deborah S.

Title
The Merchant's Wife's Tale: Language, Sex, and Commerce in Margery Kempe and in Chaucer

Published
Exemplaria 2 (1990): 595-626.

Description
An intertextual study of Margery Kempe and May in MerT reveals how language, sex, and money, considered as "media of exchange," affect medieval discourse concerning women and merchants, and especially merchants' wives. All three media are recognized as vital to the living of everyday life but also as potentially alienating and destructive forces; all three can be used by women as conscious strategies for self-assertion.

Chaucer Subjects
Merchant and His Tale.