Windeatt on “Love that oughte ben secree”
Windeatt, Barry. “’Love that oughte ben secree” in Chaucer’s Troilus.” Chaucer Review 14.2 (1979): 116-131.
Barry Windeatt in his essay, “’Love that oughte ben secree” in Chaucer’s Troilus,” argues that Chaucer makes deliberate choices in his changes from Boccaccio’s Il Filistrato to emphasize the importance for secrecy in love affairs as well as introducing a society based on courtly love that affords lovers very little privacy (116). Chaucer’s interest is in how the love of Troilus and Criseyde is limited both by their society and by their own beliefs—Pandarus’ beliefs—about how lovers should behave. Pandarus especially is guilty of these crimes, as he often convinces Troilus about how secrecy in affairs is necessary not because of common sense but because of old romances and courtly love in literary tradition (116).
Using a wide variety of examples, Windeatt contrasts Il Filistrato and Chaucer’s Troilus. He emphasizes the differences between the characters and the society in which either author places the story. According to Windeatt, the English characters are afforded less privacy than Boccaccio’s characters are. Whenever Criseide needs privacy she merely leaves the company of others. Criseyde is rarely alone when she needs or wants to be, and in Book III the only way for Pandarus to have a private conversation with Criseyde is to tell her companions he needed to discuss a state secret (118). In Filistrato, Pandaro and Criseide have a much easier time getting privacy (117). In the name of the constraints of society, Chaucer deliberately makes it harder for the English lovers to progress their affair. Too much of their efforts has to be given to keeping up appearances and maintaining public life that entirely hides their private life.
Criseyde as a character is especially aware of how she is publicly viewed. When she is with Troilus’ family as they discuss the nature of his ‘illness’ in Book II, she feels the public distinction between herself and Troilus that Troilus never acknowledges. On the other hand, Troilus often feels the need to keep up public appearances as well. When first sighting Criseyde in the temple, Troilus deliberately looks at other things so that no one can tell he is staring. There is no effort made on the part of Boccaccio’s Troilo to hide his love in this way. The letters themselves are also indications of the false nature of public appearances. Both Troilus and Criseyde are told by Pandarus that there is a difference between composing a love letter an merely writing a letter. According to Windeatt, “For Chaucer’s Pandarus a letter is an essentially non-spontaneous, pre-considered statement, consciously designed to achieve maximum effect (122). Criseyde and Troilus are both too naïve to understand this and so Pandarus is able to manipulate them.
Windeatt’s essay is well formulated and persuasive. His thesis on the contrasts between private and public life in Chaucer’s Troilus and Boccaccio’s Il Filistrato is explained in its entirety. He suggests that Chaucer’s constant inclusion of social responsibilities that are not in Boccaccio’s text is to emphasize the eternal conflict between private and public life for Troilus and Criseyde. His examples are clear and illuminating, especially when speaking about the love letter or Troilus’ initial reaction to seeing Criseyde in the temple. The examination of Troilus as conflicted between his public and his private desires was especially interesting because he is a character that spends less time conflicted with himself than Criseyde does. Criseyde spends almost the entire poem analyzing the importance of her decisions and the possible consequences of her actions, especially as viewed by others. Pandarus too emphasizes to Troilus the importance of keeping the affair a secret and how Criseyde’s reputation would be ruined if Troy discovered their love. Troilus too often leaves the decision making to Pandarus and Criseyde, letting Pandarus choose where the relationship goes and placing himself in Criseyde’s hands as her servant. But Windeatt makes excellent arguments for Troilus’s conflicted views on what is expected of him from his family and from Troy versus what he wants to do and feel.
The weakest argument of the essay was that of the repetitious nature of literary romance, and Pandarus’ use of that. The idea that Troilus and Criseyde act the way they do because of their beliefs on how lovers act is not fully fleshed out. Windeatt uses fewer examples when he could have used more to better explain and support his thesis. However, his essay overall was excellent and does not suffer too greatly for the loss of these ideas.
Reiss on Audience
Reiss, Edmund. “Chaucer and his Audience.” Chaucer Review 14.2 (1979): 390-401.
In his essay, “Chaucer and his Audience,” Edmund Reiss argues that Chaucer’s audience changes our perception of his writings because it affected what and how he wrote. There is little agreement among scholars about his audience or even if it really existed. Some claim that Chaucer was a court-writer in the same tradition as story-telling minstrals. Deter Mehl claims that it should not matter what Chaucer’s reality was, because his audience “’can never be more than an abstract reconstruction which does not really affect our experience when we read Chaucer’” (390). But Reiss argues that Chaucer’s poetry gives even modern readers the sense of an audience, and if it was important to Chaucer it should be investigated.
Chaucer’s poems have an essentially oral nature in which his composition depends on his audience. Chaucer has a unique ability to create a sense of rapport in the close relationship between writer and author. His knowledge of an audience may have led him to depend on the presence of one, and this is the involvement that even modern readers feel.
Occasionally, Chaucer makes readers doubt that the audience is any more real than his narrators are, especially when the narrator interjects to state the obvious. Reiss writes that “just as Chaucer creates a narrator addressing an audience, so he creates an audience being addressed by this narrator (392). Chaucer enjoys mixing the expected with the unexpected as well as the sincere with the ironic. To do this without fear of misinterpretation means that Chaucer knew his audience and understood their knowledge on his subjects. It is because of the audience’s knowledge that Chaucer can freely distort and pervert ideas in his irony and not fear being misunderstood. Chaucer takes pleasure in his play on ideals and common knowledge of medieval audiences.
Additionally, Chaucer plays with allusions to information that modern readers do not have access to. He enjoys using ambiguity to allow his audiences bring their own meaning to the work. What medieval audiences may have thought about certain passages will probably never be known. Since as a writer and entertainer Chaucer could not have allusions that only he and a few elite would understand, it has to be assumed that his audience would have all reacted the same to his ambiguities. Additionally, Reiss suggests that Chaucer does this to bring the audience into an interaction with the work. Since Chaucer and his audience were interested less in new material and more in the old, it is possible that they enjoyed the latter more because they could see the poet’s influence on the familiar, traditional work. It gave Chaucer a chance to show off and the audiences a chance to appreciate Chaucer the poet instead of a mere retelling of a well known text.
The second type of audience familiarity is based less on audience familiarity than on their ability to evaluate and judge the texts for themselves. Chaucer enjoys creating what Reiss refers to as “false dilemmas” to set up the appearance of conflict while avoiding making any meaningful statement about the subject at hand (399). Chaucer calls attention to discrepancies between the ideal and the real, and relies on his audience to recognize this. He offers an ideal—such as marriage as a solution to all problems in “The Knight’s Tale”—but later exchanges it for the opposite—marriage is the cause of all problems in “The Miller’s Tale.” Chaucer’s manipulations of his audience were masterful, and few can match his style.
Reiss’ thesis was direct and masterful. He offers differing opinions within medieval studies on the nature, existence and importance of Chaucer’s audience. After informing readers of the controversy he takes a side and makes his argument while addressing the concerns of all his critics in addition to crafting his essay. He addresses every aspect of his thesis in an organized fashion, and does not rely on overly-complicated scholarly language to do so. His insights into the court entertainments in medieval England are useful in referencing who Chaucer’s audience would be and what they may have been knowledgeable about. Reiss is excellent at placing readers in the historic context that Chaucer wrote in and how his audiences may have interpreted his work. The main flaw in Reiss’ essay is his choice to reference fellow medieval scholars as much as he did. While the references are often insightful and worthwhile, Reiss relies on them nearly as heavily as he relies on primary sources of Chaucer’s works. Additionally, Reiss’ essay was short in comparison to most other scholarly works. While it makes for easy reading, it also could have been a more persuasive essay had he lengthened it by adding more primary sources. Those primary sources that he does use are almost entirely from The Canterbury Tales. Troilus and Criseyde also receives a lot of attention, but no other work by Chaucer is referenced. If this was intentional, Reiss should have mentioned his focus in the title or the introduction.
La Farge on Women and Providence
La Farge, Catherine. “Women and Chaucer’s Providence: The Clerk’s Tale and The Knight’s Tale.” From Medieval to Medievalism. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992. 69-81.
La Farge writes that Emelye and Griselde have always been considered problematic by modern readers of The Canterbury Tales. Emelye is considered to flat a character to be considered the motivating heroine of The Knight’s Tale. Griselde’s perfection and imperviousness to her husband makes her more painful to readers than her husband is. La Farge argues that in order to understand these characters, medieval scholars cannot ignore Chaucer’s investigations of medieval social and religious institutions in the name of historical contextual understanding. What happens to Emelye and Griselde “can be read as an example—in both cases a rather extreme example—of the destiny of humankind” (69). Their futures threaten disaster for most of the plot but in the end is resolved. For both women, powerful men become the source of destiny and it is questioned if they are intended to appear God-like. La Farge argues in her essay that these two tales merge the uses of power in ways that justice in families, politics and the divine seem questionable.
Theseus’ behavior is mainly self-indulgent. He uses his power and freedom to continually change his mind. Palamon and Arcite are threatened with imprisonment, then death, then that death is withheld. He uses wealth and power merely because he can. He devises the theatre in imitation of God’s creation of the world, and in his final speech he abuses theatrical gestures that emphasize the gaps between the powerful Theseus and the helplessness of his subjects. His very nature of change keeps him from becoming an example of Boethian Provedence, which defined by a lack of change. Theseus is both lofty and human, for he revels in his power but is tolerant, occasionally merciful, and “fluid in mood” (73).
Emelye is an afterthought on Chaucer’s sentences, as if she is nearly forgotten throughout the story. She accepts the events of the story as if they had no effect on her. The notable exception to this is her plea to Diana to remain unwed, but that is a wish unfulfilled. Emelye’s blankness has been read as a reflection of her lovers’ desire or a sign of the romantic or anti-romantic elements of the tale. La Farge argues that the state of a lover symbolizes the helplessness of being human, and that womanhood mimics that helplessness.
Walter of The Clerk’s Tale is even less worthy of divinity than Theseus. Like Theseus, he is constantly changing his mind according to his own whims and his freedom to do so due to his powerful status. Griselde is characterized almost entirely by her lack of change, and is perhaps the best example of Boethian Providence because of this. Griselde and Walter are foils for each other, as he cannot stop changing and she will not change. At the end of the tale, it is Griselde that readers are asked to learn from. Griselde should be the example of divinity, yet it is Walter that readers are instructed to look at. La Farge believes that it is God who is freed from judgement because of the dissimilarities between God and Walter.
Chaucer uses women as modes for exploring power and freedom. Emelye and Griselde are controlled by the outside forces of Fortune, and they have little choice “except in the degree of enthusiasm they express (79). They make visible the effects of outside forces because they have no internal sources to guide them.
La Farge’s essay was not nearly as well written as expected. Her thesis indicated that her focus would be on women and Providence, but Emelye and Griselde were hardly mentioned. Both women played secondary roles in the essay to the dominating men of the story. While her thoughts on Walter and Theseus were interesting and insightful, she concentrated her efforts more on them than the women whom she claims to be interested in. If her goal was to discuss women and Providence, she failed in her discussion of the former. Emelye is only analyzed for one page in an eleven page essay, and Griselde seems to be used only as a comparison for her husband. La Farge offered no new insights onto Emelye’s character, with the exception being her mention of Emelye as an afterthought in Chaucer’s sentences.
Additionally, though La Farge focuses her analysis on The Knight’s Tale and The Clerk’s Tale, in the end of her essay she introduces The Merchant’s Tale and Troilus and Criseyde for brief analysis. Certainly if La Farge cannot find space to analyze Emelye she should not be adding more texts, especially not in the second to last paragraph of a published essay.
Catherine La Farge’s essay, “Women and Chaucer’s Providence: The Clerk’s Tale and The Knight’s Tale” had an interesting and unique title and thesis that was disregarded during the essay. If La Farge had discussed her female characters more, her essay could have been considered well-written, cohesive and persuasive. It had promise, but was unable to life up to its thesis.
Mann on Troilus’ Swoon
Mann, Jill. “Troilus’ Swoon.” Chaucer Review 14.2 (1979): 319-335.
Troilus only swoons once in Troilus and Criseyde, despite exaggerations to the contrary. Jill Mann writes that the role of the swoon can only be understood within the context of Troilus and Criseyde’s courtship. She argues that the relationship between the lovers is understood in terms of power, and that “shifts and transformations in the way each of them either exerts or refuses to exert power over the other lead to the achievement of a mature and complex relationship on which the consummation can fittingly be based” (320).
At the start of the poem, power differences between Troilus and Criseyde are based on social status. He is a prince, while she is in the dangerous position of being a woman and the daughter of a traitor. Criseyde fears masculine dominance above all else, and she finds the most terrifying aspect of love to be its subservience. Mann argues that Criseyde’s fears are unnecessary in the case of Troilus’ love, because the ordinary power structure is inverted. Criseyde becomes the lady and Troilus is her servant. Furthermore, their meeting at Pandarus’ house is a good situation because it allows them to become equals. Criseyde’s love is a process, and to abandon her previous statements about the nature of her relationship with Troilus would reveal her as a hypocrite. Similarly, if Troilus acted sexually dominant it would belie his previous statements about being her servant, and his earlier submission would be hypocritical as well.
Criseyde’s growth of love and trust in Troilus is nearly shattered by Pandarus’ story about Horaste. But it is Troilus’ swoon that saves the relationship, because it allows for the mutual submission of the lovers to each other. Confronted by a distraught Criseyde, Troilus is unable to affirm or deny his actions as told by Pandarus. To affirm them would hurt her and is a lie, but to deny them would be to acknowledge the role that Pandarus plays in their relationship. Overwhelmed by external chaos, he gives in to unconsciousness. When he awakes, Criseyde apologizes. Because of Troilus’ show of weakness, Criseyde is able to yield power to Troilus. It is only then that they are able to fit back into sexual and gendered roles to consummate their relationship. Mann reminds readers that the only reason Troilus dominates is because Criseyde has willingly submitted a part of herself to him. For Criseyde, her submission is not feared but instead is liberating to express herself the way she wishes without fear of coercion.
Jill Mann’s essay on the nature of power and Troilus’ swoon is original and exceptionally thought provoking. She introduces ideas on Chaucer’s purpose in the swoon that make an excellent argument for Criseyde’s love for Troilus. It was especially interesting to note that Boccaccio does not have Troilus swoon at the scene in Pandarus’ house but later, when it is announced that Criseyde will go to the Greeks. Mann examines Chaucer’s purpose in changing that detail, and what it means when analyzed with the rest of the text. She argues that the swoon is not placed right before the love scene as a whim or for entertainment value but instead to allow Criseyde to show her weaknesses to Troilus just as he—albeit accidentally—showed his weaknesses to her.
Mann’s theory is based on the assumption that Troilus and Criseyde do actually love each other, as opposed to the narcissistic Troilus and the uncertain Criseyde that others have seen in the same work. Mann never addresses these problems with her essay, and only mentions the other interpretation of Troilus and Criseyde offhand and dismisses it just as easily. Had she actively addressed these conflicting views, her essay would have been much stronger. Critics disagree on nearly everything in Chaucer’s works, and Mann’s assumptions that all readers feel just as she does that Troilus and Criseyde are genuinely in love limits the scope of her audience. Her thesis is based entirely off of a shared interpretation of Troilus and Criseyde and leaves no room for multiple possible interpretations of their love.
Brozyna on Gender and Sexuality
Brozyna, Martha A. ed. Gender and Sexuality in the Middle Ages: A Medieval Source Documents Reader. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, 2005.
According to Martha Brozyna, gender is a cultural construct based on perceived differences between the sexes (1). It defines roles for the sexes, attitudes and sexuality. Gender and sexuality in the middle ages cannot be understood by the modern reader without an understanding of the institutions, customs, events and documents that created these constructs. Brozyna’s cross-disciplinary compilation of documents, literature, laws and ideas are intended to help a modern student to suspend their current context and look at medieval studies from a historical context. She divides her book into nine sections: the Bible; Christian thought; chronicles; law; biology, medicine, and science; literature; witchcraft and heresy; Judaism; and Islam. Her audience is students who are just being introduced to medieval studies. The book acts like a survey course in all aspects of medieval culture that influence gender and sexuality. She looks at a wide array of material, from the Qur’an to “Ballade for Fat Margot,” a poem about a prostitute and her brothel owner.
The majority of the book is an anthology of medieval cultural sources. There is very little analysis done by Brozyna at all, though she does include brief paragraphs before each source to explain the historical significance, discuss the author or mention themes of the work. Her writing is plain and easy to read, and most if not all of her sources have been modernized for easy reading as well. She introduces each text with as little analysis as possible, and appears to be attempting to keep any outside influence from her book. There is very little to summarize besides her excellent variety of texts and her lack of commentary on any text.
Since Brozyna’s goal was to introduce the uninitiated reader to medieval gender constructs and sexuality, she has achieved her goal. The wide variety of texts in the book gives readers a multi-faceted view of gender in the middle ages that would be hard to find in another source. She lets her readers make their own conclusions about the meaning of the texts by giving very little of her own voice to the book. To be perfectly fair, Brozyna has left very little out of her anthology except perhaps her own opinions. Her book could have been greatly improved had Brozyna been willing to comment on the different issues brought up. Her assumption seems to be that her audience is high school students who are assigned the book as preliminary reading material to medieval studies. In this case, it is perfectly acceptable for her to decline statements on the texts in favor of the teacher leading discussions on her work. The book would have improved had she been willing to address her work to college students who would have been able to analyze her book and her writings on their own and make their own conclusions. By trying to keep her bias out of the texts she removes the usefulness of Gender and Sexuality in the Middle Ages for students looking for insight and analyses of the texts she includes.
The best part about Brozyna’s book is that there are probably not very many books with such a wide variety of texts included. Her book would be very useful to any class based on medieval studies with a concentration on gender and sexuality. It was especially useful that Brozyna does not consider gender to be a focus on women. Her book looks at the roles of both men and women in medieval life as well as feminine and masculine sexual traits. The texts she includes are fascinating in their insight into a medieval mindset, but they would afford little aid if one was writing a research paper. That is her weakest point. If Brozyna would have been willing to include either her own analysis of the texts or other medievalist’s writings on the texts her book would be a wonderful research tool in the hands of any student interested in the subject. Unfortunately in her quest for unbiased reading she continues to allow students to read with a modern perspective, despite her goal to open minds to medieval cultural constructs.
Reflection 2: In which Briana considers her lack of progress
1. I am slowly progressing though Troilus, with emphasis on the slow aspect. I am in the middle of book IV right now, and that took some serious effort to get so caught up. My problem right now is that I am dedicated to reading Chaucer in the original English, without modernization. It takes a lot longer than I had hoped. But I have been reading other people’s reflections recently and some have read the original Chaucer followed by the modernization and that may be the way to go. It would require a lot more time than I have been setting aside however, so I need to work on that.
2. I am often surprised by the depth of meaning that Chaucer utilizes in his works. I am especially intrigued by his use of spelling to change the meaning and interpretation of his words. I enjoy how Chaucer plays with language to manipulate his characters and audience. It sometimes seems like his personality as a writer shines through his style and word choice. He just seems like a very fun, personable guy and I love that we can feel like we know him just by reading his words. He invests himself in his writing, and I can appreciate that (even when I need you to help me appreciate his little jokes and humorous spelling changes).
3. I intend to begin the second half of my portfolio this weekend. My weeks and my weekends up until recently were filled up with Rugby, but now that that is over I have gotten books out of the library and all I need to do is force myself to write. If I get at least three done before the week of the fourth I will be very pleased with my work. I have a bad habit of procrastination (which I am sure you have figured out by now) so I really need to focus my attentions on this and other large projects for other classes. They are all due the same week, so I intend on having all of them mostly done before that week rolls around. I am very interested in gender studies for medieval literature, so I checked out Gender and Sexuality in the Middle Ages and hopefully that will help me some. It may end up being a history book more than a literature book so while it may be interesting I might have to find another book for my review.
Troilus and Criseyde: Epic or Farce?
It has long been argued whether Geoffrey Chaucer intended for Troilus and Criseyde to be read and understood literally, or if it is satirical in nature. Often the adherents to the first perspective suffer from an overly emotional and personal identification with the character of Troilus. However, most close readings reveal a depth of language manipulation as well as a lack of rhetorical fit indicating that Chaucer’s Troilus is a farce. The use of hyperbolic language in Chaucer’s opening address to the Furies and to lovers (lines 1-56) sets the satirical tone for the rest of the poem.
In ancient Greek literature, authors traditionally called on the Gods or Muses to guide their pens and poetry. Some would specify their muse, and invoke Calliope (muse of epic song), Euterpe (muse of lyric song), Melpomene (muse of tragedy) or whichever muse fit the needs of their writing. Chaucer deviates from that by calling on the Furies, the Grecian mythological personifications of vengeance. He invokes Tisiphone, the Fury avenger of murder and homicide, “Thesiphone, thow help me for t’endite / thise woful vers” (6-7). If Chaucer had wanted his audience to read his poem as a tragedy for Troilus, he could have invoked the muse Melpomene, or the Furies Alecto (moral crimes), or Megaera (jealousy, envy and infidelity). Any of those three deities would have more correctly fit the story, for though Criseyde is accused of immorality, adultery and many other things by readers, she is not the murderer of Troilus. This is a direct contradiction of mythological knowledge that any medieval reader would have. Chaucer’s use of Tisiphone is a deliberate exaggeration of the serious nature of tragedy to tell readers that they are not reading a tragedy. He writes that she is a “cruwel Furie, sorwynge evere in peyne” though Tisiphone is an avenger of wrongdoing and not a victim of tragedy (9). Chaucer asks Tisiphone to help him pen words that weep as he writes. His heavy-handed language in his request would be an immediate indicator to a medieval audience that he was writing satire.
Next Chaucer addresses the readers, or “lovers.” Here again, Chaucer exaggerates his requests in order to direct the reading audience towards farce and away from a literal interpretation. He asks that happy lovers pray for those who are in Troilus’ situation and to pray for Chaucer in his attempts “to shewe, in som manere, / Swich peyne and wo as Loves folk endure, / In Troilus unsely aventure” (33-35). His intense humbling of himself and his writing belies the pride he takes in his works, and his coy attitude about modesty instructs readers to take his writings with a grain of salt. Chaucer continues to ask his readers to pray for those who failed in love and “nevere nyl recovered be” (37), those hurt by wicked tongues and “hem that Loves servauntz be, / And write hire wo” (48-49). His repetition and emphasis on the “pain and woe” of love and Lovers sets the satirical framing of the text. His language is heavily exaggerated and contradicts much of what we believe and what courtly love teaches: that is, love is a wonderful thing that makes people happy. To pray for happy lovers and love’s servants in the same breath as those forsaken in love and who suffered from cruel gossip is absurdist and discredits his own statements. This is Chaucer’s purpose: to make the audience realize that his statements are often untrue and contradictory, and so readers must pay careful attention to these inconsistencies that create the sense of irony in Troilus.
Chaucer’s hyperbolic language is often hard to interpret as farce for a passive modern reader, but to his contemporary audience it would have been clearly satirical from the beginning. His use of exaggeration and repetition to create hyperboles is intended to change the audience’s view of the work and force them to look at it from a satirical perspective. Having accomplished this in the opening lines of Troilus and Criseyde, Chaucer is free to play with language, characterizations and situations throughout the rest of the poem, knowing that his readers are aware of his inter-textual interpretations and the purpose therein. To look only at the characters and plot of the poem ignores the rich language that Chaucer focuses so much of his efforts on manipulating and avoids his attempts to manipulate his readers through the language.
Gawain’s Five Wits
“Rereading Gawain’s Five Wits.” Whiteford, Peter. Medium Aevum, Fall 2004.
There are arguments among scholars as to what the wits represent and whether they are important to the understanding of Gawain and the Green Knight. Even those scholars who agree that the pentacle is important often disagree about the meanings of each of those points (1). The Gawain-poet explains three of the five rather simply; they represent the five wounds of Christ, the five joys of the Virgin and the five virtues. The virtues especially have caused a lot of disagreements over the different interpretations between scholars (1). It is the five wits that Whiteford concentrates on.
There is some agreement that the five wits do represent the five senses and some argue that there is a connection between the senses, the wounds of Christ and the joys of Mary (1). But Ackerman’s theory is flawed because he uses examples in which there is confession or warning about misuse of the senses (1). The pentangle is intended to be a symbol of perfection, not of repentance and to suggest that it represents “’penitential doctrine,’ jumps too readily to an interpretation that the poet is far from forcing upon us” (1). Additionally, the examples that Ackerman uses as a connection between penitential doctrine and the pentangle are weak and would indicate that Gawain was sinless as well as flawless, and it is unlikely that the Gawain-poet would have characterized any of his characters as such (1). Whiteford argues that instead of sinlessness, the pentangle more likely represents a statement about Gawain’s flawless reputation in King Arthur’s court.
Gawain’s five senses play no large part in the events of the story, and subsequent uses of the word “wyttez” do not indicate that this interpretation of the wits as a part of the pentangle or his senses is applicable (1). It is first used when he wakes up the morning of his third temptation, used again as his “five wits” when looking at the Green Chapel and finally said by the Green Knight when he explains Morgan le Fay’s role in the deception.
Other scholars argue that the five wits are not the senses at all but five inner wits identified as “will, mind, imagination, understanding, and reason” (1). This usage would make more sense as used within the text. The Aristotelian theory was that “inner senses were seen as providing a bridge between the external senses and the intellect, or between sensory perception and abstract thought” (1). Additionally, Dante and Aquinas make use of the pentangle as representative of the rational soul (1). Whiteford argues that with this in mind the pentangle represents the physical, social, intellectual, moral, and spiritual aspects of Gawain, which would fittingly adhere to the sense of unity that the poet prescribes for the pentangle (1). Because he is clearheaded Gawain is able to resist the temptation of his guide for him to run but the seduction of Lady Bertilak distracts him and he is deceived, which Spearing believes explains Gawain’s extreme reaction to the knowledge that he was tricked (1).
The major complaint against Whiteford’s article is organization. He never writes out a thesis or any kind of essay map by which one can know what his argument will be. Instead he begins by introducing the idea of the five wits, dismissing previous claims of scholars about what the five wits represent, and finally laying out his own argument of what they mean. There was hardly any introduction to the article besides the introduction to the pentangle as a symbol and that made it very difficult to write a proper critical summary on the article.
I thought that his introduction of other arguments was very helpful to me as an inexperienced medieval scholar, but it hurt his argument more than it helped because he wasted about half of his article discussing and discarding previous theories on the meaning of the pentangle. Whiteford would have been better served if he had used that space to describe his own theory in greater detail. Additionally, Whiteford mostly addressed the interpretation of the wits as the five senses and discussed nearly no other popular theories of what the wits represented (besides his own, of course).
A complaint I have with many of these articles is that when they introduce a quotation in medieval English they expect the reader to be capable of reading and understanding that quote. Some of the articles did the same with medieval French, which even fewer readers would know. This leads me to believe that the intended audience of most of these articles is lifelong medieval literature scholars. The average university student would find it difficult to read the original language of the Gawain-poet, and impossible to understand any of Marie’s Lais if the reader was not a French student as well.
Hefferman on Pears in The Merchant’s Tale
Hefferman, Carol Falvo. “Contraception and the Pear Tree episode of Chaucer’s “Merchant’s Tale.’” Journal of English and German Philology 94 (1995): 31-42.
Considered one of Chaucer’s harshest works, “The Merchant’s Tale” leaves readers wondering at the end if young May is pregnant with her lover’s child. Hefferman argues that while the question of May’s pregnancy is “irresolvable,” the irony of the tale is that May craved a pear fruit directly before having sex with Damian (1).
Pears were used by early doctors to prevent conception and there is a tradition in medieval literature of using pear trees to define adulterous relationships (1). May’s encounter with Damien in the tree has nothing to do with conception, so placing a couple in a fruit tree known for its contraceptive abilities underscores the nature of May and Damian’s relationship. Boccaccio’s story of Lidia is likely where Chaucer got the idea of a wife tricking her husband by using her “love” for him to convince him to do ridiculous things. In that story too there is use of the pear tree, and even Lidia’s lover is named Pyrrhus or pear (1).
Hefferman comments that Chaucer used the pear tree because he found it in his notes from Boccaccio and because of its relation to human sexuality (1). It was considered sexual due to the strange shape of its fruit because “’some pears were thought to resemble female breasts, while others were seen as being shaped like the male genitalia’” (1) Hefferman believes that Chaucer also used the pear because of its association with contraception and abortion, and she points out that Chaucer directly addresses these subjects in “The Parson’s Tale” (1). It is likely that Chaucer was familiar with Augustine’s denouncement of contraception as a “poison of sterility” and with Albert the Great’s scientific observations about contraception (1). He writes, “the root of pears, and especially stiptic roots and roots of slow ripening pears, carried and tied on women, impede conception: and similarly if a woman has the pear on or near herself and she will have a hard time giving birth” (1). Hefferman wonders, however, if Chaucer would have been reading Albert’s writings. It is possible that he encountered them while at court, but it is also likely that he chose a pear tree due to his most common source of material, Boccaccio (1). However only Chaucer has made the husband’s strong desire for children an important part of his story, and January is often proven the fool in “The Merchant’s Tale” (1). Not only is his wife committing adultery right above his sightless head, “ but also preventing the realization of his fondest dream” (1)
Hefferman’s article was well-written, interesting and used many examples of quotes from Chaucer and from outside sources that were relevant to the topic. She did an excellent job taking one of the more obvious symbols in “The Merchant’s Tale” and making it symbolic of much more that sexuality and adultery but also of sterility and contraception. Her interpretation makes January much more of a pathetic fool if at the end of the tale he was so excited that May was pregnant while she craved pears. The biggest problem with Hefferman’s article is that she tended to get off subject. When discussing Albert the Great’s works on contraception and abortion she first discussed his importance to Augustine and his achievements in Christian Science. While interesting and not too much of a digression, Hefferman does digress frequently in information it is obvious she must have researched extensively. Certainly this research is excellent and relevant, it is just the occasional tangents that are unnecessary.
Despite this failing, Hefferman’s article is excellent. I wish that she had written more on the subject, but it is likely that there is little more to be said. She described the pear episode and its traditional interpretation of sexuality and adultery, described the literary precedents for its use by Chaucer and even the historical use of pears as contraception as well as the numerous sources from which that idea came. Her article was well-detailed and all of her points were extensively thought-out and researched. Her use of quotations tended to let them be longer, but they were used efficiently and her range of sources was very wide. Overall Hefferman wrote a very well-crafted article, and I believe both medieval scholars and undergraduate students would find it useful as an additional interpretation of the importance of the pear tree in Chaucer’s “The Merchant’s Tale.”
Murray on Erec et Enide
De Troyes’s Erec et Enide. Murray, Sarah-Jane. The Explicator: Heldref Publications, Summer 2005. p 197.
Marriage is a ceremony of joining together things that were previously separate. Two people tie their lives together, and in the process ideas, attitudes, families, finances and many other aspects of their lives also interact. In her essay “de Troyes’ Erec et Enide,” Sarah-Jane Murray argues that the first half of the romance is “marked by the theme of conjointure” both between the families of Erec and Enide as well as the kingdom of Arthur and the unnamed land Murray refers to as “Enide’s world” (1).
Murray draws parallels between Arthur’s hunt for the White Stag and the custom of the Sparrow Hawk that takes place in Enide’s world. In the beginning of the romance, Arthur announces his intention to revive the custom of the hunt, despite Gauvain’s predictions that rewarding only the most beautiful court lady will only cause arguments. Erec removes himself from the hunt and instead follows Guinevere and her lady-in-waiting on a ride through the woods, where they encounter the mysterious knight. The knight hits Erec and the lady, and Erec vows to hunt down the knight to avenge himself and the women.
After meeting Enide, Erec is drawn into the tournament for the Sparrow Hawk. Murray notes that Erec did not participate in the parallel quest in Arthur’s realm, but willingly accepts such appointment in Enide’s world (1). Both the hunt and the tournament have the same goal of offering a gift (a kiss or a bird) to the most beautiful woman. In addition, both are considered “old customs” of that particular region, and this custom is the only information de Troyes offers about Enide’s world (1). Murray also comments that “the costume of the Sparrow Hawk actualizes the fears previously voiced by Gauvain about that of the White Stag: any claim of one lady’s superior beauty will be contested by another knight and result in a battle” (1). Gauvain’s fear does apply to the Sparrow Hawk, and Erec is forced to fight for Enide’s right to hold the bird, though Gauvain is proven wrong in Arthur’s kingdom, and Enide is given the honor of her kiss without incident.
Murray also notes that Erec encounters the discourteous knight twice in the romance: once when he insults Guinevere and Erec during the hunt, and again in the tournament for the Sparrow Hawk. His first encounter causes Erec to swear vengeance on the other knight, and the second allows him to conclude that vengeance in addition to winning the fight for the Sparrow Hawk. The events that occur in Arthur’s kingdom have direct consequences on occurrences in Enide’s world (1). It is because of Erec’s encounter with the knight that causes him to meet Enide, and Enide’s beauty gives Erec the opportunity to fight the knight. These events make the beginning of “Erec et Enide” a symmetrical story focused around the pivotal point when Erec falls in love with Enide and asks for her hand in marriage and the weaving of customs between Erec and Enide’s worlds (1). The first part of the romance closes with harmony between Erec and Enide as well as between their worlds, though the couple has many more trials to pass before they can truly be equal partners (1).
This essay is aimed at undergraduate scholars and professors who want additional resources for the classroom. Looking at the title of the essay made me believe that Murray would have problems analyzing “Erec and Enide” as a whole without looking at the romance with a more distinct focus. The introduction gave me hope, however. I was really excited to read about the conjoinate of Erec and Enide’s worlds as well as the parallels between the hunt for the White Stag and the tournament for the Sparrow Hawk and the separate encounters between Erec and the other knight. I was very disappointed with the essay, however. Murray spends most of her “analysis” as plot summary with occasional interjections of significance to her thesis. She goes through each event of the romance and from there she discusses her main points in similar style to a high school essayist just learning how to organize and prove a thesis. Her interpretations and comments are very good and certainly interesting, but she should have gone about it by discussing her main points and then using the text as support instead of discussing plot and from there mentioning her thesis. The style causes her thesis to be weaker than it should be and certainly less convincing than it could be. Perhaps she did not have enough to be said on her topic, in which case my first reactions that her essay would be “too broad” were certainly incorrect.
Murray has a good thesis but it perhaps was just too narrow, in which case she needed to either expand it or just scrap it altogether. In any case she should not have been using plot summary to bolster a weak or short essay. I did enjoy her idea of “conjoination” and that marriage, the hunt/tournament and the knight Yder’s encounters with Erec were symbolic of the meeting of Erec’s world (the kingdom of Arthur) and Enide’s world. Should Murray ever choose to revisit her essay and edit it I would be willing to reread it and change my opinion. I felt that “de Troyes’s Erec et Enide” did not live up to its potential and as such I am disappointed in it.
