Inventing Womanhood: Gender and Language in Later Middle English Writing.
- Author/Editor
- Williams, Tara.
- Title
- Inventing Womanhood: Gender and Language in Later Middle English Writing.
- Published
- Williams, Tara. Inventing Womanhood: Gender and Language in Later Middle English Writing. Columbus: Ohio State UP, 2011.
- Review
- "From the late fourteenth through the fifteenth century, Middle English writers experimented with new ways of imagining and representing women's lives and experiences," Williams asserts. "Two especially significant aspects of that experimentation were the coining of a number of new gendered terms, including 'womanhood' and 'femininity,' and the refashioning of others already in use, such as 'motherhood.' This book suggests that Middle English writers used these words . . . to signal moments where the writers are . . . exploring new ideas about femininity" (3). "Womanhood" she finds "particularly important, both because it directly invokes the conceptual problem of what defines women collectively . . . and because it was used so widely and in such interesting ways in the late Middle Ages" beginning with appearances in the work of Chaucer and Gower (3). Chapter 3 ("Beastly Women and Womanly Men"), 51-85, is devoted to the "Confessio Amantis," which she finds "crucial to the development of womanhood, providing a version that is at least as influential as Chaucer's for later writers" (51). "Gower constructs womanhood as analogous to both manhood and beastliness" and because it is "characterized by observable signifiers," identities can change, and also "be learned or feigned." Hence, "Gowerian gender is performative" (51); and "one must be able to interpret those signals accurately. This is the challenge that the frame story presents to Amans" (52). Genius' goal, in Williams' view, is to "teach Amans how to treat women," showing him their vulnerabilities by presenting "the effects of sin on female victims," an approach "that values women as worthy not only of pity but also of a respect and consideration that would have recognized and honored their virtue . . . . The epithet 'moral Gower' . . . remains apt in reference to Gower's portrayal of women" (52). The rest of the chapter is divided into three parts: the first on "'beastly women,' female characters who either seem to be or literally become beasts," the second on "'womanly men,' men who adopt feminine roles or characteristics" (53), and the third on the character of Amans--how he develops, or fails to. Under "beastly women" Williams examines the Loathly Lady from the "Tale of Florent" (where, she asserts, "Gower's exploration of womanhood begins" [54]), and the transformations of Philomena and Procne, Cornix, and Calistona. Gower innovates by depicting the effects of sin on women, and "underscores their significance in purely human terms" (58-9), though at the same time, through Genius' depictions of the maidenhead as a woman's "treasure"--which, like treasure, can belong to others (a husband, a father), raises "disquieting" issues he leaves unresolved (61-62). In the continuation of Calistona's love for her infant son even after her transformation into a bear Williams finds another aspect of womanhood for Gower: "it involves specific emotions" and "persists in observable ways: not in appearance, but actions" (64). Under "womanly men," Williams considers the tales of Achilles and Deidamia, Sardanapalus, and Iphis, in disagreement with Diane Watt, as examples not of "transgressive genders" but as narratives that "reveal that any person might show evidence of womanhood or manhood, because those conditions are identified by appearance" (65). While this applies particularly well to Achilles and Sardanapalus, who "choose their identities," Iphis, who "has an identity imposed upon him/her," poses a more complex case (70), which Williams interestingly resolves by positing that desire, "like clothing and actions," is learned behavior (72). In the third section, "'Mi ladi, which a woman is', argues that Amans' problem is not his lady's lack of love for him, but rather her failure to conform to the model of the lady-love made available in chivalric stories. He falls into the same traps as Tereus, "in his desire to violate his lady" (beastliness), and Sardanapalus, "in his inability to allow reason to overcome love" (womanliness). (74). It takes the "shock" of Venus' revelation of his age and impotence to bring Amans to see the error of his ways, in the vision of lovers he has while swooning. "In this vision, Amans . . . is able to censure male misbehavior, sympathize with female victims, and recognize female virtue" (84). [RFY. Copyright. The John Gower Society. eJGN 39.2]
- Date
- 2011
- Gower Subjects
- Confessio Amantis
Language and Word Studies
Sources, Analogues, and Literary Relations
Influence and Later Allusion