SUMMERS, KAREN CRADY, Ph.D. Reading Incest - The University ...

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19 on how troublesome it is to have a child as a king.” 4 This deletion shows that Chaucer knew the tale could be taken as a reference to Richard II’s accession to the throne when he was still a young boy” (93). The well-known Regement of Princes by Gower’s and Chaucer’s contemporary Hoccleve similarly encodes advice to the prince (Henry IV). For instance, on the subject of the king’s finances, Hoccleve relates the story of the Chaldean kings, who spent so much of the nation’s money that God sent a terrible wind which the people interpreted as a sign to justify their revolt (Ferster 142). Machiavelli’s The Prince, though not a collection of tales, continues the tradition of offering advice to the king in the next century. Writers of advice manuals and popular literature were thus able to comment on, criticize, and advise about issues impacting the land in relative safety. Gower’s concern with temporal affairs was not first addressed in Confessio Amantis. Macaulay, in his introduction to Gower’s French works, says that “From a statement [of Gower’s] in Latin . . . we learn that the poet desired to rest his fame upon three principal works” (xi): Speculum Meditantis (Mirour de l’Omme), written in Anglo- Norman; Vox Clamantis, written in Latin; and the “bok for Engelondes sake,” Confessio Amantis. The concerns, political and societal, familiar from a study of the Confessio are echoed in the other two. In addition to advising kings, critiquing the condition of the three estates, and using exempla to illustrate the effects of sin, all three works employ the analogy of the microcosm: man is both a miniature world and a metaphor of the world and as disorders occur in the man, they occur in the wider world. Man as microcosm was 4 “Et Salemon dit, ‘Doulente la terre qui a a enfant a seigneur. . . .” Renaud de Louens in Sources and Analogues of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, ed. W.F. Bryan and G. Dempster, 581, ll.381-2.
20 an idea familiar to Gower’s medieval audience. Humans exist in a realm between the heavenly and the bestial, or between the spiritual and physical. Like all creatures, man must fulfill the bodily needs of hunger and sexual drive but at the same time he alone has the facility of reason, which makes him akin to God. In other words, man encapsulates the entire cosmos by containing both spirituality and materiality. This philosophy appears in the Prologue of Confessio Amantis: Forthi Gregoire in his Moral Seith that a man in special The lasse world is properly; And that he proeveth redely; For man of Soule ersonable Is to an Angel resemblable, And lich to besste he hath fielinge, And lich to Trees he hath growinge; The stones ben and so is he: Thus of his propre qualite The man, as telleth the clergie, Is as a world in his partie (Pr. 945-56) The analogy of man as microcosm may be naturally expanded to incorporate other aspects of life; for example, husband is head of the family as Christ is head of the Church; king is head of the “family” of the nation as the pope is head of the Church and the clergy are Christ’s representatives on earth. This analogy is adapted in early modern works as well as the Gothic works I will analyze in later chapters. Incest, then, can be harmful to the individual as represented by the king, or to the family, represented by the kingdom.
Page 1 and 2: SUMMERS, KAREN CRADY, Ph.D. Reading
Page 3 and 4: READING INCEST: TYRANNY, SUBVERSION
Page 5 and 6: APPROVAL PAGE This dissertation has
Page 7 and 8: TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER I. R
Page 9 and 10: 2 of it, despite its familiarity to
Page 11 and 12: 4 about incest was influenced by th
Page 13 and 14: 6 clarification. Pope Gregory II ad
Page 15 and 16: 8 sibling, and mother-son. 2 She no
Page 17 and 18: 10 is viewed by both. Incest in eig
Page 19 and 20: 12 subverts both the social and the
Page 21 and 22: 14 CHAPTER II ‘SWICHE UNKYNDE ABH
Page 23 and 24: 16 a book to each of the seven dead
Page 25: 18 Richard” (111). The dedication
Page 29 and 30: 22 laboring-folk and Piers, in retu
Page 31 and 32: 24 introduction of Amans, the unsuc
Page 33 and 34: 26 learns. Augustine takes up the i
Page 35 and 36: 28 of the king, whose primary duty
Page 37 and 38: 30 bribed two priests to convince P
Page 39 and 40: 32 story of incest implied, averted
Page 41 and 42: 34 Again, her response impassions h
Page 43 and 44: 36 in the most extreme sense. When
Page 45 and 46: 38 in the first book, and relates t
Page 47 and 48: 40 benign, sympathetic interpretati
Page 49 and 50: 42 and Machaire, and at the same ti
Page 51 and 52: 44 To finish the turn in the narrat
Page 53 and 54: 46 oghne prest” (V.1382-3). Geniu
Page 55 and 56: 48 incestuous. When she vows to tel
Page 57 and 58: 50 epilogue that acts as a prayer f
Page 59 and 60: 52 Of wommen were absent as thanne;
Page 61 and 62: 54 speak at length and discover the
Page 63 and 64: 56 Biblical incest, mostly unjudged
Page 65 and 66: 58 of a king and the function of la
Page 67 and 68: 60 country. But the incest—the wo
Page 69 and 70: 62 As chivalry is a controlling the
Page 71 and 72: 64 conflicting demands of love and
Page 73 and 74: 66 material for adaptation or trans
Page 75 and 76: 68 four sons, Gawain, Gaheris, Agra
Page 77 and 78:
70 can not be ameliorated, at least
Page 79 and 80:
72 killed save Mordred, who was fou
Page 81 and 82:
74 surrogate son-knights. Cherewatu
Page 83 and 84:
76 Lo ye all Englysshemen, se ye ha
Page 85 and 86:
78 demonstrated to all present on t
Page 87 and 88:
80 corruption that plagues the Pend
Page 89 and 90:
82 CHAPTER III ‘INCEST IS IN ME
Page 91 and 92:
84 wished to rid himself of Anne Bo
Page 93 and 94:
86 societal forces. The plays focus
Page 95 and 96:
88 in the family and on a national
Page 97 and 98:
90 reputation shifted such that vie
Page 99 and 100:
92 comes not from an instinctive ap
Page 101 and 102:
94 virtue, resists and is made whol
Page 103 and 104:
96 willingness to sacrifice the liv
Page 105 and 106:
98 Rejection of God and divine orde
Page 107 and 108:
100 is as an “ungodly sickness”
Page 109 and 110:
102 exercise her own agency. Though
Page 111 and 112:
104 potential problem of having a f
Page 113 and 114:
106 The plots of these three plays
Page 115 and 116:
108 play, the Duchess will have bee
Page 117 and 118:
110 As we have seen, the Duchess us
Page 119 and 120:
112 BOSOLA. It seems you would crea
Page 121 and 122:
114 But as Ferdinand’s outrages i
Page 123 and 124:
116 knife as phallus. Eros (Cupid)
Page 125 and 126:
118 posed by his slide into unreaso
Page 127 and 128:
120 and, as Kenneth Graham notes, i
Page 129 and 130:
122 Castle of Otranto displays the
Page 131 and 132:
124 Theodore is killed a group of k
Page 133 and 134:
126 memory, and regard your highnes
Page 135 and 136:
128 first Gothic playwright, publis
Page 137 and 138:
130 the castle is there primarily t
Page 139 and 140:
132 strength, and the men enter the
Page 141 and 142:
134 God bless me; and pass’d on.
Page 143 and 144:
136 familiar. It is more usual for
Page 145 and 146:
138 sensation of horror in the audi
Page 147 and 148:
140 foil to the Countess, with her
Page 149 and 150:
142 And when he knelt, weeping, to
Page 151 and 152:
144 Castle of Otranto, the knife is
Page 153 and 154:
146 and political realities during
Page 155 and 156:
149 destruction and disaster. One o
Page 157 and 158:
151 subvert both patriarchy and mon
Page 159 and 160:
153 BIBLIOGRAPHY Aers, David,ed. Me
Page 161 and 162:
155 Classen, Albrecht, ed. Violence
Page 163 and 164:
157 Ford, Jane M. Patriarchy and In
Page 165 and 166:
159 Lenz, Joseph. The Promised End:
Page 167 and 168:
161 Riddy, Felicity. Sir Thomas Mal
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