John Lydgate, The Siege of Thebes

Lydgate, John. The Siege of Thebes. Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2001. Print.

I found reading through The Siege of Thebes somewhat tedious. Much of this likely comes from a saturation point in my reading, the fact that this is the first longish primary text I've read in a couple of weeks, or even from Lydgate's attempts to pitch himself as on par as Chaucer (and let me tell you, despite his obvious talent Lydgate is no Chaucer). Regardless, while I can't say that this is my favorite chunk of Middle English literature, there are some interesting points throughout the text. 

The TEAMS introduction spends some time discussing Lydgate's attempt to insert himself into Chaucer's narrative, indicating that this is part of Lydgate's larger project to explore nearly all of the Chaucerian genres. For The Siege of Thebes, Lydgate inserts himself directly into The Canterbury Tales as another pilgrim catching the return trip from Canterbury, whose turn for tale telling has come up. The Host, as he is wont to do in Chaucer's work, makes some specific requests on the nature of the tale, as Lydgate is a monk and the Host wants to avoid overly moralistic tales. Despite this, Lydgate's tale drags on for much longer than any of those told by Chaucer's pilgrims, and while it is spaced out the tale still contains a series of moralistic points. Lydgate attempts to take on the same role as Chaucer by inserting himself in the text, but Chaucer the Pilgirm's tale was cut off by the Host. I can only image the same would've occured with Lydgate's tale. 

While on the matters of intertextuality and authorship, Lydgate sets his tale up initially under the pilgrimage tale telling model but the tale itself is self consciously a written tale at multiple points. The introduction touches on this briefly, calling this part of Lydgate's self consciousness, but the interjections seem to go a bit beyond that. Calling often to his cited sources, specifically describing his act as that of writing, and pausing to reflect on the tale itself at regular intervals. In some ways, this spoils the dynamic of the pilgrim tale structure, but mostly I think this represents an author whose predominant method of writing is heavily intertextual who cannot help but point this out to his readers. Chaucer was willing to have his own character in the tales be a poor tale teller, allowing the rest of his work to speak for itself. Lydgate seems incapable or unwilling to do so. 

Epic Bromance (to borrow the phrase from the Szyd):

I won't belabor this point too much, especially as male friendship is not a topic I work with terribly often, and Neel and the Szyd would handle it much more effectively, but one cannot ignore the epic bromance between Polymete and Tydeus. I use the phrase "epic" here both in its sense of grandeur and literary genre. The early section of the tale, retelling the Oedipus story, is predominantly set up for the epic/romance that will develop out of the contention between his sons. These elements begin to develop around the relationship between Polymete, one of Oedipus' sons and (supposedly) temporary exile from Thebes, and Tydeus. After their initial conflict surrounding sleeping arrangements, the two come together under Adrastus' direction, are "armed" by that king with the trappings of nobility in what is functionally an arming of the hero scene (1436-1445), and eventually become the best of buds. Functionally, Will Ferrel's Step Brothers could have been based on this section:

 

To further set up the male homosocial bonds, Adrastus joins Tydeus and Polymete to one another through marriage, or rather through the marriage of his two daughters, which is nearly the same thing in this situation. I did find it interesting that, while this should be the story of contention between the heirs of Oedipus, Tydeus acts as a representative for Polymete and the text features a larger proportion of Tydeus' role in the siege than Polymete himself. I suppose that it is a brospouse's responsibility to stand in for their bro whenever necessary (I think I just coined the term brospouse; dibs!).

Exchange, Contracts, and Lions (oh my!):

The final aspect of this text which interests me is the manner in which various agents attempt to bring the crisis to a (relatively) peaceful end. Specifically, at this point in the text issues of exchange and contracts begin to move to the forefront. For contracts, whether or not Ethiocles has fulfilled his social contract to Thebes becomes a point of discussion, and his trustworthiness as a result has been put into question. As Ethiocles' wife and mother (I just realized that in this context I need to specify that these are two different people) attempt to sue for peace, a negotiation begins. Even outside of the direct negotiation, this section of the text is filled with a higher frequency of economic metaphors, suggesting that Lydgate saw this matter as one dealing with exchange. Perhaps the most absurd part of this text is the random appearance of the wondrous lion. Lydgate suggests that this comes from his sources, but more odd than a playful, seemingly domesticated lion showing up in the middle of negotiations is one party trying to barter off that lion as part of the deal. Sort of like this: "holy crap, is that a lion? He's totally badass!" "Really...ummm...you know we could throw it in to sweeten the deal." "Huh. I thought he was just a WILD FUCKING LION that showed up out of nowhere, but sure." This works out for exactly as long as it takes someone not involved in the negotiations to see said lion and kill it, triggering the war. While odd, the attempt to commodify the lion says something about the attempt to consciously add extra market factors to economic exchange. One cannot prevent such factors entirely, but depending on them as the basis for the exchange itself is problematic at best.

"The Simonie," "Above All Thing Thow Arte a Kyng," "In Erth It Es a Litill Thing (Sir Penny)," and "London Lickpenny."

Medieval English Political Writings. Ed. James Dean. Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1996. Print.

• "The Simonie" 
• "Above All Thing Thow Arte a Kyng" 
• "In Erth It Es a Litill Thing (Sir Penny)" 
• "London Lickpenny"

Due to their respective foci on the role of money in late medieval England, these four poems have been grouped together in this text under the heading "Simony and the Abuse of Money." As might be expected, each of these short poems takes a critical perspective on how money, or the desire thereof, affects society or subverts just power structures. As these poems are relatively short, I'm handling each of them in this post. 

"The Simonie"

Predominantly, this poem is concerned about the extent to which church officials have, in their desire to increase monetary and worldly gains, strayed from their proper roles as God's representatives on earth. In many ways, this poem reads similarly to The Vision of Piers the Plowman, largely due to the anti-fraternal and anti-clerical sentiments expressed therein. Predominantly, "The Simonie" is concerned with apparent rampent commodification of clerical duties and services, to the extent where even the gleefully sinful can receive repentance as long as they are able to pay the proper authorities the improper amount. Beyond indulgences, the poet describes the overt comfort that monks live in, as compared to the poor, "In uch toun / I wot non eysiere lyf than is religioun" (155-156). As far as the poet is concerned, monks have drifted away from the contemplative, poor lives that they were meant to live and have, if anything, become overly caught up in worldly concerns. Several lines later, the poet even describes a scene where, after a man has died, the monks argue not over who should have the privilege of carrying out funeral rights but over who gets to keep his property (181-186). In sum, "The Simonie" is convinced that, stemming from the practice of simony, the Church has itself become a commodified institution more concerned with its bottom line than the salvation of men's souls. 

"Above All Thing Thow Arte a Kyng"

As its title would suggest, this poem is concerned with the predominance of money over all other authority. Each of the poems stanzas tracks another aspect of society, from the king's court down through the rest of society. Here, money itself has replaced any estates model or other structure for societal functionality; instead, each member of society works solely for their own access to money. On this, however, two interesting components crop out. First, nowhere in the poem does the idea of money being spent come up, nor on what it could even purchase. The closest the poems comes to this is stating that money "maket justynges, pleys, dysguysynges," yet even here it is not clear if money is actually purchasing the services needed to carry this out or simply making them possible (15). Instead, money is sought out for money's sake rather than any commodity it can obtain. Secondly, the identity of each member of society in the poem is tied to their attempts to acquire money. As the poem concludes, "Yt ys allwayes sene nowadayes / That money makythe the man" (79-80). More than being "Kyng," money is itself the goal for all social identities, which has the final effect of blurring these social divisions as each individual seeks the same thing. This may be an interesting aspect to consider in the rise of an urban burgess class, one that has a liminal social position fueled by their growing economic power. 

"In Erth It Es a Litill Thing"

In regards to its ability to lead to social subversion, this poem does not add much more to the conversation created by the above poems. There are, however, two interesting additions to the topic at hand. To begin with, the metaphor of "Sir Penny" throughout the poem creates an aristocratic identity for money and its function in late medieval England. The allegorical representation of money is thus a transgressive social figure that has both positive and negative effects, doing good and ill depending on those around him. This certainly demonstrates a more balanced perspective on money, and evokes the Lady Mede section from The Vision of Piers the Plowman. Secondly, the poem has a comment on the wake Sir Penny leaves behind him: "The more he es to men plente, / The more yernid alway es he, / And halden dere in horde" (58-60). Despite the balanced perspective on money's role, the poem is also clear to point out that the possession of money begets the desire for further wealth, emphasizing the avaricious aspect of money and calling up similar concerns as are present in Book 5 of Gower's Confessio Amantis. 

"London Lickpenny"

The only of these four poems to have a narrative structure, "London Lickpenny" involves a poor man entering a city looking for justice and continuously being denied. Having his hood stolen from him at the beginning of the poem, the narrator of the poem seeks justice from various levels of authority and, when denied, even turns to sources of comfort only to meet with the same refusal. At each stage, the specific reasoning for this refusal is the same "For lacke of money, I may not spede" (8). In sum, this poem identifies that as sources of lay and clerical authority have become commodified they deny access and justice to the poor, creating a system that protects only the wealthy and ignores the existence of the poor. The economic inequality is such that the narrator, seeing his stolen hood for sale, cannot even purchase his own goods again. This sentiment in particular seems to echo the current economic and political climate in the U.S.; the Justice Department recently announced, for example, that it wouldn't pursue charges against HSBC because it was too important to the U.S. economy, functionally making that company, who has clearly and admittedly participated in trafficking money for drug cartels and terrorist organizations, too rich to prosecute. A system that has differing levels of justice for differing social/economic groups is problematic at best, and it is easy to sympathize with the narrator of this poem.

 

Stanzaic Life of Katherine

Stanzaic Life of Katherine. Middle English Legends of Women Saints. Ed. Sherry Reames. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 2003. Print.

In many ways, Stanzaic Life of Katherine follows many of the formulaic conventions of virgin martyrs, as with the Stanzaic Life of Margaret I read this morning. The differences with Katherine, however, are interesting. Instead of being approached by a would-be suitor, Katherine confronts the emperor in his place of worship. With a rhetorical flourish, Katherine stuns Maxenceus, causing him to send for the greatest philosophers and theologians to defeat her Christian logic. Oddly, rather than countering her Christian proclamation immediately with torture, Maxenceus seeks to combat her at an intellectual level. Within divine aid, Katherine not only out debates the philosophers but manages to convert them all. Maxenceus is furious, sentencing these men to being burned at the stake. This sets a pattern throughout the poem, Katherine converting Maxenceus' followers and the emperor in turn martyring these new converts, including the vicious treatment of his wife. Interestingly, these punishments are all more severe than what Katherine herself receives; she does see torture eventually, but this is always later and to a lesser severity than that acted upon the converts. From the point he meets her, Maxenceus seems to treat Katherine as an equal whom he needs to turn to his own ends, granting her general respect rather than trying to bend her with direct and immediate force. In many ways, the contention between Maxenceus and Katherine is one of philosophy, almost as a demonstration that the word of God is superior to the logic of pagans, possibly a shot at the neo-Classicists of the medieval Church.

On a different note, the relationship Katherine has with Christ is one that makes Margery Kempe's affection of the saint understandable. In others of these virgin martyr narratives, the martyr is often visited by an angel or even the Holy Ghost to affirm their actions. At several points, however, Katherine is visited by Christ directly, who seems to go out of his way to comfort the virgin martyr in her actions. This direct connection is interesting, and combined with Katherine's philosophical bent makes this martyr stand out from the general hagiographical formula. 

Mary Anne Kowaleski and Judith Bennett. “Crafts, Guilds, and Women in the Middle Ages: Fifty Years after Marian K. Dale.”

Kowaleski, Mary Anne and Judith Bennett. “Crafts, Guilds, and Women in the Middle Ages: Fifty Years after Marian K. Dale.” Sisters and Workers in the Middle Ages. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989. 11-38.

This will likely be a succinct post, but the essay in question is to the point and clear in its discussion of women and guild involvement in late medieval England. Building off of the work done in Marian K. Dale's 1933 article, Kowaleski and Bennett plot out the role of guilds in women's labor, protections, and freedoms. Acknowledging some of the advantages that guild participation provided for women, Kowaleski and Bennett spend the larger portion of this essay  discussing how that participation could in itself be restrictive. Women who had gained membership in late medieval guilds were often treated as second class members, paying lower dues but also afforded far fewer protections and privileges than their male counterparts. Unlike male guild members, women were seldom granted journeyman status, instead serving as apprentices in their masters' shops until they married, entering into their husbands' trade instead. The wives of guild members, including high ranking ones, were afforded some further privileges, yet these tended to be only through their current husbands; a widow who remarried could face expulsion from the guild entirely, let alone denial of those benefits. Generally speaking, Kowaleski and Bennett argue that with a few exceptions the medieval guild structure offered more social and economic limitations than freedoms for women. 

Interestingly, Kowaleski and Bennett's article is followed by a reprint of the original Marian K. Dale article, which I will return to at a later date for my work with Emare. The focus of that article, and of a portion of Kowaleski and Bennett's essay, is of the briefly successful London women silk workers. While not able to form a full guild, for a time this group of women were able to maintain their trade independence and even petitioned (and received) several protections from parliament. Unfortunately, this was short lived as by the 16th and 17th century men pushed into their trade in London, eventually edging these women out entirely. For my Emare work, I want to particularly look into Dale's suggestion that "[s]ilkworking was a true 'myster' ... a skilled craft with secrets of production and trade passed only from mistress to apprentice" (17).

Stanzaic Life of Margaret

Stanzaic Life of Margaret. Middle English Legends of Women Saints. Ed. Sherry Reames. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 2003. Print.

As with many virgin martyrs, the Stanzaic Life of Margaret deals with a saint who powerful men attempt to marry through threat of force and, when this fails, torture. Eventually the virgin martyr represents too much of a threat to the authority of the powerful man in question and must be put to death. Much of this is familiar territory, and this text in particular bears great similarity to Cynewulf's Juliana (which I will discuss in more detail below). As with the other hagiography I've been reading, I'll focus on how this text differs. 

When Olibrus, the lord of Antioch, sees Margaret, he decides that she must become his "lemman." Yet, rather than simply taking her, Olibrus sends his men to make his offer for him, emphasizing that such a union would afford her rich clothes, foods, and goods. Margaret of course refuses, and Olibrus sends his men to simply take her by force. Again, Olibrus emphasizes what he has to offer, pointing to the goods and wealth she would be afforded. Despite his continued offers, Margaret sees his offers as worth "not a hawe" (73). Even through the torture, Olibrus sees this is a negotiation of exchange, with Margaret continuously refusing his offers. This ties to Olibrus' perception of Margaret as a sexual commodity he is attempting to purchase; he does, after all, emphasize that if she is someone's thrall he will simply buy out her contract. Interestingly, Margaret's refusal to negotiate would seem to work against her role as a sexual commodity, but I wonder how this works with her role as the patron saint of childbirth, which she vows to protect at two major points in the text. 

The other way in which this text stands out is in how it so similarly resembles Cynewulf's Juliana. Both texts are virgin martyr tales, have a negotiation of sort over the proposed union (although Juliana is the active negotiator while Margaret refuses to negotiate), involve very similar types of torture including being hung by the hair and scourged, see the martyr imprisoned and then involved in a physical scuffle with a devil, have the prosecutor of the martyr attempt to boil the martyr alive (Juliana in led, Margaret in water), and finally both texts have their martyrs finally taken outside of the residential area to a liminal space to be finally executed. To some extent, saints lives tend to follow set formulas with only some changes to their primary plot, yet the specificity with which these texts resemble each other is interesting. In the Stanzaic Life of Margaret we do get a clear discussion between the saint and the devil about how the latter corrupts childbirths, which Margaret pronounces to oppose, yet the section where Juliana speaks to her devil is missing a large chunk of text in the MSS of the Exeter Book. It would be very interesting to have that missing text and compare the similarities between these texts. 

Peter Nicholson, Love & Ethics in Gower's Confessio Amantis

Nicholson, Peter. Love & Ethics in Gower's Confessio. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 2005. Print.

Originally, I read this text in error. I had requested Nicholson's monograph for my Gower term paper last semester, and as the book came late I picked it up with a stack of exam reading texts. Assuming it was on my list, I sat down Saturday morning and spent three hours or so pouring over it, went to write my blog post, and realized it wasn't on my list. While I was frustrated at the time, I am glad I did so now as the opposite happened yesterday. I sat down to read Justin Steinberg's Accounting for Dante. While the book itself is a rather interesting consideration of Dante's readership, I quickly discovered that it basically had nothing to do with my exam topics or interests. My intention with choosing Accounting for Dante was that I was convinced, for some reason, it looked at mercantile culture through Dante's texts, which I would have used more for its methodology than anything else. Unfortunately this was not the case, but Nicholson's text is actually more related to my topic, as it at least covers a major text on my list, so I'm switching them out.

In his Preface, Nicholson self consciously states that it is not usually a compliment to say that a new book could have been written forty years ago, but defends his approach to an extended reading of the Confessio Amantis as filling the critical gap as no one produced such a reading in the past hundred years of scholarship. As such, Nicholson's text attempts to make an overarching reading of the massive text that comprises Gower's Confessio Amantis. Critical attention of Gower's work has picked up in the past decade or so, as scholars have begun to push back on the "Moral Gower" designation. Interestingly, prejudice against Gower is still prevalent as one book review of Nicholson's book finds it novel that the author treated Gower "as if he were a major poet of Middle English literature deserving critical attention." The pretentiousness of that statement still rocks me. 

Nicholson's stated purpose for his reading is to argue that "the principal subject of the Confessio Amantis is human love...most importantly of all, that the moral structure of the poem is the fundamental harmony rather than opposition between God's ethical demands and love's" (vi). Nicholson is pushing back against the more standard reading that Gower's text advocates avoidance and separation from romantic love in favor of following God's love. Rather than following this critical consensus, Nicholson advocates that the Confessio is providing the guidelines for following  balanced approach to love, one that fulfills the demands of both God's and romantic love's demands (8). Throughout the rest of his monograph, Nicholson traces these aspects throughout the entirety of Gower's text. For the purposes of time and my own interests, I'll spend the remainder of this post considering his points on Book 5.

According to Nicholson, "Book 5 is Gower's loose baggy monster" (254). Readers approaching this book often have an initial point of confusion due to its wide range of topics (that digress from the confessional structure that had been maintained up to this point), and the book is itself nearly three times as long as those that precede it. While some of the sections, such as the 1200 line discussion of world religions, seem out of place, Nicholson argues that as a whole Book 5 is dedicated to showing the various ways in which Avarice interferes with an ethical approach to love, both romantic and God's love. Interestingly, Nicholson states that it is not the goods themselves that are the root of Avarice, which in this case would extrapolate to Amans' lady as a sexually commodified object, but the unethical approach to obtaining either. For Nicholson, this approach supplants the cynicism of materialistic approaches to love and exchange, "offering...a nobler, redeeming vision both of humanity and of the world" (309). Nicholson's perspective interestingly fits in with the ameliorative shift in the perception of mercantile culture in late medieval England, suggesting not that goods and money are themselves evil but the mishandling there of is. 

The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle

The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle. Sir Gawain: Eleven Romances and Tales. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval    Institute Publications, 1995.

A relatively short and popular tale, The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle is another of the Loathly Lady tradition tales that crop up in several Middle English texts, most notably in Chaucer's the Wife of Bath's Tale. In this version of the tale, King Arthur, while out hunting, is caught unarmed by a heavily armed enemy knight,who makes Arthur swear to return later, still unarmed, with an answer to a riddle, what women really want. Arthur returns and, hoping to aid his lord in any way possible, Gawain assists him in surveying the country with answers to this question, filling two books. Upon returning they both feel these answers are insufficient, and heavily inconsistent, so they leave again. On this excursion, Arthur comes across a hideous woman who promises him the answer needed to save his life in exchange for Gawain's hand in marriage. Gawain agrees to this, without seeing the lady, and her answer does indeed save Arthur's life.

At this point in the text, Dame Ragnelle takes a more prominent and disruptive role in the text. Rather than being escorted back to court in secret for a private marriage ceremony, Dame Ragnelle insists on a public presentation to the court and subsequent wedding to Gawain. At the following feast, the court is put off by Ragnelle's grotesque appearance and extreme appetite, despite her remarkably expensive clothing and, aside from appetite, close adherence to courtly behavior. On the wedding night, Ragnelle insists upon her sexual dues from Gawain, and when he turns to see her she is miraculously a beautiful woman. 

From here, the text has some interesting characteristics. The choice that Ragnelle offers Gawain is that she can either be beautiful at night and ugly by day or ugly at night and beautiful by day. Gawain waffles over his choice as the duration of her beauty markedly changes her role as his wife. If Ragnelle is beautiful at night, Gawain's sexual responsibilities to her are markedly improved, but if she is beautiful by day she adds to his social standing. As in other Loathly Lady tales, Gawain eventually returns the choice to her, promising her sovereignty in this choice but also of his wealth: "Evyn as ye wolle, I putt itt in your hand. / Lose me when ye lyst, for I am bond; / I putt the choyse in you. / Bothe body and goodes, hartt, and every dele, / Ys alle your oun, for to by and selle - / That make I God avowe!" (679-684). It is interesting that here Gawain equates the choice of how her bodily assets shall be divided as an economic decision, largely suggesting that even the Loathly Lady is a sexual commodity, however she is apparently granted sovereignty. In fact, even this arrangement fails to last, as she only lives as Gawain's wife for five years before dying of undisclosed causes, leaving Gawain free to have several more marriages. After all, we wouldn't want Arthur's premier knight locked into a marriage that kept him under someone else's authority would we?