ENGL 320 British Literary Traditions Borders and Boundaries: Human/Animal/Monster?

John Gower, “The Tale of Philomene and Tereus”

Sept 28

John Gower (c. 1330-1408) A friend of Chaucer?

John Gower, “The Tale of Philomene and Tereus” Confessio Amantis [The Lover’s Confession]

• 8 books; 80 + “moral” stories • Structured around the Se7en Deadly Sins and a model of penitence. Book 5 is about the sin of avarice. In our tale, rape is a form of greed.

• Amans [the Lover] confesses himself to Genius, the priest of Venus, the goddess of love • But Genius’s “moral” tales are mostly drawn from Ovid’s poetry of erotic love • Poem offers a model of sexual governance analogous to political governance

Questions

1. To what extent is the tale on women’s side?

2.What do we make of the sisters’ “culinary vengeance” (Dinshaw)?

British Library, MS Egerton 1991, fol. 7v

John Gower,

Confessio Amantis

[The Lover’s Confession].

The Lover kneeling before the Confessor, Genius (the priest of Venus, the goddess of love).

Early fifteenth-century English manuscript.

British Library MS Harley 3869, fol.18.

Ovid, Metamorphoses (6.426-676)

Philomela is kidnapped and then raped by Tereus. He keeps her in a “ramshackle building... [with] stone blocks around her cottage” to guard against her escape. He holds her tongue with a pincer and cuts it off with a sword. The severed tongue writhes like a snake on the ground. Philomela lives a year in silence, weaving her story on her loom. She gives the cloth to an old woman, who understood Philomela’s trouble and gives the cloth to the queen, Procne, who is outraged. Procne rescues her sister and kills her son Itys. The sisters cook Itys and feed him to Tereus. They confront him with Itys’ head and he chases after them for vengeance. The women pray and the gods turn the three of them into birds. Philomela becomes a nightingale, Tereus a hoopoe, and Procne a swallow.

To what extent is the tale on women’s side?

Genius critiques the notion that rape … is fundamentally a crime against men [because women are men’s property] …Genius goes to some lengths to reinstate women as the real victims of rape, and to counter the misogyny so common in this sort of narrative. … The moral … is that rape, which is both a crime and a sexual sin, inverts the “natural” order of things because it disrupts rather than reinforces gender cate gories. (Watt 91) Pierpont Morgan, MS M.126 fol. 122r (c. 1470)

“Tereus’s own unnatural and consuming passion is countered by infanticide … and cannibalism, a form of unnatural consumption.” (Watt 92)

Bot thus his owene flessh and blood Himself devoureth again kinde , As he that was tofore unkinde .

360 And thanne, er that he were arise, For that he scholde ben agrise, [horrified] To schewen him the child was ded, 365 This Philomene took the heed Between two dishes, and al wrothe Tho comen forth the sustres bothe, And setten it upon the bord.

How much do we see the point of view of the victim?

sche was of to litel myht Defense again so rude a knight To make, whanne he was so wood [mad] That he no reson understood, Bot hield hire under in such wise That sche ne myhte noght arise, Bot lay oppressed and disesed As if a goshawk hadde sesed A brid, which dorste noght for fere Remue: and thus this tyrant there Beraft hire such thing as men sayn Mai neveremor be yolde again, And that was the virginitee.

95 [escape] [restored]

“rape threatens the stable identity of not only the aggressor but also the victim.’ (Watt 94)

And he thanne as a lyon wod With his unhappy handes stronge 140 Hire caughte be the tresses longe, With whiche he bond ther bothe hire armes That was a fieble deed of armes And to the grounde anon hire caste, And out he clippeth also faste 145 Hire tonge with a paire of sheres.

So what with blood and what with teres Out of hire ye and of hir mouth, He made hire faire face uncouth. [unfamiliar]

References

Dinshaw, Carolyn. “Rivalry, Rape, and Manhood: Gower and Chaucer.”

Chaucer and Gower

. Ed. R.F. Yeager. Victoria, BC: U of Victoria P, 1991. 130-52.

Echard, Siân, ed.

A Companion to Gower

. London: Boydell & Brewer, 2004. Fisher, John.

John Gower: Moral Philosopher and Friend of Chaucer

. New York UP, 1964. Watt, Diane.

Amoral Gower

. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2003.

Yeager, R.F.

John Gower’s Poetic: The Search for a New Arion

. Rochester, NY: Brewer, 1990.