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[me_ves_y_sufres]

This goes out to all the medievalists on my flist: can you recommend any good books that combine study of medieval literature/society with queer theory or readings? I've got Dinshaw, Pugh and Burgwinkle (BURGWINKLE what a name) on stack request. Alternatively-- and I realise this is really hazy, but at the moment I am just randomly googling search

Comments

[lollardy]

This post is so not meant for me, and I have never even read what I am recommending and so it probably doesn't fit what you're asking for, and my sentence structure alone should make it clear that no one should pay heed to any english-related advice I give, but 'Mrs Thatcher's Pearl' by John Kerrigan (I think it's in The Body and the Soul in Medieval Literature eds Torti and Boitani. Sounds like that kind of thing everyone except me would have read already, come to think of it) always sounded a bit interesting to me, but evidently not enough to have actually read it. THE END.

[lollardy]

Also, did you not totally man up to it a bit already by writing a 6000 WORD ESSAY ON PIERS PLOWMAN? If anyone can do this, IT'S YOU.

[me_ves_y_sufres]

I JUST WENT AND READ MRS THATCHER'S PEARL IT'S AMAZING. I wish I'd read it before my optional thesis. Or my Piers Plowman work. It really makes me want to read the original poem.

[liminereid]

Read Pearl, it's beautiful and one of my favourites.

[magic_doors]

*cracks knuckles

[highfantastical]

and there is NO WAY a group of sexually frustrated women would turn to the vicarious enjoyment of gay male eroticism, IS THERE?

:D :D :D

YAY SLASHER NUNS.

[deathbyshinies]

Fuck, I just wrote a really long comment and LJ ate it. Short version:

Bardsly, Sandy, Venomous Tongues

Vern L. Bulloughs, ed., Handbook of Medieval Sexuality

Louise Fradenburg, City, Marriage, Tournament

---., Sacrifice Your Love

McDonald, Nicola, Pulp Fictions of Medieval England

You might also want to have a look at the Roman de Silence, although it's as misogynist as it is queer - a really problematic and interesting text. The link is to a translated edition.

Marxist stuff: If you haven't looked at the stuff on 1381 in Hochon's Arrow, it's definitely worth it, as is Hilton's Bond Men Made Free.

More as I think of it! :D

[me_ves_y_sufres]

Thank you! This is all really useful. I've got Hochon's Arrow checked out, and Veonomous Tongues and the Handbook of Medieval Sexuality on stack request. Pulp Fictions of Medieval England also looks amazing, I will hunt it down.

[deathbyshinies]

Zeikowitz! How could I have forgotten him? That's Richard Zeikowitz, Homoeroticism and Chivalry. I think I might actually have it SR'd to the Upper Reading Room at the moment, but you're welcome to drop in and double-borrow it if you like.

Also, I know I've ranted at you about him before, but the existence of Aelred of Rievaulx makes me so happy on so many levels, and you should read Brother and Lover by Brian McGuire if you want to hear all about an openly gay-celibate 12th-century Abbot who was also a pretty good historian and genuinely lovely person. But that, I cannot pretend will help you with Finals at all.

[slasheuse]

OH OH OH there's an anthology of medieval women's writing which is useful, LOTS OF GYNAECOLOGICAL STUFF. GOOD TIMES.

Also about breasts and wounds and everyone leaning on the Lord's breast, aka LATHER RINSE REPEAT until the eighteenth century.

[liminereid]

The one I;'ve got which is really interesting anthology of med women is edited by Alexandra Barrett. Most of the interesting criticism of the type you are talking about that I know is for french lit so probably not very helpful. Though Sharon Kinoshita wrote a really interesting essay about colonialism and depictions of other in Marie de France's lais that might have transferable ideas.

[me_ves_y_sufres]

Thank you! I will bear the Kinoshita essay in mind if I have any spare time (oh god, the exams are REALLY SOON, why didn't I start earlier, etc).

[liminereid]

You'll be fine and it's quite short, so if you have a spare half hour it might be fun. Just don't panic and don't over work. (makes a grim mocking sound a how helpful the same advice was offered to me.)

[toft_froggy]

For queer theory/readings, I recommend reading David Townsend's articles on the Alexandreis (in The Tongue of the Fathers: Gender and Ideology in Twelfth-Century Latin (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998)), and 'The Naked Truth of the King's Affection in the Old English Apollonius of Tyre'
Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies - Volume 34, Number 1, Winter 2004. He's pretty awesome. I don't know about exchange/economics, I'm afraid.

Hm, random or marginal medieval texts - have you read The Life of Christina Mirabilis, by Thomas de Cantipre? And if you haven't read The Book of Margery Kempe, you should definitely read that.

[me_ves_y_sufres]

Thank you, those are all really useful suggestions-- I think the Townsend articles may be a bit early for my paper, but I'll look into them. Hearteningly, the Book of Margery Kempe definitely isn't marginal on the Oxford English syllabus (it's a central text and I've seen a lot of discussion on it), but The Life of Christina Mirabilis is quite unusual, I think, so thank you. :)

[toft_froggy]

I also recommend the Life of William of Norwich by Thomas of Monmouth, which is incredibly interesting, but it might be tricky to get hold of a copy, there's only one translation and it was done in the late 19th century (but reprinted in the forties).