Prelims: Gender Construction Flashcards
Introduction (7)
Virginity and separation from men
Wife’s Lament and the male voice (?)
Wulf & Eadwacer problematises this - potential underlying criticism of the church
Production of female voice through poetry - whether as a means of constriction or in some ways opposing this?
Susan Crane: Gender, like all social presentations has a history and literature is significant in that history
Judith Butler: Gender is a social construct that is performed. The only reason that gender appears fixed and stable is due to the perpetuation of social roles and expectations
The church and normative social values associated with such institutions insisted upon female constriction and isolation, namely to maintain their virginity - these expectations of women could be written into poetry and texts in order to emphasise them
P1 - Virginity and separation from men (10)
Judith Bennet - Feminists must not forget the patriarchal history in the masculine portrayal of women
St. Aethelryth of Ely remained a virgin throughout her two marriages, the second lasting over 12 years - legend has it her body improved in the grave and her tumour went down; highlighting the Anglo-Saxon desire for virginity and purity
Shari Horner - Discourse of Enclosure argues that the church and normative patriarchal elements of society constructed an identity for women through poetry that emphasised their role as needing constraint and isolation
“Wait for their beloved with longing” - “of langope leofes abidan”
“Divide us two, that we two separate” - “todaelden unc paet wit gewidost”
“Over the tumultuous sea” - “Ofer ypa gelac”
- -> Links to the Nam Languens (Cambridge Songs) in which a female, too, is isolated across the sea (emphasis upon this as part of a means of constructing gender identity on a more institutional level)
- -> Whereas in Wanderer and Seafarer, they find ultimate freedom, in Wife’s lament the remain constricted (men go free, whereas women remain constrained)
–> Emphasised in “under actreo” (“Under an oak tree”) and “eordsceafe” (“Earth cave” / kenning for “grave”)
–> Similarly highlighted in Deor, where Weland the Smith is hamstrung but his liberty is repeatedly implied by the poem’s refrain, whereas Beothild is trapped inescapably by her pregnancy (further emphasising the significance of virginity)
P2- Wife’s Lament Male influence and voice (6)
Bambas amongst other critics argued that the poem was written by a male rather than a female, whilst Clarke has followed a homosexual/homosocial line of argument in claiming that could be the relationship between two men
–> Stevens and Wentersdorf have argued against that a common critical assertion is that it is likely a female writer and female narrative voice
–> However, the fact that so many have read it as a man’s voice implies some degree of masculine involvement in the poem and in its production
“A young man must always be sad at heart” - “A sycle geong mon wesan geomormod heard heortan”
“Miseries” - yrmpa
“torment” - wite
“exile” - wraecsipa
Only has her freedom when part of the lord-retainer bond (in fiercely masculinised territory)
–> “Hlaford” (x2), “leodfruma” (at start of the poem) before becoming constricted when this transforms into a love affair
P3 - W&E similar yet oppositional?
Michael R Burch calls the poems “Fraudenleider”, meaning women’s songs, emphasising how regardless of who wrote them, they are attempting to perform specific gender identity and thus we must read them in the way they perform this, rather than concern ourselves with the true nature of the writers
Wulf & Eadwacer follows the traits of isolation and separation from men: “Wulf is on an island; I on another”
“Wulf is on iegge, ic on operre”
–> However problematises this through the introduction of another wolf? Who is she really being separated from and why?
“When the sword-strong lord laid his limbs around me, that gave me joy though it grieved me greatly”
“ponne mec se beaducafa, bogum bilegde / wea se wyn to pon, wea hwaepre eac lad”
–> Potential rape but physical pleasure in it?
“Eadwacer” - translates to “heaven watcher” / “property watcher”: Highlights the woman merely as property? Or is she being abused by those in an institutional position? is she attacking the projection of femininity in art by patriarchal structures?
P4 - Creating the female poetic (5)
W&E
“Wudu” - translates to the “woodland”, thus another place of restriction but also a kenning for “shield” or “cross” - poetically shaming the church or associated institutions?
“renig weder ond ic reotugu saet” - Rainy weather and I sat weeping”
–> Pathetic fallacy translating into the speaker herself, writing herself into a textual space; purposefully hard to comprehend in order to deconstruct meaning. Produce a variety of possibilities, a hermeneutic expanse, and thus a degree of freedom?
Refrain breaks OE conventions by having only 5 syllables compared to the usual minimum of 8
“Ungelic is us” (“Different is our lot”)
Repetition of “I” at start of Wife’s Lament accentuates writing for a woman’s voice, a woman’s poem etc
–> “Ic”, “me”, “minra”, “minre”
Reference to self as poet: “I utter this song for myself”
“Ic pis giedd wrece bi me”
Conclusion (3)
Benjamin Thorpe: “Of this I can make no sense, nor am I able to arrange any of the verses”
W&E may appear a response to male control and oppression through being so obfuscating, but in the process it makes itself impenetrable, which is the aim of the church itself : Does this mark a distinction from Wife’s Lament, for example, or must it conform to these expectations, in order to perform female gender at the time?
–> Thus has the creation of female gender performance gone beyond the texts and surged even into any opposition / attempts to distinguish self from the church?
