ENGL 320 British Literary TraditionsBorders 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

Questions1. 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 bloodHimself devoureth again kinde, 360As he that was tofore unkinde.And thanne, er that he were arise,For that he scholde ben agrise, [horrified]To schewen him the child was ded,This Philomene took the heed 365Between two dishes, and al wrotheTho 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 knightTo make, whanne he was so wood [mad]That he no reson understood, 95Bot hield hire under in such wiseThat sche ne myhte noght arise,Bot lay oppressed and disesedAs if a goshawk hadde sesedA brid, which dorste noght for fereRemue: and thus this tyrant there [escape]Beraft hire such thing as men saynMai neveremor be yolde again, [restored]And that was the virginitee.

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

And he thanne as a lyon wodWith his unhappy handes stronge 140Hire 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 145Hire tonge with a paire of sheres.So what with blood and what with teresOut of hire ye and of hir mouth,He made hire faire face uncouth. [unfamiliar]

ReferencesDinshaw, 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.