Freedom Through Renunciation? Women's Voices, Women's Bodies and the Phallic Order

Author / Editor
Straus, Barrie Ruth.

Title
Freedom Through Renunciation? Women's Voices, Women's Bodies and the Phallic Order

Published
Jacqueline Murray and Konrad Eisenbichler, eds. Desire and Sexuality in the Premodern West (Toronto; Buffalo, N.Y.; and London: University of Toronto Press, 1996), pp. 245-64.

Description
The formel eagle in PF, Emily in KnT, and Margery Kempe seek to delay or renounce sexual activity. The eagle's blush embodies her later request to delay a choice of mate; Emily's desire to remain unmarried is marked by her desire to reject the "physical effects of heterosexuality." In these works, as in Margery Kempe, female choice is constrained by masculine discourse.

Alternative Title
Desire and Sexuality in the Premodern West.

Chaucer Subjects
Parliament of Fowls.
Knight and His Tale.