Homoeroticism and Chivalry: Discourses of Male Same-Sex Desire in the Fourteenth Century

Author / Editor
Zeikowitz, Richard E.

Title
Homoeroticism and Chivalry: Discourses of Male Same-Sex Desire in the Fourteenth Century

Published
New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.

Physical Description
x, 216 pp.

Series
The New Middle Ages.

Description
Examines homoerotic acts between knights (kissing, expressions of love, and forming of lifelong bonds) in a variety of late medieval texts: "Amys and Amylion," the "Prose Lancelot," "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight," the "Stanzaic Morte Arthur," and TC.
Provides backgrounds on friendship from classical and medieval precedent and explores the sexual reputations of several medieval kings, including Edward II and Richard II. Considers how the friendship between Pandarus and Troilus in TC competes with the love of Troilus and Criseyde, channels homoerotic impulses, and is dramatized in "sodomitical discourse." Also discusses the autoeroticism of Criseyde's gaze.

Chaucer Subjects
Troilus and Criseyde.