Sexuality and Its Queer Discontents in Middle English Literature

Description: Pugh theorizes "the compulsory nature of queerness in creating heterosexuals," exploring how a number of masculine characters in Middle English literature are "rendered queerly normative due to external forces that reimagine their masculinity as little more than a phantastically inadequate performance." Individual chapters discuss the Dreamer in "Pearl," the Host in CT, Walter and the audience in ClT, the protagonist of "Amis and Amiloun," and that of "Eger and Grime." The discussion of the Host was previously published in 2006 (see SAC 30 [2008], no. 167).