Publication Date

4-25-1997

Abstract

When examining ideas on the sexuality of Chaucer's characters, one cannot help but come across the work of Alfred David. In his bookTheStrumpet Muse, David studies selected Canterbury tales from the perspective of New Criticism, analyzing various sexual attitudes expressed in the separate tales. In this paper I appropriate a basic concept of David's and use it to my own feminist critical purposes, adding significantly to David's core idea. Throughout the following study of sexuality and power in the Canterbury Tales, I use "sexual natural" to define a certain state of human sexuality. While the term is my own, the idea is drawn from David's general argument on the "comedy of innocence"(95).

Disciplines

English Language and Literature

Download

Share

COinS