The Decameron Continues!

1. story 3.3: How does the maiden communicate with the man she desires? What can be said about the friar? Explain and use examples from the text.

The maiden, who goes unnamed, communicates with her crush through the gullible friar. She uses reverse psychology to make what she wants to happen actually happen. It's like witchcraft! By complaining to the friar that his friend had been harassing her, she actually got the friar to plant the idea in his friend's head. Even more importantly, she lets it become known that any potential advances from him would be both welcomed and reciprocated.

This text shows that the friar means well, but that he is not conniving enough to realize that he is being duped. Just as an over-the-hill prostitute thrives on caked-on makeup, so does the Decameron (as we know well by now) delight in painting the Church the color of lust and sin. But this tale is different. In showing the friar as naive and innocent, the Decameron still points out a flaw of the Church - but one of over-piety and a debilitating lack of worldliness. In many ways, this friar is just like the friar who, in the very first story of the Decameron, declared "Master Ciappelletto ... a saint." Taking what is said at face value, these two friars believe that what people say is what they mean - in essence, that speech is synonymous with truth. However, as the Decameron shows us time and time again, this is woefully far from the way things are. These friars need to poke their heads out of their confession booths and realize that the big, bad world out there is real un-pretty.

3. story 3.9: In beginning Beltramo didn't want anything to do with Giletta. How does his love for her in the end define how women were viewed? How does this compare to other strained relationships in the Decameron?

In the end, Giletta conforms to the role that society has set out for her: that of being a mother. It is only in this guise as a baby-making machine that Beltramo accepts her. Before, when she was defined by how she broke society's rules of conduct, Beltramo refused to see in her a suitable match. Imagine him marrying a lowly physician's daughter - and even more so, one who goes out on her own and does things like heal the king! The horror of a working woman! Granted, this was a lot more uncommon (and disreputable) back in the Middle Ages. It is not only her comparatively low social status but her threatening individuality and intelligence that drives away the man she loves. At the end of the tale, when she comes to him literally on her knees, dressed in ugly pilgrim garb, pleading her case desperately, that he will even listen. By losing everything that set her apart, she gets the guy.

It seems like Beltramo is a man who likes his woman beneath him, and there is no doubt that her strict adherence to his "ring and children" rule only emphasizes the male power in a marriage. By fulfilling the impossible-sounding standards he set out, Giletta does not impress on her husband how amazing she really is, but how much of a dishrag she is. I wish she could have just laid down the law to him and made him be with her! Now that would take a really strong woman. But by making pigs fly, Giletta shows that she is quite capable ... but only of following society's rules.

The Decameron, Days Two and Three

5. Story 3.1: In story 2.7 we read about a ‘mute’ woman who does not speak because nobody speaks her language. Here we read a story about a ‘mute’ man in a convent. What are the differences / similarities here? How do you read this ‘muteness’? How might this play into a politics of gender, power, etc. that may or may not be related to speech? Use specific examples from the story to support your analysis.

Whereas Alatiel is "mute" because of a situation over which she has no control - an act of God that leaves her shipwrecked in a strange land - Masetto chooses to be mute for his own advantage. Both main characters end up having a whole lot of sex, but Alatial, again, is a more passive participant whereas Masetto's whole goal in going to the convent is to have intercourse with the nuns. Alatiel, as a woman, is seen as helpless because of her inability to communicate with those around her. Masetto, however, a brawny male figure, uses false muteness as an end to a means. For him, muteness is not a disability but rather a tool. "The place is far hence and none knoweth me there," says Masetto. "I can but make a show of being dumb, [and] I shall for certain be received there." He consciously chooses to be mute because he knows he can get away with the disguise and also because it will give the nuns a sense that their secrets are safe with him. It's like having cake and eating it too! Masetto understands, in a crude way, that language used for effective communication will undermine his master plan. He has nothing without having secrecy on his side. So, by essentially removing the ability to use language to communicate the latest in nunnery newsflashes, he plays up how powerful speech can truly be.

Alatiel, on the other hand, wants to use speech to communicate with those around her, but cannot. After being shipwrecked, she and her ladies try to explain their situation to the first men to rescue them, but "perceiving that he understood them not nor they him, they made shift to make known to him their misadventure by signs." Signs might get the job done, but they don't give the same full and wholesome sense of understanding that language does. Later in the tale, when Alatiel meets up with Antiochus, it is his comprehension of her language that makes him so attractive to her. After all, he is conventionally the least attractive of her bevy of mates: he is old ("a man in years") and low-status (he is a servant to Osbech). I imagine that his back would give out if he tried to sweep her off her feet. Nevertheless, the wheels of love are greased because Antiochus is "urged by love and know[s] her tongue (the which was mighty agreeable to her, as well as it might be to one whom it had behoved for some years live as if she were deaf and dumb, for that she understood none neither was underst[oo]d of anyway)." For Alatiel, initially a chaste and honorable woman, her inability to communicate conventionally (i.e. through speech) with those around her forces her to find other ways to communicate: namely, through sex.

The Decameron!

I would like you to choose one quotation that interests you from three different stories. Why does this draw your interest? How do you "read" this quotation (the "analysis" or "interpretation" question)? What does this quotation have to say about themes within the tale? About the tale as a whole?

Day 1, Story 2: Abraham the Jew, at the instigation of Jehannot de Chevigne, goeth to the court of Rome ...

The theme of this tale is to show how God's continued goodwill towards those who sin repeatedly serves to strongly reinforce his benevolence. Because one might logically expect God to rain down punishments on bad boys and girls, the fact that he doesn't goes to show just how "benign" he is. When Abraham returns from his trip to Rome, where he saw that all the Papal clergy behaved in ways totally unsuitable to their stations, he states that nonetheless that "your religion [Christianity] continually increaseth and waxeth still brighter and more glorious," so "meseemeth I manifestly discern that the Holy Spirit is verily the foundation and support thereof, as of that which is true and holy over any other." This seems to me such an ironic thing to say. Why abandon your religion because another one is more corrupt? It would be illogical to do so. However, when Abraham argues his point - that a religion so corrupt at its core can still maintain a geographically impressive hold on so many pious citizens - I had to admit that he had a point.

But as a Jew myself, I still would have been happier if he didn't convert. It's funny to me that this little fable almost corrupts the Jewish commandment to study Torah. The idea of "Talmud Torah" (studying the teachings of the Torah) is not just to study the stories, but to debate and discuss them in order to truly understand what happened, why, and how to apply those moral lessons to your own life. It's ironic that Abraham uses this intrinsically ethical and logical principle of Talmud Torah in order to basically abandon the roots of this way of thinking - and in doing so, he is showing his Jewish-ness more than ever (although in a flawed way, because he's taking the logical argument too far). He's using the tools of one ideology to sway himself in the direction of another ideology. It's like getting from one tree to the next by climbing from one branch to the next, until the branches intertwine and you are no longer in the tree where you started - but how would you have gotten to the second tree without the support from the branches of the first?

Within the tale, Abraham's conversion is meant to show how that despite the Papacy's terrible reputation, God's benevolence on the Vatican's sinners allows them to still make a positive impression on a good man, and ultimately convert him to their cause. However, I also believe that Abraham's conversion is meant to be taken with a grain of salt. Because the Church is shown in such an ugly light not only in this tale but throughout the entire Decameron, readers are not supposed to feel that Abraham is better off Christian. Rather, they might get a chuckle out of his twisted logical arguments. So in the end, could it be that Abraham - who is not a sinner except by dint of his religion - gets the short end of the stick because God is busy giving a break to those who sin more than him?

Day 2, Story 3: Three young men squander their substance and become poor; but a nephew of theirs ...

On day two, the seven ladies and three men tell stories of wild success despite difficult burdens. Pampinea goes further with this story to show the important role of luck in making this transition from threadbare to throned. But it seems to me that fortune's whims, however benevolent they may turn out to be, still manifest themselves initially in this story through sinful lust and misleading disguise. During the course of the trip from England to Rome, the abbot "called to Alessandro in a low voice and bade him come couch with him. Alessandro, after many excuses, put off his clothes and laid himself beside the abbot, who put his hand on his breast and fell to touching him no otherwise than amorous damsels use to do with their lovers; whereat Alessandro marvelled exceedingly and misdoubted him the abbot was moved by unnatural love to handle him on that wise." Eventually the abbot strips down to show that he is actually a she, with nice perky breasts to show for it. How could such standard no-no's as lust, sodomy, and concealment of true identity be the very elements that ultimately lead Alessandro to glory?

It seems to me that the theme of sight (and the lack thereof) within this tale - the three brothers eyes being opened by poverty and, conversely, their obliviousness to finances when they are in wealth; seeing the abbot's true identity versus not knowing who she is - all go to show that luck is blind, and so the decisions that might seem so bad are actually the ones that will pay off for the better. After all, isn't Lady Fortune traditionally depicted with a blindfold on?

1. Gawain gives a speech on pp. 326-327. What is the outcome of this speech (in other words, what does this speech accomplish, for better or worse)? How do you interpret the agreement Yvain then makes with Laudine? What kind of agreement is this? Would you want to accept such an agreement? Why or why not?

Gawain's speech appeals to Yvain's senses of logos, ethos, and pathos - he's like a miracle worker of rhetoric! In any case, he convinces Gawain to leave his wife behind in search of that glimmering ideal: adventure! Gawain convinces Yvain to accompany him and the rest of King Arthur's court back to Britain, in order to joust and fight and do other silly (yet violent) knightly things.

However lofty Yvain's goal in going out to re-make a name for himself (he's in the same boat as Erec, isn't he?), the underhanded way in which he goes about doing it bodes ill for a happy and timely reunion with his wife. Yvain already knows that Laudine won't like what he has to say - and that's why he, in effect, makes her sign a contract without reading it. Actually, the way he takes his leave here reminds me of the beginning of this tale, when Yvain left King Arthur's court ahead of everyone else, "having no desire for their company [and] set off alone, whether it might bring him joy or grief" (303). The refreshing thing about Yvain's character is that he is a complex mix of conventionally positive elements (chivalrous, brave, etc.) and unexpectedly sneaky, down-and-dirty ones - like his odd habit of leaving to go on a journey while leaving a bad taste in everyone else's mouth.

Personally, I would not be happy at all to be in Laudine's shoes - but I would also hesitate to agree to something before knowing at least some of what it would involve. People have common sense so that they can use it. So while I think it is a nice gesture that Laudine trusts Yvain enough to agree to his wishes before knowing what they are, the outcome of the situation shows that her trust is, unfortunately, misplaced.

2. In this last passage of the text we witness an interesting event, we are told of the "death" of Erec and his later "rebirth", what does this mean? Why did Chretien choose to not only include this? Is there a deeper meaning? How does this event relate to the rest of the text?

I think that the "death" and subsequent "rebirth" of Erec symbolizes a death of one element of his personality - the completely image-driven, egocentric side of it - and a birth of another aspect of it - the more appreciative, humbler side of it.

Erec, as always, is a good enough knight to defeat the terrifying giants despite being outnumbered and already weak from his earlier injuries. However, when he collapses in front of Enide in a coma-like state, it is as if his superhero identity suddenly dissolves. As Erec's consciousness fails him, out goes his constant inner monologue acknowledging his own proud presence, and so too goes his physical prowess. In turn, his ability to fend for himself and to boss Enide around leave him as well. He is returned to an entirely helpless state, as though he were a baby, and he had better be thankful now that Enide loves him well enough to watch over him.

Returned to a formative state, this fetus version of Erec loses his pure masculinity - formerly one of his only defining elements. Reborn, Erec gains some femininity - as if Enide's selfless love for him has manifested itself in his unsuspecting body - and with it, the ability to see situations from multiple perspectives, not just his own point of view. For once he experiences "deep grief and anguish when he [hears Enide's] voice ... Wrath and the love he bore his wife made him bold" (96). For once he seems to have a real reason to fight. Later, when he fights the knight in the garden, Erec says, "One can speak folly as easily as wisdom. Threaten all you like, but I shall just keep silence, for there is no wisdom in threats" (109). Could this mean that he has looked back on his own threats to Enide (telling her to be quiet or else), taking into account her point of view of his unfulfilled remarks, and that he has now resolved to take a page out of her book? This openness to another's opinions is certainly a new step for Erec.

This death and rebirth also makes me think of Christ, killed on the cross and resurrected three days later. Chretien de Troyes, by having Erec undergo this miraculous event, cannot help but inspire in his audience images of Jesus. Could it be that Erec dies as a mortal - superficial, flawed, weak, and completely self-centered - and then is raised from the dead as an even larger-than-life (if at all possible) embodiment of his former self - ferociously gallant, handsome, and noble - but with a touch more humility, sympathy, and appreciation of Enide?

Erec and Enide, Day 2

1. If the first part of the romance belongs to Erec, the second part most certainly belongs to Enide. How do we see her character emerging here? In what context do we finally get her name?

We finally get Enide's name when she marries Erec: "When Erec received his wife, she had to be named by her proper name, for unless a woman is called by her proper name she is not married" (de Troyes 62). This statement implies that a single woman had no need for a name, because she was not expected to do anything or accomplish anything. Without a name, it would be difficult for others to acknowledge a woman's possession or achievement: "That is Jill's cow" or "Mary planted that garden." However, in order to be married, a woman would have to be given a name, if only to determine her identity so that her husband would be able to claim her as his possession. This makes me think of the Biblical story of Jacob, who worked for his relative Laban for 7 years in order to win Laban's younger daughter Rachel as his wife. However, Laban put his older daughter Leah in Rachel's place on the day of the wedding (her face hidden by a veil so that Jacob wouldn't be aware of the deception). If those girls had been identified by their own names instead of by their father's, things would have turned out differently.

2. Enide also speaks for the first time in the text in this part of the romance. What are her first words? How do you interpret her speech? How does Erec interpret her speech? How do you explain his reaction? Why?

Enide's character emerges here as a woman concerned for her husband's status. Her first words are, "Wretch ... unhappy me! Why did I come here from my land? The earth should truly swallow me up, since the very best of knights ... [she goes on to praise him here] ... has completely abandoned all chivalry because of me. Now have I truly shamed him; I should not have wished it for anything." She seems concerned that Erec's followers are losing faith in him because he has been spending more time with her in the sack than out in the field making conquests and riding around on horses, sticking his lance into things. (One lance exchanged for another, I suppose!) I believe that her speech comes from a genuine place. After all, she is having a great honeymoon period with him (and he with her) - there would be no reason besides unselfishness to bring up other people's newly disappointed perceptions of Erec. In fact, she doesn't want to tell Erec the bad news for fear that it will "distress" him. Also, she blames herself for this flaw of Erec's. He would still be galavanting about if he weren't married.

Well, of course she is right. Erec interprets her speech as criticism and as an impetus to get out and go prove everyone wrong. To me, his train of thought goes something like this, "Those people think I'm good for nothing now, do they? Well, I'll prove them wrong! Road trip time!" Unfortunately, Erec is so caught up in loving himself and in being loved by others that he fears that losing the esteem of others means losing his place in the world as the golden boy, which is his very identity. Erec, the man who sees Enide as if looking at himself through a mirror, defines himself only by an image, by others' opinions of him - what the other knights and kings and noble ladies see. If he valued himself according to his own sense of self-worth and accomplishment, perhaps he would be able to shrug off the people's sinking opinion of him and simply revel in his happy lifestyle. As for Enide, Erec sees her as a trophy wife meant to reflect her husband's accomplishment. According to that position, Enide should fade in order to proportionally reflect the light from her husband's waning star. However, by being her usual wise self, she can't help but point criticism out to Erec, and by being her usual beautiful self, he can't help but see her as suddenly "better" than him.

4. We are told the love potion has ‘worn off’ after three years. Describe the reactions Tristan and Yseult have regarding this fact. Why is this the case?

After the potion wears off, Tristan, who is hunting at the time, "instantly [begins] to repent." This repentance is full of complaining for his own "suffering," his lost material goods, his lost status at court, his poor relations with his uncle the king. Eventually he is done complaining about his own sorry state and turns his thoughts to how his actions have negatively impacted Yseut: "She is in the wood, and she could be living withe her servants in fine rooms hung with silken cloths." He resolves to reunite Yseut with Mark.

Meanwhile, Yseut goes through a similar mental process, bemoaning her own fate and blaming Brangain for giving them the potion. Eventually Tristan and Yseut explain their feelings to each other and decide to return to King Mark as knight and queen, respectively.

I think that Tristan and Yseut react the way they do - quite selfishly, initially - because no matter how angelically Beroul tries to paint them, they are still human - and humans always look out for themselves first. Then, after they complain about the holes they are in for a while, their noble natures return to them and they present the other person's misfortunes as a reason to do something about the issue. However, I don't believe that either of them wants to reconcile with King Mark for purely selfless reasons. After coming out from under the potion's thumb, the first elements life that they regret missing out on are material goods (silks, furs) and societal conventions (servants, ladies in waiting). This leads me to believe that they are not quite the perfect, flawless models that Beroul wants us to believe that they are.