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Virgin
Virgin: Not yet touched, handled, or employed for any purpose; still undisturbed or unused; perfectly fresh or new (Oxford English Dictionary online, definition 16b).
For the Renaissance writers, virginity was a precious ideal and a favorite theme. It went by many names: virtue, chastity, purity, maidenhead; but it signified that rare thing that was untouched, fresh, new. In a large sense, it was everything that the Old World of Europe ached and searched for: a new thing, the New World. Virginity was a thing men wanted to admire and treasure, but also to conquer and consume. And to the bearer, the virgin, it was an invaluable asset.
Virginity is bounty, riches, and treasure. When European explorers first set foot on the ‘virgin soil’ of the Americas, they were awestruck by the profusion of life, resources, and beauty. This land, innocent of the European touch, "… had many goodly woods full of deer, coneys, hares, and fowl, even in the midst of summer in incredible abundance (Barlow 1067)." The plowing of earth is often compared to the ‘tilling and sewing’ of a virgin woman. Sir Walter Raleigh (1064) explicitly employs this sexual metaphor when he writes "… Guiana is a country that hath yet her maidenhead, never sacked, turned, nor wrought; the face of the earth hath not been torn …"
Virginity is so admired that the word ‘virtue’ is a synonym for it. But in large part, it is prized only because of the difficulty of overcoming it. The deflowering of a girl or a new-found land is an exciting challenge to be surmounted. Raleigh goads his Queen to take the challenge of colonizing Guiana when he writes of her: "For whatsoever prince shall possess it shall be greatest, … shall hereby hear the name of a virgin which is … able to … invade and conquer so great empires so far removed (1066)."
While virginity retained leaves the suitor unsatisfied, it does likewise to the virgin. This mutual yearning and frustration seems to drive Renaissance writers to new heights of poetic expression. For example, Stella reassures Astrophil that, while she must make him wait, she too burns with passion: "Trust me while I thee deny, In myself the smart I try, … (Sidney 993)" In Shakespeare’s first sonnet, he laments that his would-be lover, by denying him, is "Making a famine where abundance lies, Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel (1169).
Women were auctioned off as “merchandise” to the best suitor they could get in town. Beauty, though important, was not as important as the dowry the woman possessed, because it was the dowry the family provided that could exalt a man’s societal status to all new heights. Once married, women were expected to have son’s for their husbands in order to take over the family business. A barren woman was not an option and could have easily been rushed to the nearest convent to take her vows of a nun, for no honor could be brought otherwise. No woman could run from the societal and legal pressures placed upon them. Rather than run, some chose to accept their place, but, like Lusanna, some chose to fight the status quo for rights they believed they
Ulrich shows a progression of change in the way that women’s sexuality was viewed in New England. First, she starts with a society that depended on “external rather internal controls” and where many New Englanders responded more to shame than guilt (Ulrich 96). The courts were used to punish sexual misconducts such as adultery with fines, whippings, or sometimes even death. There were certain behaviors that “respectable” women were expected to follow and “sexual misbehavior” resulted in a serious decline of a woman’s reputation from even just one neighbor calling her names such as whore or bawd (Ulrich 97-98). Because the love between a man and his wife was compared to the bond between Christ and the Church, female modesty was an important ideal. “Within marriage, sexual attraction promoted consort; outside marriage, it led to heinous sins” (Ulrich 108). This modesty was expected to be upheld even as death approached and is seen with the example of Mary Mansfield in 1681. Ulrich describes Mary to have five neck cloths tucked into her bosom and eleven caps covering her hair. “A good wife was to be physically attractive…but she was not to expose her beauty to every eye”. Hence, even as she died, Mary was required to conceal her sexuality and beauty. However, at the end of the seventeenth century and throughout the
...ked “the court, the church, the aristocracy, the academies, the salons, and the monarchy itself” through the lens of sexual sensationalism (Hunt, pg. 91). Sex in society was recognized as a political satire; however views that sex was to be shared privately between man and woman still lingered, for the actions of Marie Antoinette were scandalous for she was breaking the common view of proper sexual conduct.
Sexuality is a subject that has changed over times, the idea of sexuality and sex shifted from one view to another as people began to enforce different views in society. At the beginning of the 17th century there was little need for secrecy about sexuality and sexual practices as the idea was an open topic that could be discussed freely in society. Adult humour was not kept from children and ideas were open to all (Foucault and Hurley, 2008). However this times in society changed due to the power of the Victorian bourgeoisie. Sex and sexuality became confined and moved into the privacy of the home. People no longer spoke freely about it and secrecy became key (Foucault and Hurley, 2008).
This book showed NATO as being an organization that is very unorganized. It came across as though the countries involved did not respect each other’s thoughts and opinions. It dwells on the mistakes made by countries for example the United States, various other European countries. It made it seem as though NATO was in conflict within each other making the organization as a whole seem incapable of compromise and the defence of anything. At many points NATO wanted to vote the United States out of the organization but this obviously never happened. At one point it was a problem “about the possibility of being dominated and ultimately overwhelmed by too close an association with the United States” (pg.30) for Canada and their relationship.
...e speaker admits she is worried and confused when she says, “The sonnet is the story of a woman’s struggle to make choices regarding love.” (14) Her mind is disturbed from the trials of love.
When he writes "And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare as any she, belied with false compare." (lines 13-14) in the final couplet, one responds with an enlightened appreciation, making them understand Shakespeare's message that true love consists of something deeper than physical beauty. Shakespeare expresses his ideas in a wonderful fashion. Not only does he express himself through direct interpretation of his sonnet, but also through the levels at which he styled and produced it. One cannot help but appreciate his message of true love over lust, along with his creative criticism of Petrarchan sonnets.
No greater degradation took place in the Victorian woman’s life than in the bedroom. The Victorian woman had no right to her own body, as she was not permitted to refuse conjugal duties. She was believed to be asexual: “The majority of women, happily for them, are not much troubled with sexual feeling of any kind” (Woloch 128). The inference is, if the husband did not demand the f...
Comparing Tone in To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time and To His Coy Mistress
Bloch, R. Howard. Medieval Misogyny and the Invention of Western Romantic Love. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1991.
At the same time, women were repressed in their sexual feelings and were subject to their husband’s demands. If an unmarried woman had sexual relations, she would be dishonored, thrown into exile or even killed. Horrible experiments sought often to find ways of getting rid of any pleasure women would experience during intercourse.
Over the years the endurance of NATO has led to closer ties among its members and to a growing community of interests. The treaty itself has provided a model for other collective security agreements. NATO activities are no longer small only to Europe. In
“The Wife of Bath’s Tale” is written in an entertaining and adventurous spirit, but serves a higher purpose by illustrating the century’s view of courtly love. Hundreds, if not thousands, of other pieces of literature written in the same century prevail to commemorate the coupling of breathtaking princesses with lionhearted knights after going through unimaginable adventures, but only a slight few examine the viability of such courtly love and the related dilemmas that always succeed. “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” shows that women desire most their husband’s love, Overall, “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” shows that the meaning of true love does not stay consistent, whether between singular or separate communities and remains timeless as the depictions of love from this 14th century tale still hold true today.
In “Sonnet XVII,” the text begins by expressing the ways in which the narrator does not love, superficially. The narrator is captivated by his object of affection, and her inner beauty is of the upmost significance. The poem shows the narrator’s utter helplessness and vulnerability because it is characterized by raw emotions rather than logic. It then sculpts the image that the love created is so personal that the narrator is alone in his enchantment. Therefore, he is ultimately isolated because no one can fathom the love he is encountering. The narrator unveils his private thoughts, leaving him exposed and susceptible to ridicule and speculation. However, as the sonnet advances toward an end, it displays the true heartfelt description of love and finally shows how two people unite as one in an overwhelming intimacy.
Rumbarger, Lee. "Housekeeping: Women Modernists' Writing On War And Home." Women's Studies 35.1 (2006): 1-15. Literary Reference Center. Web. 30 Mar. 2014