Courtly and Queer: Deconstruction, Desire, and Medieval French Literature

In Courtly and Queer, Charlie Samuelson casts queerness in medieval French texts about courtly love in a new light by bringing together for the first time two exemplary genres: high medieval verse romance, associated with the towering figure of Chrétien de Troyes, and late medieval dits, primarily associated with Guillaume de Machaut. In close readings informed by deconstruction and queer theory, Samuelson argues that the genres' juxtaposition opens up radical new perspectives on the deviant poetics and gender and sexual politics of both. Contrary to a critical tradition that locates the queer Middle Ages at the margins of these courtly genres, Courtly and Queer emphasizes an unflagging queerness that is inseparable from poetic indeterminacy and that inhabits the core of a literary tradition usually assumed to be conservative and patriarchal. Ultimately, Courtly and Queer contends that one facet of texts commonly referred to as their "courtliness"--namely, their literary sophistication--powerfully overlaps with modern conceptions of queerness.

Author: Charlie Samuelson
Publisher: Ohio State University Press
Published: 03/24/2022
Pages: 240
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.00lbs
Size: 9.06h x 6.06w x 0.87d
ISBN13: 9780814214985
ISBN10: 0814214983
BISAC Categories:
- Literary Criticism | Medieval
- Literary Criticism | European | French
- Literary Criticism | English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh

About the Author
Charlie Samuelson is an Assistant Professor of French at the University of Colorado-Boulder.