The Appropriation of Masculine Discourse and the Disruption of Gender Identity in Chaucer's "The Merchant's Tale"

Abstract

Where Chaucer's attitudes lie on feminism and even anti-feminism is a contentious and perhaps unanswerable question. While some scholars offer readings of Chaucer as a misogynist poet who deprecates women, others, such as Elaine Tuttle Hansen, attempt to mitigate that misogny by placing it in a broader political context, one which is sensitive to the political nuances of Chaucer's time. In this way, Hansen wants to argue that any feminist critique of Chaucer must cleverly negotiate those political and literary conventions in which Chaucer wrote, namely, the hierarchical position of the masculine over the feminine. Yet as Hansen explores Chaucer's sexual politics in the hopes of recuperating a more humanist Chaucer, she maintains the fixity of those gender roles, arguing that women often "die" in their attempts to transgress gender lines. In The Merchant's Tale then, I intend to move beyond Hansen's treatment of women and thereby suggest that it is only through a transgression of stable gender categories, an appropriation of the authoritative masculine discourse, that May may gain access to political agency and thus elide adulterous recriminations.