Was She a Boy? The Queer Maiden of the Middle English Pearl
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8863025 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Barbara Kowalik (0000-0001-6479-2164, Institute of English Studies, University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 101 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 112-133 |
| Publication date | 2019-08-07 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | English Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0013-838X • E-ISSN: 1744-4217 |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/0013838x.2019.1640049 |
| OpenAlex | W2966391703 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 18 |
This paper investigates gender in Middle English Pearl through language analysis in broader literary, cultural, and philosophical contexts, focusing particularly on the portrayal of the maiden, but taking into account also the dreamer-narrator and the Lamb. It is demonstrated that, far from being a consistently feminine figure, the Pearl maiden is a queer being, invested with masculine attributes as well. The article traces the reversals of normative gender patterns and sexual roles throughout the poem and attempts their interpretation. It questions, for the first time in Pearl criticism, the assumption that the maiden was a female person, probably the poet's daughter
Art · Criticism · Daughter · Epistemology · Interpretation (philosophy · Linguistics · Literary criticism · Literature · Middle English · Normative · Pearl · Poetry · Queer · Queer theory · Sociology · Gender Studies in Language · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Swearing, Euphemism, Multilingualism · Gender Studies · History · Law · Philosophy
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2025 - 2025 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |