When a Rose is Not a Rose: Homoerotic Emblems in the Roman de la Rose

This is the first of the essays I’ve read in Gender Transgressions: Crossing the Normative Barrier in Old French Literature–and I love it. Unfortunately, what makes the article so great is what makes it irrelevant to my thesis project: it is an alternate reading of the canonic text the Roman de la Rose, positing that the central romance of the work occurs between two male figures rather than between a male and female figure. The argument is made chiefly by decoding the undoubtedly coded language used in the work, chiefly words like rose (literally “rose” but possible code for “penis”) and baiser (literally “kiss” but possible code for “sex” or “fuck”) and citing instances that attest to a deep love between the two allegorical male characters. The argument is presented very well, but the fact remains that sexuality and gender are two distinct concepts that I will need to keep separate in my mind. There was a clear benefit to the article, though, in that it challenged the automatic gendered assumptions people make that affect their conception of how a story is supposed to grow. This was more in reference to heteronormativity and European conceptions of gender roles in romance, but it was helpful nonetheless.

Before And After Gender

Though this text comes from the 1970s, when prevailing notions of gender were still painfully binary, I think there will be some usable content. I’m particularly interested in the chapter where Strathern details (and debunks) existing gender stereotypes and the very idea of gender stereotyping. In my reading so far, she’s already placed the terms “man” and “woman” in quotation marks, and made mention of ever-toxic “gender-thinking.” Looks good so far.