Medieval Women’s Texts: Medieval Women Adventurers

What is a woman adventurer in medieval literature? How do these protagonists expand or subvert medieval (and modern) notions of exploration and travel? What are the female counterparts to the questing knight – characters more mobile, cunning and commanding than a damsel in distress? The title of this class is as much a challenge as a theme, and over the course of this semester we will expand the terms of adventure. By reading medieval texts across a range of genres – romance, hagiography and history writing – we will explore how different characters – queens, maidens and mothers, both fictional and historical – travel, stake out ground, and encounter strangeness. We will give particular attention to how romance, a precursor to the novel, imagines women’s movement in unusual ways. Fulfills Comparative, Poetry and pre-1800 requirements.