EVELYN BIRGE VITZ
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here of the interesting points (though they are offensive to many) made
by Camille Paglia in
Sex, Art and American Culture.
Might we think of this
young girl as tossing a rather self-satisfied wink at the knight - and at the
men and women of the audience?
In
power-play there is power but also
play. Love and sex can be a complex, ritualized game in which women
may allow men to force them to do what they intended to do anyway.
In
short, sexuality is a complex expression of human nature, and there is
much more to it than just victims versus victimizers.
Some
pastourelles
end on the invitation to an ongoing relationship
between the shepherdess and knight: "When I had done my will with the
shepherdess, I got .on my palfrey, and she cried out: 'To the son of saint
Marie, knight, I commend you; do not forget me, for I am your sweet–
heart, but come back often.'" This poem gratifies both male fantasies of
having women thank them for raping them and the female desire for
commitment.
In
other poems, no strings are attached to the girl's pleasure
and gratitude: this is sex without responsibility - and who would deny
that this has always been attractive to men?
Let us take a last look at these shepherdesses and the aristocrats who
liked hearing about them: if a Marxist-feminist analysis is in order, we
could see noble women alienated from themselves and their interests, co–
opted by patriarchal class structure, collaborating with the oppressor and
laughing at the suffering of peasant rape victims. I have tried to show that
this view is erroneous, but one final remark: shepherdesses are the social
inferiors of aristocrats. But they are also traditionally understood - and
fantasized - as superior to persons of refinement with regard to their rela–
tionship to nature. The courtly ladies who listened to these songs may
well have been moved to admiration, indeed to envy, of the imaginary
bergeres.
Why should all this shock and surprise us? Unless we are determined
to place the entire blame for human misery on male shoulders, must we
not acknowledge that some women have fantasized about being forced to
have intercourse by some men, just as some men have enjoyed thinking
about raping some women? What is shocking is surely that the fantasies in
question are about forced sex: rape. Women are caught in the act of en–
tertaining the thought of being sexually subjected by men . But both men
and women do in fact have fantasies of which they are ashamed.
If
it is true that some women have entertained such fantasies, might
knowing this make men less guilty when they commit rape? Saying so
(we are told) might even encourage rapists. Now one can never be sure
what foolish things people will assert when accused of wrong-doing, but
this is surely a weak argument. An analogy: many people have wanted to
die; some have had detailed fantasies about their deathbed scene. But this
