IMC 2013: Sessions
Session 1320: Gendering the Pleasure Garden: (Re)Reading the Hortus conclusus in the Middle Ages, II
Wednesday 3 July 2013, 16.30-18.00
| Sponsor: | Society for Medieval Feminist Scholarship |
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| Organiser: | Liz Herbert McAvoy, Department of English Language & Literature, Swansea University |
| Moderator/Chair: | Roberta Magnani, Department of English Language & Literature, Swansea University |
| Paper 1320-a | Flourishing in the Anti-Garden: Purgatory, Pain, and Salvation (Language: English) Index terms: Gender Studies, Language and Literature - Middle English |
| Paper 1320-b | The Time of the Tree: Returning to Eden after the Fall in the Cornish Creation of the World (Language: English) Index terms: Gender Studies, Language and Literature - Celtic |
| Paper 1320-c | Reflections on the Divine: Hildegard of Bingen, Marian Prophet (Language: English) Index terms: Religious Life, Theology, Women's Studies |
| Abstract | The image of the hortus conclusus has long haunted the human imaginary. Emerging, in part, from the tradition that included the Song of Songs, it found its way into both religious and secular medieval texts, becoming a staple of monastic and courtly discourse. Most famously associated with the virginal maternity of Mary, its pleasures became associated with religious discipline and spiritual fecundity as well as carnal love and sexuality. These sessions, therefore, revisit both the pleasures and displeasures of the medieval hortus conclusus, from the perspectives provided by gender-aware methodologies. |