Sexy Gods

            On Saturday morning song practice went fairly smoothly and although my B string was still constantly going out of tune I was able to get it back quickly and finished rehearsal much earlier than usual. This allowed me time to put the finishing touches on the British Literature essay that I’d expanded from three to five pages. I finished it just after 9:00 and attached it to an email to my professor. 

            Here it is: 

            I’m your Venus, I'm your fire. What's your desire? - Robbie van Leeuwen 

           Sexual Deception in Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene 

           Comparing two cases of sexual deception in Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene we find that both acts of misrepresentation are assisted by the victims’ fantasies. These flights of erotic whimsy are inspired by some of the more amorous manifestations of classical mythology. In one of these occurrences the malicious Archimago fools the Red Cross knight with a lusty illusion of his lady by causing him to dream of a wedding presided over by pleasure loving Roman gods (1.2.416-432). In the other event the trickster is the naive female knight Britomart and her victim is the lascivious Lady Malecasta. 

            Mistaking the disguised Britomart for a beautiful man, Malecasta is drawn to her in imitation of the seduction of Adonis by Venus (3.1.298-547). Britomart’s act of convincingly cross-dressing in a world where clothing specifies gender becomes the foundation for Malecasta’s delusion that Britomart is the man of her dreams. Britomart further deceives by pretending not to understand this (3.1.450,459). Malecasta takes that pretence for consent (3.1.494-495). When the truth shatters her delusion she loses consciousness (3.1.553). Both of these situations teach us that sexual trickery requires the receiver’s hope that the imposture be real. But also that deception must be rendered beautiful for its illusion to fool the victim. The lie must correspond to an image of beauty that has been burned into the brain by old mythologies. 

           In Book One of The Faerie Queene, the Red Cross Knight is compelled by the magician Archimago to dream of libidinous play, but it is the polytheistic imagery of the hallucination that seduces him. A mirage of Una is lying beside him in bed and telling him that Cupid has made her want to give in to her carnal desire for him (1.2.418-423). It seems to Red Cross in this moment that Venus has delivered him a flower crowned by Flora while Aphrodite’s handmaids, the Graces are singing the Hymn to Hymen (1.2.424-432). This Christian knight wishfully imagines that he is no longer a Christian and believes that he has married Una in a pagan ceremony. If this dream were truly offensive to him he would perceive it as a nightmare, but he does not. Red Cross’s response to these images is to feel lust, albeit unaccustomed, but nonetheless he welcomes the dream by the fact of being initially aroused. If he later reacts negatively to the situation and wakes up it does not take away from the fact that at first he perceived the dream as pleasant. This shows that for Red Cross, Christianity is merely a disguise with the design of covering his own heathenism that continues to worship the old gods in his dreams. His faith is more about behaviours that override instinct rather than a consciousness that displaces desires more compatible with the polytheistic classical era. The armour of his faith exists as a defence against attacks from within rather than without. He is willingly deceived by naked, relaxed and happy gods that do not require deadly weapons to be persuasive. 

            In Book Three Britomart travels while posing as a male knight, but her mendacity does not result in harm until she encounters the Lady Malecasta. When Britomart reveals her beautiful face she is perceived by Malecasta as a desirable young man. For her Britomart is like Adonis as he is portrayed in the tapestries depicting his love affair with Venus that decorate the walls of a great chamber of pleasure where guests are entertained in her castle (3.1.298-306,376-387). Then just as Venus falls in love with Adonis, Malecasta is smitten with the visage of Britomart (3.1.415-423). The beguiler here is Britomart but her lie is elaborately spiced in Malecasta's mind by the voluptuous heathen mythology that she reveres. 

            The narrator of The Faerie Queene tells us that this lover of the classical world gives control of her body to appetite, so that like an unruly horse it tramples her honest name (3.1.444-445). Later the Lady begins to be called “Malecasta” as if her behaviour has caused her appellation to be changed (3.1.508). But to be “unchaste” as this title indicates is not in itself dishonest. Her actions do much less harm than the fraud that Britomart maintains to protect her chastity. This renders Britomart far more dishonest than Malecasta, who only dupes herself by allowing Britomart’s lie to enhance her own fantasies. 

            Malecasta is said to be “false” but only in the sense of living a lifestyle that runs contrary to Christian morality rather than by being untruthful (3.1.448). Her behaviour is not “ladylike” in the way that women are expected to behave in noble English society but there is nothing harmful or malicious about it. The narrator declares that love always inspires honour to perform generous deeds, but he also notes that Malecasta shows herself to be bounteous (3.1.365). The fact that she makes her sexual desires obvious and speaks openly about them shows that she is truthful (3.1.424-430, 440, 449, 462-474). As generosity and honesty are characteristics of honour, Malecasta proves herself to be an honourable personage. Britomart however, in feigning ignorance of Malecasta’s meaning shows far more falsity and dishonour than her hostess (3.1.450-459). 

            Britomart will not allow herself to understand the meaning of Malecasta’s glances. She circumvents herself by pretending not to know. The fact that Britomart “would not” know such a “guileful” message indicates that she consciously applies her will to not knowing (3.1.459). To respond to cunning with feigned ignorance is what is called in modern parlance “playing dumb,” but in Britomart’s case it serves no clever purpose and merely fumbles to temporarily protect her gender ruse. In this instance then Britomart’s theatrical ignorance is ironically the display of a true absence of intelligence. No means no, but silence is ambiguous and so Britomart’s lack of protest against Malecasta's advances is taken by her as an invitation. If Britomart had made her objections clear then Malecasta would not have come to her bed later that night (3.1.495). 

            When Malecasta gently slides into bed next to Britomart she is attempting to emulate the scene in her tapestry that depicts Venus coming to dote love on the sleeping form of Adonis. Just as Venus's affection towards Adonis is primarily manifested by displaying care for him while he is sleeping, Malecasta takes the same innocent approach when she comes to Britomart. She does so even more shyly than the love goddess, being strikingly content to simply lie tenderly and quietly beside the sleeping warrior with only a slight touch to discern whether or not the knight is sleeping (3.1.316-324, 523-547). Since Britomart had not rejected her declarations of desire at the dinner table, Malecasta reasons with the logic of someone who is a stranger to deception that the knight would not resent such a peaceful intrusion. 

            Britomart draws her sword when she wakes because she thinks that her chastity is under siege (3.1.551-553). Malecasta’s fantasy of finding her own gentle Adonis is shattered when she is threatened by a fierce and violent Christian woman and so she faints in terror (3.1.553-555,562-567). Both she and Malecasta have been mistaken about one another. Britomart thought that a man had come into her bed while Malecasta thought she had come to a man’s bed. This would not have happened if Britomart had made it clear from the start that she is a woman. 

            The Red Cross knight and Malecasta are both disarmed by counterfeit realities. But in each situation the misconceptions are amplified by the pantheistic wishes of the victims. Red Cross, whose passions are self imprisoned in the stiff armour of Christian morality, recognizes and welcomes the arrival of the icons of sexual audacity of the pre-Christian world: Venus, Cupid, Flora and Hymen into his dream of Una (1.2.416-432). And Malecasta, whose elegantly elaborate tapestries indicate that she idealizes the supernatural love that blossoms between Venus and the androgynous Adonis, is easily fooled by a female knight concealing her gender (3.1.298-306,376-387). 

            All deceptions presented in The Faerie Queene or in the real world are forms of myth making. The established iconography of mythical beings that have been lied about for centuries causes them to become gods. The longest maintained deceptions require a core of truth to hold them together and the most compelling truths are sexual. The deities that have been lied about for the longest time have the most experience. But the gods that do not manifest themselves sexually, such as the one worshipped by the Red Cross Knight and Britomart, are more likely to be cuckolded by the old gods in dreams and in the deceptions that we fall for. 

            Work cited 

Spenser, William. “The Faerie Queene.” The Broadview Anthology of British Literature: Concise 

            edition, Volume A, 3rd Edition, Edited by Black Joseph, L. Conolly, K. Flint, I. Grundy, D. 

            LePan, R. Liuzza, J. McGann, A. Prescott, B. Qualls, C. Waters, Broadview, 2019, pp. 677-678,

            lines 414-495. 

Spenser, William. “The Faerie Queene.” The Broadview Anthology of British Literature Online 

            Archive. https://web.archive.org/web/20190528234832/http://wwnorton.com/college/

            english/nael/noa/chron.htm#16thC, Book 3, Canto 1, lines 298-567.