"All this he saw, for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered."
Veiled in Wit: Queer Subtext and Gender Play in The Heptameron Often dubbed “the French Decameron,” The Heptameron is a collection of 72 stories told by a group of noble travellers, written by Marguerite Queen of Navarre, sister to King Francis I, and one of the...
Not by Nature, but by Habit: Christine de Pizan and the Complexity of Gender Roles “If it were customary to send little girls to school and teach them the same subjects as boys are taught, they would learn just as well… Not because they are female,...
The Sword and the Stage: La Maupin, the Scandalous Virtuosa of Baroque France Julie d’Aubigny, better known as La Maupin, was a French opera singer, expert swordswoman, and outlaw who lived as boldly as the heroines she portrayed. Born into a noble family and trained at...
As Blossoms Fall: The Poetry of Ephemeral Love in Nanshoku Ōkagami “Their sleeves were soaked with tears, not from shame, but from knowing they had only this one night. In the garden, plum blossoms were falling—each petal a sigh, each gust a farewell.”-- Ihara Saikaku, The...
In the Courtyard at Dusk: Female Intimacy in Mughal Miniature Painting In the world of the Mughal court, the zenana was a secluded space that offered elite women both constraint and community. Mughal miniature paintings often depicted moments of leisure among women: dressing, reading poetry, making...
The Queer Alchemy of Benvenuto Cellini: Desire, Scandal, and Self-Fashioning in Renaissance Florence Benvenuto Cellini — sculptor, goldsmith, author, swordsman, and scandal — lived at the heart of Renaissance Florence with the fire of a man determined to be seen, remembered, and unruly. Best known for...
Dressed in Double Truth: Visual Echoes of Elen de Céspedes Elen de Céspedes (c. 1545–after 1588) was born in Spain, assigned female at birth, and lived much of their adult life as a man. A former enslaved person and farmworker, they eventually became a licensed surgeon,...
Neither Man Nor Woman, but Saint: the Iconography of St. Marina the Monk In the hagiographic tradition of Eastern Christianity, Saint Marina the Monk (more properly known as Marinos) occupies a space that defies categories. Assigned female at birth, Marina disguised herself as a man to...
Queer Voice and Urban Wit in the Poetry of Abu Nuwas In the glittering intellectual courts of Abbasid Baghdad, one poet spoke of queer desire with wit, joy, and unapologetic sensuality. Abu Nuwas (c. 756–814 CE) — satirist, court jester, and literary rebel — composed verses...
Unbound, Unnameable: Desire and Dissolution in Marguerite Porete’s Mirror “Love has no why,and the soul who loves has no need to ask.She is unbound. She neither wills nor does not will,for she is held, wholly,in the embrace of Love’s will.”-- Marguerite Porete, The Mirror of Simple...
