Wheldrake
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quote:
ORIGINAL: LadyNTrainer
quote:
ORIGINAL: Wheldrake
Are there any specific pieces of "actual literature" that you would recommend as a starting point? I'm very interested in the idea of an analogy between knightly chivalry and submission in a BDSM sense, and I've even toyed with the idea of writing a novella based on this theme. Like Peon, however, I've always been a bit skeptical about the supposed similarities. It's been many years since I read the Morte D'Arthur, but I don't remember too much in the way of hair-shirt masochism - mostly knights drawing their swords and cleaving each other unto the brain-pan, or sometimes unto the paps if they got a particularly good stroke in.
Having mentioned it, I really should in all fairness do the research necessary to properly cite it. Unfortunately my university days are behind me by a few years, and I no longer have access to the libraries in which I found the works that originally impressed me with the strong themes I was discussing. Nor do I remember specific titles. Probably the quickest way to get there from here would be to find and bother a net-accessible medieval literature specialist, asking for suggestions on where to start in your research on those subjects. If you can't find one, I can, but it's a "vanilla" connection so I wouldn't tell them that you were referred on CollarMe. LOL
Do keep in mind that we're talking about a pretty broad historical period here. Arthurian literature is definitely not the be-all and end-all of chivalry.
Well, I managed to dig up a page with a couple of selections from Chretien de Troyes that seem to more or less fit the bill:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/1170chretien-lancelot.html
The context isn't totally clear, but Sir Lancelot is apparently battling through various obstacles in an effort to reach Queen Guinevere. He resists the seductive blandishments of another fair damsel (who orders the knights of her household to attack him, for good measure), and afterwards crawls across a bridge in the inconvenient shape of a giant sword with a sharp, upturned edge. He removes the armour on his hands and feet, seemingly to get a better grip, and Chretien says:
"He will be in a sorry state when he reaches the other side. He is going to support himself with his bare hands and feet upon the sword, which was sharper than a scythe, for he had not kept on his feet either sole or upper or hose. But he felt no fear of wounds upon his hands or feet; he preferred to maim himself rather than to fall from the bridge and be plunged in the water from which he could never escape. In accordance with this determination, he passes over with great pain and agony, being wounded in the hands, knees, and feet. But even this suffering is sweet to him: for Love, who conducts and leads him on, assuages and relieves the pain."
This certainly sounds like the harsher side of the courtly love tradition - not entirely my cup of tea, but still a fascinating Mediaeval picture of male humility, devotion and self-sacrifice.
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RE: Do mistresses love their slaves, or just use them? - 
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