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Further evidence for Chaucer's representation of the Pardoner as a womanizer.(in Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales)

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From: Medium Aevum
Date: 20020922
Author:Green, Richard Firth

Twenty years ago I argued that the hints of effeminacy to be found in Chaucer's portrait of the Pardoner should not be taken to indicate either homosexuality or a physical condition (whether that of a eunuch or a hermaphrodite), but rather an inordinate preoccupation with women. (1) To be effeminate in the Middle Ages, I suggested, was primarily the mark of a womanizer. This position has recently been endorsed by H. A. Kelly, who has adduced a plethora of evidence from theological, legal, and physiological texts to support it. (2) My purpose here is merely to add a brief footnote ...

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