Abandoned Women: Rewriting the Classics in Dante, Boccaccio, and Chaucer

Book Description
Medievalists have long been interested in the "abandoned woman," a figure historically used to examine the value of traditional male heroism. Moving beyond previous studies which have focused primarily on Virgil's Dido, Suzanne Hagedorn focuses on the vernacular works of Dante, Bocaccio, and Chaucer, arguing that revisiting the classical tradition of the abandoned woman enables one to reconsider ancient epics and myths from a female perspective and question assumptions about gender roles in medieval literature.
Suzanne Hagedorn is Associate Professor of English at the College of William and Mary.



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Medievalists Have Long Been interested in the "abandoned woman," a figure traditionally used to examine the value of male heroism. Moving beyond previous studies; which have focused primarily on Virgil's' Dido, Suzanne Hagedorn incorporates an array of primary texts which influenced and inspired medievat writers as they created their own poetic visions. Focusing on the vernacular works of Dante, Boccaccio, and Chaucer; she argues that revisiting the classical tradition of the abandoned woman enables these medieval authors to reconsider ancient epics and myths from a female perspective and question assimptions about gender roles in medieval literature. Hagedorn's careful examination of these ancient texts illuminates the complex web of allusions that link medieval authors to their literary predecessors. In essence the author argues that the process of reading reimagining, and reinscribing Ovid's Heroides in their own vernacular fictions teaches Dante, Boccaccio and Chaucer how to write from a revisionist perspective and how forecast and reconsider epic history and mythology from women's viewpoints. Hagedorn further demonstrates that all three authors present remarkably powerful and sympathetic views of women in their works. Abandoned Women will be of interest to medievalists and non-medievalists alike, with an interest in the areas of medieval text reception, poetic tradition comparative literature, and gender studies.


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