View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship Repository THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF LOVE: THE NEGATION OF THE SUBJECT IN MYSTICISM AND TROUBADOUR FIN’ AMORS BY VALERIE WILHITE DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Comparative Literature in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2010 Urbana, Illinois Doctoral Committee: Professor C. Stephen Jaeger, Chair Associate Professor Karen Fresco Associate Professor Richard Layton Professor Keith Busby, University of Wisconsin-Madison ABSTRACT This dissertation compares the works of select troubadours with three mystical tracts in order to present the similarities found in these two literary traditions. Mystical writings have a far longer history reaching into antiquity and continuing until the present day. The traces in the manuscript traditions situate in the late eleventh century a new poetic form in Occitan with a focus on earthly love. The love as it is described in the songs of the composers who write or sing about it comes to be called bon amors or fin’ amors, the term we use today to name the love of the troubadour tradition. The period of lyrical production in Occitan by troubadours speaking of fin’ amors does not endure more than three centuries if we begin our count with Guilhem IX (1071-1126) and close with the poet so often called the last of the troubadours, Guiraut Riquier (1254-1292). These two traditions of love literature are thus distinguished by the nature of their literary histories and also by the loves they describe. Despite this, the shape of the loves they discuss as well as the language used to speak about love are not so different. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................... 1 SUBJECT AND SELF IN COMPARING TROUBADOURS AND MYSTICS............................................... 2 PREVIOUS SCHOLARSHIP .............................................................................................................. 4 CURRENT SCHOLARSHIP ............................................................................................................... 8 JUSTIFICATION OF THE CORPUS .................................................................................................. 14 OUTLINE OF THE DISSERTATION ................................................................................................. 20 PART I: CONSIDERING THE SELF.......................................................................................... 23 CHAPTER 1: THE SELF ACCORDING TO TROUBADOURS AND MYSTICS................... 27 THE BODY IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE SELF......................................................................... 27 THE EMOTIVE UNITY OF THE SELF ............................................................................................. 32 Emotions................................................................................................................................. 35 The Will as Self or Entangled with the Emotions................................................................... 39 Love and Self: Will or Emotion?............................................................................................ 43 THE COGNITIVE FUNCTIONS AND SELFHOOD ............................................................................. 58 CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................. 66 CHAPTER 2: DECONSTRUCTING THE SELF IN TROUBADOUR AND MYSTICAL THOUGHT ................................................................................................................................... 68 LOVE AS TRANSFORMATIVE ....................................................................................................... 68 LOSING THE SELF FOR LOVE....................................................................................................... 75 The Body and Loss of Self ...................................................................................................... 76 Mental functions and the Loss of Self..................................................................................... 83 PART II: THE TROUBADOURS............................................................................................. 108 CHAPTER 3: COSSIR E REMIRE: SEEING, DREAMING, AND CONTEMPLATIVE ENVISIONING IN THE TROUBADOUR’S PROCESS OF LOSING THE SELF................. 109 ANTIQUE SOURCES AND CONTEMPORARY THEORIES OF OPTICS .............................................. 110 THE SUBJECTIVITY OF SEEING AND BEING SEEN ...................................................................... 115 IMAGINING AND DREAMING THE OTHER AND LOSING THE SELF .............................................. 120 Cossirar: Contemplating the Beloved and Losing the Self .................................................. 130 The Visual Creation and Destruction of a Subject............................................................... 135 CHAPTER 4: BERNART DE VENTADORN SINGING THE FADING SELF...................... 141 DEFINING THE LOVER AS SELFLESS .......................................................................................... 141 THE FRAILTY OF THE CENTERED BODY, WILL, AND MIND....................................................... 151 Cor e cors............................................................................................................................. 153 Fors’ e poder........................................................................................................................ 170 Saber e sen ........................................................................................................................... 187 PART III: THE MYSTICS ......................................................................................................... 193 THE TRADITIONS OF MYSTICISM .............................................................................................. 194 BODY........................................................................................................................................ 196 ENVISIONING ............................................................................................................................ 199 LANGUAGE ............................................................................................................................... 201 iii CHAPTER 5: THE IMAGE AND ENVISIONING IN THE MYSTICISM OF ANGELA DA FOLIGNO ........................................................................................................... 205 FEMALE FRANCISCANS ............................................................................................................. 205 ANGELA DA FOLIGNO ............................................................................................................... 206 CHAPTER 6: FROM IMAGE TO TEXT IN THE MYSTICISM OF MARGUERITE D‘OINGT ......................................................................................................... 241 THE WOMEN CARTHUSIANS ..................................................................................................... 241 MARGUERITE D‘OINGT ............................................................................................................. 242 CHAPTER 7: THE LOVER RAFFINNÉE OF COURTLY LITERATURE BECOMES THE SOUL ANIENTIE OF THE BEGUINES AND MARGUERITE PORETE ............................... 255 CONCLUDING THE DISSERTATION UNITING MYSTICAL AND FIN' AMORS WRITING .................. 255 THE BEGUINES AND THE HERESY OF THE FREE SPIRIT ............................................................. 256 The Tradition of Fin' Amors in Mysticism before Marguerite Porete ................................. 257 MARGUERITE PORETE .............................................................................................................. 267 CONCLUDING REMARKS ...................................................................................................... 281 BIBLIOGRAPHY ....................................................................................................................... 283 iv INTRODUCTION This study will explore new ways we can account for this sameness. I propose that though the love objects of troubadours and mystics are worlds apart—one found in the beyond and of a divine nature, the other found here on earth and all too human— the two érotiques, or ways of loving, do in fact share a common structure. I suggest that the similarities in the literature of mystics and troubadours can be explained most of all by the fact that both groups share a common understanding of the self and the common goal of dismantling the self before a superior being. A shared vocabulary of images, notions, and linguistic features sets out the connection. The first section of the dissertation will introduce the discourse of these two traditions as that of the fragile self. Part two will analyze how these images, ideas, and language are used to destabilize the centered self in the work of various troubadours, including Jaufré Rudel, Arnaut de Maruelh, Falquet de Romans, and Bernart de Ventadorn. Part three will look at these same elements in the works of the mystics Angela da Foligno, Marguerite d’Oingt and Marguerite Porete. The dissertation