OK, here goes. This is specific to the Katherine Group
Seinte Margarete, and is acknowledged to be speculative. I
started by worrying about Margaret's patronage of
childbirth, and the implicit analogy between childbirth and
her emergence from the dragon: so a woman would not only
have to identify with the dragon but expect to be burst
apart. I still can't see what women might have got out of
this. However, Katherine Group texts distinguish
consistently between female bodies and virgin bodies:
virgin bodies (I'd argue, and do elsewhere at length) are
actively produced in the course of the legend. The
dragon's often read as a masculine sexual oppressor on the
grounds of sexual symbolism - long pointy tongue - but if
we're going to take sexual symbolism into account, it
doesn't pierce, but engulf her. So I read the dragon here
as representing the abject female body - Margaret's, or her
mother's - from which the virginal body is born. It is
referred to by masculine pronouns, but then there is some
doubt as to whether it's an actual beast or a demon in the
form of a dragon, in which case it doesn't have a secure
gender identity, demons' sex-changing ways being
well-known, and can manifest into whatever is most
demonically convenient for it.
And yes, I'm sure you could make an analogous case for
Jonah's whale.
On Mon, 2 Oct 2000 23:41:51 +0100 John A W Lock
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Oh the power of words!
> It seems that beauty is not the only thing that rests in the eye of the
> beholder...
> If only the whole world was so open to perception ...
> we wouldn't have to read those boring old texts at all. However I'm not
> being fair. I assume that you mean the state of being a dragon generally?
> Like the state of being a ship?
> I can understand dragons being male or female in mediterranean-type
> languages, but what happens with the Germanic where they have the 'it'
> option?
>
> What can you make of Jonah and his whale? Isn't that exactly analagous?
>
> regards
>
> john a w lock
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Sarah Salih <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Monday, October 02, 2000 9:57 AM
> Subject: Re: gendered dragons & st margaret of antioch
>
>
> > Margaret's dragon does usually seem to be male, though as I
> > said in a previous message, I think there's sometimes a
> > case for reading it as symbolically female. The person
> > who's written the St George book is Sam Riches: the book id
> > forthcoming from Sutton.
> >
> > On Sun, 1 Oct 2000 11:03:56 -0000 "John A.W.Lock"
> > <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > From: <[log in to unmask]>
> > > To: <[log in to unmask]>
> > > Sent: Saturday, September 30, 2000 3:17 PM
> > > Subject: gendered dragons
> > >
> > > <snip>
> > >
> > > > what about St. Margaret and
> > > > dragon (i.e. the one she emerges from)? are there any
> > > > indications whether this beast is thought of as male
> > > > or female?
> > >
> > >
> > > according to one version I've seen (BL Stowe 611) and others by
> quotation
> > > and repute definitely male. Nothing funny about St. Margaret. 'Mon
> frere
> > > Ruffi' (aka Rufus) as described by fiend No.1.
> > >
> > > ... I was on the verge of putting in a plea for the male dragons before
> > > they were entirely erased from the collective historical/mythological
> > > consciousness by the airbrush of female assertiveness...
>
> > > regards
> > >
> > > john a w lock
> > >
> > >
> > > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
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