But Tom, she made goodly court to him and bade him love her dear. Heavy
petting at least, at least in his dream.This behavior is typical of Celtic
fairy mistresses, and they go all the way. I admit it's problematic when
applied to the Queen, but so is the reference to Belphoebe's (Queen's)
sexual organs as "the virgin rose the daughter of her morn . . . lapped up
her silken leaves most chare . . . . let to flourish fair". My approach is
to take the text at face value and then admit there's a problem rather than
saying no the text can't mean what it seems to mean because then there
would be a problem. Maybe emphasis on "dream" is the way to solve the
problem: he dreamed they went as far as heavy petting at the least but who
knows how far they went in actuality, could we agree on that interpretation?
At 10:42 PM 7/17/2002 -0100, you wrote:
>It is almost certainly not from Lewis. I cannot imagine his saying anything
>like that, except as a come-on before an avalanche of counter-argument. I
>know none such. Just think of the indecorum for Spenser to suggest that his
>dedicatee had slept with her Arthur, or any one for that matter. "Pressed
>gras" is all he got. tpr
>
>Genevieve Guenther wrote:
>
> > Hello all --
> >
> > somewhere in the back of my head I can hear Lewis saying about the faerie
> > queene's nocturnal visit to Arthur something to the effect of "either she
> > was real or she was not; either they slept together or they did not."
> >
> > Clearly I've got the quotation wrong, since it's highly unlikely that
> > Lewis would use the locution "slept together," but I can't find the
> > reference either in my notes or in my Lewis texts. Does anyone recognize
> > my poor approximation, and could you tell me where it's from?
> >
> > With thanks,
> > Genevieve Guenther
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