FRINK Linked Data Fragments server

Matches in SemOpenAlex for { <https://semopenalex.org/work/W31585945> ?p ?o ?g. }

• W31585945 abstract "[1] In this essay, I am interested in how changing expectations of masculinity are reflected in the erotic text A Spy on Mother Midnight; or, the Templar Metamorphosed and parts two and three of that text, printed the same year, A Continuation of Mr. F--'s Adventures in Petty-Coats and A Further Continuation of Mr. F--'s Adventures in Petty-Coats(1748). (Throughout this essay I will consider the three parts of the text as one, as the letters are numbered continuously throughout. I will refer to the three parts of the text by the title of the first text, A Spy on Mother Midnight, and cite them parenthetically by letter and page number). This text is particularly useful for study of masculinity because it is published as standards of male friendship are shifting, and as ideal men are expected to govern their society and their more benevolently. Both the epistolary style of the text--it is written in series of six letters from one male friend to another--and its visible but suppressed violence reveal narrator straining against the new limitations on friendship and violence. Laura Thomason is the only scholar to address A Spy on Mother Midnight at length; her argument, like mine, is interested in the homoerotic elements of the text as well as its lack of violence. However, she argues that the text is light-hearted celebration of libertine sexuality, and that the sense of distance [created by the epistolary frame] and the tale's light tone obviate the need to punish Mother Midnight's characters or its readers for either their homoerotic or their pornographic interests (271). My reading, however, places this text and its second and third parts--which are crucial to an understanding of the text's homoeroticism and which are not addressed by Thomason--within larger context of shifting expectations of male friendship and masculinity, including decrease in the acceptability of individual violence, and argues that the epistolary frame itself calls attention to the same-sex desire at the base of all erotica. [2] Unlike much of the period's erotica which, as Karen Harvey notes, allowed men to look at sexually desirable male bodies, by placing these bodies in strictly heterosexual context: male bodies were craved for by women, revealed only to women, and responded only to women the unique characteristics of this text call attention to the very possibilities of male vulnerability and male same-sex desire that they should obscure (Majesty, 214). The narrator's own cross-dressing--which he undertakes in order to penetrate all-female spaces and to pursue resistant lovers to their private chambers--calls into question the very masculinity that his successful conquest of multiple lovers attempts to solidify. Indeed, though the narrator does manage to coax or trick many into bed with him, he also incites the desire of several men convinced by his dress that he's beautiful young woman. The narrator ultimately loses control over his performance; his own body becomes objectified and passive as he renders himself subject to men's advances and--through the letters he writes documenting his escapades--to his closest male friend's own sexual gratification. This epistolary frame simultaneously reveals the same-sex male desire that always lingers beneath erotica which vividly displays male sexual conquest for presumably male readership. The narrator's attempted performance of sexually dominant masculinity ultimately highlights the innate perversity of the insatiable libertine Englishman, as he disrupts gender boundaries which he cannot then reinstate. [3] Jason M. Kelly points out, using the exclusive, all-male associations of the Calves-Head Club and the Mendenham Monks as examples, that there was an active masculine libertinism through the mid-eighteenth century. These libertines still celebrated and reveled in specifically aristocratic privilege, but balanced those excesses with more polite interests; they represented a specifically Enlightenment form of gentlemanly association that valued knowledge--both classical and modern--as parallel to libertinism (794). …" @default.
• W31585945 created "2016-06-24" @default.
• W31585945 creator A5001695468 @default.
• W31585945 date "2012-09-22" @default.
• W31585945 modified "2023-09-24" @default.
• W31585945 title "Phallic Nationalism: Limits of Male Homosocial Desire in A Spy on Mother Midnight" @default.
• W31585945 hasPublicationYear "2012" @default.
• W31585945 type Work @default.
• W31585945 sameAs 31585945 @default.
• W31585945 citedByCount "0" @default.
• W31585945 crossrefType "journal-article" @default.
• W31585945 hasAuthorship W31585945A5001695468 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C10559345 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C107993555 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C11171543 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C121332964 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C124952713 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C1276947 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C142362112 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C144024400 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C15744967 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C17744445 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C199539241 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C25188466 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C2776445246 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C2778736484 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C2779103072 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C2780583480 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C42133412 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C52119013 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C521449643 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C77805123 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C94625758 @default.
• W31585945 hasConcept C95457728 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C10559345 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C107993555 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C11171543 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C121332964 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C124952713 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C1276947 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C142362112 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C144024400 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C15744967 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C17744445 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C199539241 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C25188466 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C2776445246 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C2778736484 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C2779103072 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C2780583480 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C42133412 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C52119013 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C521449643 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C77805123 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C94625758 @default.
• W31585945 hasConceptScore W31585945C95457728 @default.
• W31585945 hasIssue "56" @default.
• W31585945 hasLocation W315859451 @default.
• W31585945 hasOpenAccess W31585945 @default.
• W31585945 hasPrimaryLocation W315859451 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W101606748 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W130159371 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W131028208 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W1490227897 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W180419534 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W1935342290 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W1998211961 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2014262916 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2063572092 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2125065568 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2326661716 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2478063427 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2485007725 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W2525756255 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W303497743 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W340923941 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W41013580 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W4929419 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W1018655180 @default.
• W31585945 hasRelatedWork W1135587 @default.
• W31585945 isParatext "false" @default.
• W31585945 isRetracted "false" @default.
• W31585945 magId "31585945" @default.
• W31585945 workType "article" @default.