The rise and fall of Seigneur Dildoe: the figure of the dildo in restoration literature and culture

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dc.contributor.authorFriesen, Sandra A.
dc.contributor.supervisorMiles, Robert
dc.date.accessioned2017-01-23T21:04:45Z
dc.date.copyright2017en_US
dc.date.issued2017-01-23
dc.degree.departmentDepartment of Englishen_US
dc.degree.levelDoctor of Philosophy Ph.D.en_US
dc.description.abstractSeigneur Dildoe, as this dissertation will contend, was a fixture in Restoration literature and culture (1660-1700). But what was his provenance, by what means did he travel, and why did he come? This dissertation provides a literary history of the fascinating and highly irreverent dildo satire tradition, tracing the dildo satire’s long and winding progress from antiquity to Restoration England, where the tradition reached its early modern zenith. Adding breadth, context, and texture to existing treatments of the trope’s political and sexual potency, this dissertation investigates the dildo satire’s roots in both Greek comedy (Aristophanes, Herodas) and Latin invective (Martial, Juvenal), its influential association in early modern Italy with Catholicism and monastic life (Aretino), and its introduction in early modern England (Nashe), where it cropped up in the works of a surprising number of literary giants (Shakespeare, Jonson, Donne, Marvell). In Restoration England, we find in the satiric dildos of Butler, Rochester, and the contextually rich “Seigneur Dildoe” articulations of a dildo gone viral: the mock-heroic Seigneur deployed as a politically central motif symptomatic of its society’s acute patriarchal fissures. Throughout I argue that the dildo satire’s longevity is due not to a uniformity of purpose or signification (misogynist, anti-Catholic, emasculating, or otherwise), but to its innate versatility and ambiguity as a fugitive sexual and political figure. I also argue that what does in fact unite the satiric dildo’s variety of contingent ends, against what has been assumed in the scholarship, is its status as a markedly anti-Phallic figure.en_US
dc.description.embargo2018-01-09
dc.description.proquestcode0401en_US
dc.description.proquestcode0733en_US
dc.description.proquestemailmissmenno.sf@gmail.comen_US
dc.description.scholarlevelGraduateen_US
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1828/7750
dc.languageEnglisheng
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.rightsAvailable to the World Wide Weben_US
dc.subjectRestoration Englanden_US
dc.subjectClandestine satireen_US
dc.subjectPolitical satireen_US
dc.subjectDildo poetryen_US
dc.subjectFemale sexualitiesen_US
dc.subjectPhallocentrism in literatureen_US
dc.subjectBrazen womenen_US
dc.subjectDildo historyen_US
dc.subjectMasculinism and xenophobic discourseen_US
dc.subjectCatholicism and anti-Catholicismen_US
dc.subjectMisogyny and anti-misogynyen_US
dc.titleThe rise and fall of Seigneur Dildoe: the figure of the dildo in restoration literature and cultureen_US
dc.typeThesisen_US

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