Consciousness, Literature and the Arts
Archive
Volume 12 Number 3, December 2011
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DiPasquale, Theresa M. Refiguring the Sacred Feminine: The Poems of John Donne, Aemilia Lanyer, and John Milton.
Duquesne University Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-8207-0405-0
Reviewed by
Theresa M. DiPasquale’s 2008 contribution Refiguring the Sacred Feminine: The Poems of John Donne, Aemilia Lanyer, and John Milton (which I will refer to it as Refiguring the Sacred Feminine from now on), carefully questions long-stable and historical beliefs of feminine divinity and spirituality that have been taken for granted by intellectuals and lay people alike since at least before the Reformation period. Using intertextuality as an interpretive method to her formalist analysis, DiPasquale attempts to “enrich readers’ understanding of specific works” as to how the three selected poets position divine femininity not as something to be abhorred and devalued but rather as the misunderstood underpinning of the entire Judeo-Christian church structure. She writes “My goal is to present illuminating new readings of poems that challenge twenty-first century orthodoxies as unflinchingly as they did early modern ones….” (5).
Refiguring the Sacred Feminine is densely written for an audience that is conversant and comfortable with biblical texts and religious studies and the three poets’ selected works. Not only is the content delivered in this dense fashion; it is divided into three main chapters for each poet. There is an introduction and a “coda” to conclude the work, along with extensive notes.
The main thrust of the Donne chapter is to show how Donne reconciled himself to being an acceptable bride for Christ while at the same time realizing his own masculine position. The difficulty being that divinity is cast as femininity, and Jesus sees mothers as more than a body subject to sin. In the second chapter, DiPasquale focuses on Lanyer’s work, pointing to ways in which this poet was clandestinely able to be a priestess and minister, and this is the duty of women. More, attention is drawn to interpretations of Solomon’s visits from the Queen of Sheba and the role of Pilate and Pilate’s wife in reversing and nullifying Adam’s complicity in Eve’s temptation. As such, woman is no longer subject to her husband as Genesis 3:16 dictates. Woman in fact is the bride of Christ and only can the church be redeemed through her. DiPasquale writes, “But woman in Ecclesia incarnate, the gentle woman who heals the wounds in Jesus’ body, feeds his flock, and proclaims his Word, she is the bride most faithful to her divine spouse” (162). Finally in the last chapter, DiPasquale reviews Milton’s work and concludes that he “praises …[woman’s] her dignity and spiritual luminosity” (223). Femininity is sacred, full of redemptive virtue, according to the interpretation here.
Providing a new reading of the sacred feminine is much needed and DiPasquale’s approach is unique. Allowing for ways to see the world constructed under a different paradigm is a challenging exercise. For example, to consider the constructed world from the point of view as woman being the sacred of the two genders, rather than the male being constantly exalted, for those enmeshed in traditional readings is difficult. However, even with this relief, some of the ideas presented are puzzling and destabilizing but they are likely useful for consideration. It would be monumental, albeit not impossible as was done with the Reformation, to revise the notions of gender that have come to form our western consciousnesses since documentation of the Fall, based on Eve’s failure.