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T H E F O C U S O F S A T IR E IN T H E S Q U I R E O F L O W D E G R E E BRYAN RIVERS St. Boniface College T h e late medieval romance usually referred to as The Squire of Low Degree has generally not fared well at the hands of critics. W. E. Mead, who com piled the standard edition, declared: “we can praise The Squyr of Lowe Degre only with considerable reservations, and do not seek a place for it among the great creative poems of the world.”1 Other commentators have tended to share this unenthusiastic perspective, being brief, hostile, or patron izing in their evaluations.2 A welcome exception to this trend, however, is a recent article by K. S. Kieman which views the work not as a flawed romance, but rather, as a witty satire of popular romance conventions. Kiernan observes, quite cor rectly, that the complete title of the work is Undo Your Door, Otherwise Called the Squire of Low Degree, and argues that “No intentionally serious romance. .. could have been called Undo Your Door.” 3 Viewing the work as a burlesque of popular romance readily resolves a great many problems of interpretation, especially with regard to the extraordinary behaviour of the princess. Unfortunately, by his own admission, Kieman deliberately limits the scope of his discussion, observing that “though humor pervades the poem a good deal of it is controlled by the knighting motif, and so, for clarity, I have limited my discussion of humor to those sections which relate directly and indirectly to the knighting ceremony” (346). Thus, while Kieman’s argu ment is convincing, its focus is arbitrarily limited. The present article argues that the poem’s satire embraces both lovers, and that the colophon Undo Your Door, with its obvious bawdy innuendo,4 indicates that the primary target of the satire is the sexual timidity of the princess rather than, as Kiernan would argue, the mercenary aspirations of the squire. From the outset the princess exhibits an ambivalent attitude towards her would-be lover. Although flattered to have a suitor, she is nevertheless intimidated by the thought of a sexual consummation. She attempts to mask her inhibitions behind the stylized posturings of courtly love, accepting the squire as a suitor but manipulating the conventions of the code in order to E n g l ish Studies in C anada, vii, 4, December 198 keep him at a respectful distance. Thus most of the poem’s somewhat sar donic humour is derived from the ongoing disparity between her romantic declarations and her pragmatic behaviour. The satiric treatment of the princess is further reinforced by the poetic justice of the conclusion where she is unexpectedly forced into a marriage which she had thought to evade through the imposition of a formidable quest of several years’ duration. The context of the first meeting of these unlikely lovers symbolically illus trates the basic dynamics of their relationship. The squire is associated with the vitality of the natural world. He is discovered in an arbour “fayre and gaye” (103) which is itself an image of natural fecundity replete with over sixteen varieties of trees and nineteen species of birds which sing “wyth notes clere” (61). The princess, by contrast, is confined within her chamber, “Closed well with royall glas” which is “Fulfylled . . . with ymagery” (94-95). She is an outsider viewing the world, quite literally, through rose-coloured glass, being a romantic spectator of, rather than a participant in, the cycle of Nature. From her window the princess overhears the squire lamenting and enquires after the cause of his distress. He politely, yet desperately, declares his love for her, and she accepts him as suitor immediately, declaring: “Though I for thee should be slayne / Squyer, I shall the love agayne” (153-54). How ever, the remainder of her speech radically qualifies this initial enthusiasm as she seeks to intimidate and distance her aspirant lover. Firstly, he must remain silent: “If ever ye wyll come to your wyll, / Here and se, and holde you styll” (159-60). Secondly, she warns him of the...
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