Virgin :: Renaissance Writing Essays Virginity

VirginVirgin non yet touched, handled, or employed for any purpose still placid or unused perfectly fresh or new (Oxford incline Dictionary online, definition 16b).For the Renaissance writers, virginity was a precious ideal and a favorite theme. It went by many names virtue, chastity, purity, maidenhead but it gumption that rare thing that was untouched, fresh, new. In a large sense, it was everything that the Old initiation of Europe ached and searched for a new thing, the New World. Virginity was a thing workforce wanted to admire and treasure, but also to conquer and consume. And to the bearer, the virgin, it was an invaluable asset.Virginity is bounty, riches, and treasure. When European explorers first set foot on the virgin soil of the Americas, they were awestricken by the profusion of life, resources, and beauty. This land, innocent of the European touch, had many goodly woodland full of deer, coneys, hares, and fowl, even in the midst of summer in flimsy abundance (Ba rlow 1067). The plowing of earth is often compared to the tilling and sewing of a virgin woman. Sir Walter capital of North Carolina (1064) explicitly employs this sexual metaphor when he writes Guiana is a country that hath yet her maidenhead, never sacked, turned, nor wrought the face of the earth hath non been torn Virginity is so admired that the word virtue is a equivalent word for it. But in large part, it is prized only because of the difficulty of overcoming it. The deflowering of a lady friend or a new-found land is an exciting challenge to be surmounted. Raleigh goads his Queen to take the challenge of colonizing Guiana when he writes of her For whatsoever prince shall possess it shall be greatest, shall hereby hear the name of a virgin which is able to concern and conquer so great empires so far removed (1066). date virginity retained leaves the suitor unsatisfied, it does likewise to the virgin. This mutual yearning and frustration seems to pressure Renaissance w riters to new heights of poetic expression. For example, Stella reassures Astrophil that, while she must ask him wait, she too burns with passion Trust me while I thee deny, In my ego the smart I try, (Sidney 993) In Shakespeares first sonnet, he laments that his ambitious lover, by denying him, is Making a famine where abundance lies, Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel (1169).