Cross-dressing in literature

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Cross-dressing
History of cross-dressing
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Mr. Rochester disguised as a Gypsy woman sitting at the fireplace. Illustration by F. H. Townsend in the second edition of Charlotte Brontë's 1847 novel Jane Eyre.

Cross-dressing as a literary motif is well attested in older literature but is becoming increasingly popular in modern literature as well.[1] It is often associated with character nonconformity and sexuality rather than gender identity.[2]

Analysis and function of the motif

Female characters who cross-dress as men are also frequently portrayed as having done so to attain a higher social or economic position, a phenomenon known as the

social progress narrative.[3] Assuming a male identity allows them to travel safely, pursue jobs traditionally only available to men, and find heterosexual romance by breaking away from the all-female social world of the private sphere during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.[3] These characters are generally described as heroic, courageous, and virtuous.[2] Craft-Fairchild (1998) argues that the motif of female-to-male cross-dressing symbolizes women's discontent with their relegation to the domestic sphere of society. However, the discovery of the characters' assigned sex is often met with disapproval, indicating the endurance of traditional expectations of femininity.[2][3]

Male-to-female cross-dressing is much less common in literature, and it is often used for comedic value or as a form of punishment for a male character. When it does appear, characters are often negatively feminized or portrayed as villains, in contrast to the heroism among female-to-male cross-dressers. The most well known example of this concept is the wolf from Little Red Riding Hood.[4] Male-to-female cross-dressing is also almost always more closely linked to a character's sexuality and that of their partners than in female-to-male cross-dressing.[3]

The following is a partial list of literary works that address the motif of cross-dressing:

Ancient and medieval literature

In the myth of the Trojan War, Achilles' mother Thetis wanted to keep him from joining the Greek forces (and thus dying in battle as was prophesied), so she dresses him in women's clothes and hides him among a cloister of women. When the Greek envoy arrives to fetch him for battle, Odysseus is suspicious of Achilles' absence and concocts a scheme to reveal the deception: he offers gifts to all the women, including among them a sword and shield. Then he has an alarm sounded, and when Achilles instinctively grabs the weapons to defend himself, the ruse is revealed and he must join the Greek army and fight at Troy.

In Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, Bradamante, being a knight, wears full-plate armor; similarly, Britomart wears full-plate armor in Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene. Intentionally or not, this disguises them as men, and they are taken as such by other characters. In Orlando Furioso, Fiordespina falls in love with Bradamante; her brother Ricciardetto disguises himself as his sister, dressing as a woman, persuades Fiordespina that he is Bradamante, magically changed into a man to make their love possible, and in his female attire is able to conduct a love affair with her.

Early modern literature

Several of William Shakespeare's works include cross-dressing. Shakespeare made substantial use of cross-dressing for female characters who took on masculine clothing to carry out actions difficult for women. Relevant examples include:

  • Cymbeline (c. 1611) in which Cymbeline's daughter Imogen dresses as a page and calls herself "Fidele".
  • In
    Portia
    and her maid dress as men to plead in court on the merchant's behalf, and are quite successful in their ruse; in the same play, Shylock's daughter Jessica dresses as a man to elope with her Christian lover.
  • When Rosalind and Celia flee court in As You Like It (c. 1599), Rosalind dresses, for their protection, as a man. However, as a way to further complicate the situation for comedic effect, Shakespeare has Rosalind's male character "Ganymede" dress as a woman to help a male friend, Orlando de Boys, practice wooing Rosalind, with whom he is smitten, while at the same time fending off the affections Phoebe has for "Ganymede". In other words, it is a man, (the actor), dressing as a woman, dressing as a man, dressing as a woman.

Belle-Belle ou Le Chevalier Fortuné (1698), a fairy tale by Madame d'Aulnoy in which the female protagonist, Belle-Belle, disguises herself as a male knight to help the ruler of her kingdom defeat an emperor.

Edmund Spenser's The Faerie Queene (1590-1596) includes a long section about Britomart, who dons male armor, falls in love with a woman, and has many adventures as a man.

Theophile Gautier
(1834) in which the eponymous heroine dresses as a man to discover what men are like when not in the company of women before she gets married.

In

Arcadia (1593), Sir Philip Sidney
has one of the heroes, Pyrocles, disguise himself as an Amazon called Zelmane in order to approach his beloved Philoclea.

Don Juan (1819–1824), had Don Juan disguised as a woman in a harem
.

Modern literature

See also:
List_of_wartime_cross-dressers § As_a_major_plot_device_in_fiction

"The current popularity of cross-dressing as a theme in art and
criticism represents, I think, an undertheorized recognition of the
necessary critique of

binary thinking
, whether particularized as
male and female, black and white, yes and no, Republican and
Democrat, self and other, or in any other way."
—Marjorie Garber, 1991[1]

In

Huckleberry Finn
disguises himself as a girl at one point in the novel, not very successfully.

In Anthony Powell's From a View to a Death (1933), Major Fosdick's penchant for going to his room and donning a black sequin evening dress and a large picture-hat ultimately leads to his unraveling.

In

crossdressing during wartime
.

In Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (1954-1955), Éowyn disguises herself as man under the name Dernhelm to fight in the Battle of the Pelennor Fields outside the city Minas Tirith, and confronts the Witch-King of Angmar, Lord of the Nazgûl.[5]

In Tamora Pierce's The Song of the Lioness series (1983–1988), the main character, Alanna, disguises herself as a boy for eight years in order to become a knight.

In

postmodern poetry collection Empire of Dreams
(1988), the heroine Mariquita Samper is a cross-dressing Macy's makeup artist who plots a literary revolution to kill the narrator.

As a theme

  • These Old Shades by Georgette Heyer (1926); historical novel. During the reign of Louis XV, a girl disguises herself as a boy.
  • 1745 Jacobite Rising
    .
  • The Corinthian by Georgette Heyer (1940); historical novel. In which a young woman disguises herself as a boy in order to escape an unwanted marriage to her cousin.
  • The Famous Five
     book series (1942) - Georgina wears boy's clothes, prefers to be called "George" and is pleased to be mistaken for a boy.
  • The Rose of Versailles (1972) - The female protagonist, Oscar François de Jarjayes, dresses as a man, but privately acknowledges her feminine side.
  • Johnny, My Friend (a translation of the Swedish novel Janne, min vän from 1985) - Johnny is a girl disguising as a boy.
  • Song of the Lioness
     - The main character, Alanna, disguises herself as a boy to become a knight.
  • Soldier's Secret - A fictional retelling by Sheila Solomon Klass of Deborah Sampson's life, who disguises herself as a soldier during the Revolutionary War.
  • Sano Izumi attends.[6]
  • Boy2Girl (2004) by Terence Blacker - Sam, the main character Matthew's male American cousin, is dared to go to school disguised as a girl as a challenge to prove himself to Matthew and his friends. However, the prank doesn't turn out the way it was planned.
  • The Outlaws of Sherwood (1988) by Robin McKinley - A young girl disguises herself as a boy and joins Robin Hood's band of outlaws.
  • Rowan Hood: Outlaw Girl of Sherwood Forest (2002) by Nancy Springer - A girl dresses as a boy to find her father, the famous outlaw Robin Hood.
  • Ouran High School Host Club series by Bisco Hatori - a female student masquerades as a boy to earn extra cash.
  • Princess Princess series by Mikiyo Tsuda - a young male student is invited to join an elite club at his new school whose members dress like girls.
  • Monstrous Regiment (2003) by Terry Pratchett - After her brother vanishes, Polly Perks dresses up like a man to find him.
  • Leviathan (2009) by Scott Westerfeld - Deryn Sharp, a young girl, dresses up like a man so she can join the British Air Service.
  • The Pearl that Broke Its Shell (2014), a novel by Nadia Hashimi - Rahima, an Afghani girl in 2007 needs to adopt the ancient custom of bacha posh that allows girls to dress and be treated as boys until they are of marriageable age in order to take care of herself and her sisters. A century earlier, her great-aunt, Shekiba, left orphaned by an epidemic, saved herself and built a new life the same way.
  • Yentl the Yeshiva Boy (1983) by
    Talmudic Law
    .

As a minor plot element

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "from Vested Interests: Cross-dressing & Cultural Anxiety (1991)", Marjorie Garber, 1991. Retrieved 21 September 2011.
  2. ^
    S2CID 162232302
    .
  3. ^
    ISBN 978-0520270626
    .
  4. ISBN 978-1610692533
    .
  5. ISBN 978-0-415-86511-1
    .
  6. ^ Peralta, Ederlyn (June 10, 2014). "Live-Action Korean & Taiwanese Adaptations of Manga You Might Not Know About". Anime News Network. Archived from the original on October 27, 2018. Retrieved August 6, 2021.

Further reading

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