In reading the section of Boccaccio's On Famous Women titled 'Circe, Daughter of The Sun,' several details stand out to me about the characterization and description of Circe in comparison to contemporary texts such as Madeline Miller's Circe, published 2018. 

Unlike how Venus is described as "Queen of Cyprus" and Isis as "Queen and Goddess of Egypt," Boccaccio immediately describes Circe in terms relational to her male relation. Despite being of divine origin, Circe is given the title of daughter—product of and lesser being than her father. Madeline Miller takes the liberty of personifying Circe's father as Helios, Greek titan god of the sun. Alternatively, Boccaccio offers other potential reasons for why Circe is referred to as the daughter of the sun throughout myth, such as her "extraordinary beauty" and "great knowledge of herbs" (74). This refusal to identify Helios/The Sun is especially interesting. 

Boccaccio also insists that Circe is a celebrated figure and uses the example that the island of Circeo was named after her. Miller, on the other hand, uses her imagined narrative of Circe's life to express how un-celebrated she is throughout time. Unappreciated and neglected in her childhood, used and discarded in young adult life, Miller's Circe experiences none of the celebration spoken by Boccaccio. 

I struggled in my reading of this section particularly because I come from a very Miller-driven perspective of Circe and her life. There was something in particular that resonated with me when thinking of Miller's description of Circe's assault experience, however. Boccaccio writes "there are many Circes everywhere and many more men whose lust and vice change them into beasts" (75). Ignoring the misogynistic framework in which this quote is found, I think this is a very true statement and one that I might have ancticipated from Miller in the 21st-century. 

In My Secret, Petrarch describes a conversation between himself and Saint Augustine in which Augustine questions Petrarch about his biggest weakness---a desire for fame and recognition as a great and successful writer. Augustine argues that wanting glory and praise is a form of pride that ultimately stands between Petrarch and spiritual peace. What stood out to me is that, while Petrarch doesn’t fully argue back, he also doesn’t fully agree. He knows that caring solely about fame might be 'wrong,' but he clearly doesn’t want to give that up. This made my reading of the text feel more honest and human as Petrarch expresses his difficulty letting go of something that he truly cares about even though he understands it might not be good for him. 

In class discussion, it would be interesting to take time to discuss whether Petrarch truly wants to change or if he uses this text as a way to work through his thoughts and feelings, grappling with them as one might do in a diary or journal. Does he actually want to become more spiritually focused, or does he secretly value his ambition more? 

In Turner's The Wife of Bath: A Biography, Alison is the name consistently used to refer to the character of the Wife of Bath of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Something that I especially appreciated in this reading was the author's dedication to humanizing the character through the use of her name rather than her title derived from her social function and, moreover, her relational identity to a man (cough cough, her array of previous husbands). 

As opposed to 'The Wife of Bath,' the name Alison gives the character a personal identity and invites readers to consider her as a character with flaws, values, likes, and dislikes rather than a symbol for some larger literary or political structure. Turner’s consistent use of the name Alison reflects on her project of treating the character biographically, as someone embedded in history alongside real medieval women. Turner encourages us to read Alison's confessions, jokes, and memories as lived experience rather than satire or stereotype—a product of Chaucer. 

Irony is an aspect of Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales that connects many of the selected tales read for class --- namely The Pardoner's Tale and The Prioress's Tale. The Pardoner, at the beginning of his tale, announces to the group that his personal motto is "radix malorum est cupiditas" or "greed is the root of all evil." That being said, he goes on to describe the theft and fraud that he commits on a regular basis to trick faithful strangers into purchasing/giving alms to pig bones and other false relics. 

Similarly, to the Pardoner, the Prioress wears a golden brooch that reads "amor vincit omina" or, in English, "love conquers all" (Chaucer 11). However, the only love that the Prioress expresses in the selected tales is toward animals, to whom she is described feeding them better than most men are fed and weeping at their deaths. This stands in stark contrast to how she describes her fellow man---with hateful, smearing language. The Prioress acts in ways that directly contradict her 'motto' which directly parallels the Pardoner's hypocrisy in the previous tale. 

A modern phrase that came to mind in my reading of The Prioress's Tale was "there is no hate like Christian love" which, to my understanding, refers to the tendency of Christian religious institutions to reject or be unwelcoming toward minority groups like the LGBTQ+ community, pro-choice women, immigrants, or those belonging to another faith. I was especially reminded of the Prioress in her descriptions and treatment of Jewish people which was obscenely antisemitic compared to the previous readings. In her tale, she states that the Jewish community is directly influenced by Satan and that a "wasp's nest of Satan" resides within their community. 

A question that arose from this reading was in regards to Chaucer's intentions for the Prioress as a character. We know that Chaucer has the capacity for parody by looking at the tale of Sir Thopas. By viewing the Pardoner's Tale as a commentary on indulgences and corruption of the church, could we then view the Prioress's Tale as satirical literature poking fun at uneducated antisemitism? 

The image to the upper left is of Martha -- a devout character from Wake Up Dead Man (2025). She is who I pictured as the Prioress in my first reading. 

In Fit III of Gawain and The Green Knight, two hunting scenes are posed parallel of each other. One hunt, composed of the castle's lord and his courtly men, takes place outdoors and targets woodland prey. Meanwhile, within the home, the lord's wife conducts a hunt of her own. She approaches Gawain while he sleeps in his bedchambers, almost appearing to overpower him in such a vulnerable setting. 

As the hunting scenes parallel each other, so too do their spoils. The prey animals hunted each day in the wilds increase in size each passing day—beginning with a fox, then bore, then a doe. Meanwhile, the kisses and tokens of affection either demanded from Gawain or bestowed upon him also increase on a daily basis, beginning with one kiss and ending with four or more + a green and gold girdle. The lord's wife even refers to Gawain as "courtly game" which calls to mind scenes of a hunting party—one that is uniquely domestic or sexual in nature. The reference to game also has the potential to remind audiences of the game instituted by the Green Knight in Fit I during which he encouraged Gawain to slice off his head with an axe. 

This semester, I aim to use this portfolio to express my interpretations of class content in creative ways that reflect my personality as well as my academic pursuits.

This digital space is one that I have utilized throughout my HUST career, and I look forward to enriching the narrative of my portfolio through journal entries and other similar assignments in the upcoming months. Over the course of 6+ semesters, I have cultivated a rich online archive of human culture and literature. My goal for this portfolio with this semester in mind is to continue building my collection of information, readings, and experiences but also be able to see how my perspectives change over the course of these journal entries. 

I see this digital space enhancing my learning through the use of multimedia to make connections between my personal academic interests and the content discussed in class.