Scabs and Sovereignty in the Franklin's Tale

Trauma studies concentrates on an originary event that is ignored but still haunts the present and future. It provides an approach that can help to clarify the complexities of the Franklin's Tale and Chaucer's sources for it. Reading this tale in conjunction with Pamphilus de Amore exposes how depictions of male woe can be highly manipulative, and how medieval depictions of heterosexual romantic love can embed structural inequalities, violence, and trauma. In arguing that the marriage in the Franklin's Tale functions as a sursanure, this article tracks the pain lying below a superficial show of contentment. Taking Dorigen as a test case, this article explores how Chaucer addresses-and textually redresses-the traumas of originary women by erasing the origins of their wounds while, at the same time, maintaining the consequences and voicing of that pain.