Mon Oct 23 13:24:37 1995<BR>From: Zacharias.P.Thundy@nd.edu <BR> I thoroughly enjoyed reading Professor Martin Irvine's well-researched and ingeniously interpretative paper on Abelard'sgender-related problems.  On the rhetorical level I agree with the tenor of of the paper.  However, on the historical plane I have some serious reservations about Abelard's intentionality in his posturing in the Historia Calamitatum. Roscelin and Fulco corroborate (or the other way) Abelard's claim that he was castrated by the agents of Heloise's uncle.  If the story is true, then what I say below is all irrelevant.  Is the castration story true, physically speaking?  We know that Abelard was elected abbot  and ordained to the priesthood--because he was abbot he was a priest-- after his supposed castration.  How can a castrated person be ordained in defiance of the Canon Law?  If Abelard was validly ordained, then he was not castrated. The castration story certainly damaged Abelard's reputation, or he was metaphorically emasculated by the story more than by the surgical process.  Even if physical castration never took place, reputational castration took place.  In this sense, whatever Professor Irvine says is quite relevant.  Much of what Abelard says in the Historia is for selfpreservation and for avoiding any serious punishment from his enemies.  Perhaps he continued his affair with Heloise. perhaps not. In my perspective Abelard is not telling the whole about his personal life.  Maybe it is none of other people's business to know the truth about Abelard's personal and private life. Maybe that is what Ableard is telling us by making up or by not denying the story of his "castration." All that I say  does not imply that Abelard is a complete liar.  Not at all.  His ethical principle of intentionality could probably absolve him of any serious wrongdoing in the compilation of his autobiography.  Congratulations for a fine paper.  --zach Thundy<p>
 Thu Oct 26 11:05:23 1995<BR>From: Martin Irvine, irvinemj\@gusun.georgetown.edu <BR> Zach,<BR>I don't know anyone who has suggested that Abelard wasn't castrated by<BR>canon Fulbert's "kinsmen and relatives," as Abelard states in his letter.<BR>There is certainly plenty of troping on castration, emasculation, and<BR>victimization, as I pointed out, but the evidence is just too overwhelming<BR>for his actual, physical castration. Canon law may have prevented the ordination<BR>of castrates as priests and abbots most of the time, but there were always<BR>exceptions. Hugh of Lincoln, cited in my paper, was known to have been<BR>castrated, and a bishop and saint.<BR><BR>Abelard's letter isn't an "autobiography." The narrative of self in the<BR>letter has close affinities with Augustine's Confessions, but the whole<BR>letter is a rhetorical performance utilizing several genres and discourses.<BR>Speeches and certain description narrated are of course "made up", following<BR>the rhetorical rules for plausibility and truth. But the events narrated<BR>have reference to real-world material and political history, and I'm interested<BR>in the *representation* of that history in discourse. --MI<p>
 Sun Jul  7 18:26:48 1996<BR>From: jburkhol\@imperium.net <BR> This is a quite remarkable treatise, but I think one must somehow return to prehistory...perhaps even if this is impossible.  There must be a conncection between the specific mutilation of castration and other forms of mutilation (both self and otherwise).<BR>I have been impressed by the reflections of Walter Burkert in his Creation of the Sacred.  He has interesting thoughts about these various topics...even if they cannot be supported by hard research.<BR>  Thanks for your detailed research!<p>
 Fri Sep 27 14:15:19 1996<BR>From: Barbara Wendling--WENDLIB+aDET01%7332724\@mcimail.com <BR> Interesting essay, but is quality of mind, or as you put it, one's ability to penetrate other minds, gender-bound? Methinks not. In any case, Plato anticipated this thesis, albeit with less aplomb, in The Symposium.<BR>Best regards,<BR><BR>Barb