the physical constraints of tight dress and its accessories as signs of their commitment

whereby a man might hold love and serve love well and loyally. Ovid's book, the one in
which he instructs lovers how to contnil their love, was being thrown by Venus
into a fire, and she was excommunicating ail those who ever perused this book
or followed its teachings.)
VCIiile this often quoted passage does not consider tight dress specifically, it does
illustrate Marie's interest in expressing the positive effects of tightness in a way
that contrasts with Ovid's. Critics are largely in agreement that Venus burns die
Remedia amotisf a text which promotes love as a restrairiing force that encumbers
the lover. In order to assuage physical pain, Ovid teaches men how to 'control
ruinous passions' and free themselves from the restraints of love by rejecting
It altogether.*' In a prelude to persuade the lover to abandon pains caused by
love, the Remedia amnris repeatedly draws attention to metaphors t)f burdening
- whether by yoke, chain, or rod - and to the reprieve upt)n freeing oneself
from love's excruciating hold on the body.''- Ovid highlights the lover's pleasure
in escaping metaphorical chains of love: 'opdmus Ule sui vindex, laedentia pectus
/ vincula qui rupit, dedoluitque semel' (lines 295f.; 'he best wins freedom for
himself whi) has burst the bonds that hurt his soul, and once for all o'ercome
the smart"). Ovid's lover, bridled with emodonal discomfort, learns first to loathe
what he initially desired and then to seek Hberadon from his bonds. In this case,
the classical poet employs the language of restraint, which invites infidelity in love.
Marie, too, expresses lovesickness in a similar way, but she ultimately understands
the by-products of restraint differently. Instead of rejecting feelings of selfdiscipline
and doing away with love, Guigemar and his lady adopt the physical
constraints of tight dress and its accessories as signs of their commitment.
104 MEDIUM JEvxm LXXVII.j
Like Ovid, Marie draws upon language that describes psychological pains
of love that act upon the body in visible ways: Guigemar's physical appearance
betrays internal suffering when his lovesickness registers externally as 'la dotur
/ dunt il ot pale la colur' (lines 423f.; 'pain that drained colour from his face").
Likewise, the !ady feels 'cum Amur la destreineit' (line 420; 'how love constricted
her"), a point first made clear by the couplet 'senteit' (line 419; 'felt") and
'destreineit' (line 420; 'constricted'), and then reiterated when Marie explains
that the lady 'Veill  aveit, de ceo se pleint; / Ceo fet Amur, ki la destreint' (lines
429f.; 'had been awake all night; that was her complaint. It was the fault of love,
pressing her hard'). The lady's anguished physical demeanour, which results
after 'amur la destreineit' (line 420; 'love oppressed her'), reveals her passion
for Guigemar as a constrjctive force and encourages the commonplace reading
that links interior love wounds with physical oppression.

Marie adopts and adapts Ovid's binding metaphors to her own purposes,
thereby modifying convention in order to propose that lovers should incorporate
control uito courtship. Her elaboration suggests that erotic love can exist for
a couple if the individuals remain estreitement hende' (line 373; 'tightly bound') in
dress, unUke Ovid, who wishes to manage love by eradicating it entirely. She
affirms her kind of love, which is controlled and restricted but still erotic, in the
rhv-ming couplet 'tenir' and 'servir' that describes Venus teaching 'cumcnt hom
deit amur tenir / B lealment e bien servir' (lines 237f.; 'how a man should hold
love and serve it well and loyally"). Love holds ('tenir') the body in a way that
should convey the commitment between the lovers to serve ('servir') each other.
Marie's immediate turn to ' I ^ livre Ovide, ou il enseine / Comment chascuns
s'amur estreine' (lines 239f.; 'rhe book of Ovid in which he teaches how one
should control love*).

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