Keith, 'Constraints of Desire. The Anthropology of Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece' URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/bmcr/bmcr-v2n01-keith-constraints 2.1.18, John J. Winkler. *The Constraints of Desire. The Anthropology of Sex andGender in Ancient Greece*. New York & London: Routledge, 1990. Pp. x, 269. ISBN 0-4159-0122-7; 0-4159-0123-5 (pb.). Rev. A.M. Keith The publication of this thoughtful and thought-provoking collection ofstudies makes an important contribution to debates in several fields ofclassical study: gender and culture studies, literary interpretation andcurriculum debate, social and religious history. The book falls into twosections with a central ``Interlude'': the first section, entitled``Andres'', is androcentric in its examination of the protocols whichconstrain male behaviour in ancient society, while the second section,``Gunaikes'', is gynocentric in focus. Winkler's interest in stimulatingdialogue informs each individual study and is reflected in the veryorganisation of the collection, since the two sections pivot around themediating ``Interlude''. Indeed, the single most exciting aspect of thisbook lies in its invitation to the reader to generate further discussion. Throughout, Winkler's prose style engages his reader as an active partner inthe narrative exposition of his argument. The introduction raises a number of theoretical issues which recur insubsequent chapters. Taking as his starting point a personal anecdote,Winkler proceeds to a scrupulous accounting of his own relationship to thematerial under study in a discussion that problematises the notion ofscholarly objectivity as it reinstates it. Such a procedure owes aconsiderable debt to the feminist credo that the personal is political, andindeed, an important stratum of scholarship in Winkler's study is feministanthropological theory. Thus he suggests that the task of the scholar is to``learn to see the various kinds of spin and misdirection that qualify themeaning of ... pronouncements [concerning sex and gender] in their fullsocial context, the unspoken stage directions that are understood but notvoiced by the social actor'' (p. 5). Such an approach -- requiring thatattention be paid to both text and the circumstances of textual production --aligns Winkler within the framework of post-modern debate about sexuality andgender, and points, in particular, to Foucault's pronouncement that instudying a culture's sexual protocols, the silences may be just as importantas (and possibly even more important than) the public statements.<<1>> Forthis reason, Winkler tackles not only texts which explicitly treat issues ofsex and gender, but ranges broadly over areas usually conceptualised byClassicists as widely disparate fields: ``ancient Greek oratory, vases,politics, magic, poetry and religious rites'' (p. 10). Winkler makes acogent and compelling case for a holistic examination of materials ``thattogether ... reproduce the variety of perspectives and experiences whichsingle approaches tend to simplify and iron out'' (p. 10). The first three chapters -- which constitute Part I, ``Andres'' --investigate the cultural construction of manhood and especially malesexuality in the ancient Greek world. Winkler is concerned to ask what kindsof texts and what parts of these texts we read in our attempts to interpretancient attitudes towards sex and gender. These questions invite us toconsider not only the limits which our own ideological positions impose onthis canon, but also the limits imposed by the body of texts whichaccidentally survive from antiquity.<<2>> Indeed, Winkler is concerned tointerrogate the texts themselves as representative of a peculiarly narrowideological position: It cannot be said too strongly or too frequently that the selection of book-texts now available to us does not represent Greek society as a whole. The social and editorial conventions within which most public speaking and published writing took place tended to give voice to a select group of adult male citizens and to mute the others -- female, adolescent, demotic (working persons with a minimum of leisure), metic (non-citizen). (p. 19)<<3>> Thus Chapter One, ``Unnatural Acts'', rejects the privileged position ofphilosophy in ``reconstructing a picture of ancient society'' (p. 19), andinstead employs the evidence provided by Artemidoros' Dream Analysis togenerate a broad picture of the varying social meanings of male sexual actsin antiquity. Chapter Two, ``Laying down the Law'',<<4>> traces thecharacteristics of the citizen hoplite and the kinaidos, whom Winkleridentifies as the two opposing poles within which Athenian upper class malesexuality was constructed and against which manhood was measured over theperiod 430-330 BCE. Of fundamental importance to Winkler's demonstration isthe potency of gossip and oratory as instruments of social control andpolitical manoeuvering, and in these findings he is in broad agreement withD. Halperin's essay ``The Democratic Body''.<<5>> The final chapter of thissection, ``The Constraints of Desire'', proposes a psychoanalyticinterpretation of ancient erotic magic spells.<<6>> Winkler suggests thatsuch spells tell us considerably more about the psychology of the (mostlymale) magic user than they can about the psychological state of the (mostlyfemale) victim, though he notes that they do indeed provide evidence in anindirect way of the social constraints exercised over the (usually female)victim of such spells. The mediating Interlude, entitled ``The Education of Chloe'', isstructured as a dialogue between Longus' second century CE novel Daphnis andChloe and Winkler himself in the role of ``a visiting anthropologist, whonotices problems which native experiences raise without directly addressing''(p. 104).<<7>> He then proceeds to read the novel as an account of ``thepain of sexual acculturation'' (104), focusing on the violence associatedwith Chloe's sexual initiation. I was particularly impressed by Winkler'sinsight into the pedagogic strategies of ancient literature propounded in abrief interpretation of the myth of Pan and Syrinx as it is related andre-enacted in a festival at D&C 2. 34-35 (pp. 119-120). Noting that ancientliterature has the pedagogical function of promoting and licencing violencedirected towards women in the patriarchal societies of the ancientGreco-Roman world, Winkler argues that narrative reinscribes culturallysanctioned violence against women even as it denies and conceals it. Such areading takes narrative seriously -- as humanities departments and universityadministrators all too rarely do -- as a powerful ally in the culturalconstruction of patriarchy.<<8>> Winkler's conclusion to this chapter facesthe issue squarely, and deserves quotation in full: And what does it finally mean? I find it hard to determine whether the well-concealed Longus had a fundamentally patriarchal attitude to Chloe -- that she is to be simultaneously protected and made to undergo a painful rite of passage--or the more critical stance I have outlined here. The former reading is implied by most of the modern critics who have noticed the violence at all ... But the larger methodological issue is whether readers should simply be trying to reproduce the author's meaning (if he had one -- that is, if he had one) as the goal... If our critical faculties are placed solely in the service of recovering and reanimating an author's meaning, then we have already committed ourselves to the premises and protocols of the past -- past structures of cultural violence and their descendants in the bedrooms and mean streets and school curricula of the present. This above all we must not do. (p. 126; cf. p. 19) Chapter Five is devoted to elucidating the central role played byPenelope in the plot of Odysseus' homecoming, which Winkler finds to be``stronger and more cunning ... than is often attributed to her'' (p. 130). He suggests that Penelope's role in Odyssey 17-23 be interpreted in the lightof evidence provided by anthropological studies of pre-industrialcommunities, which emphasise the constraints upon both male and femalediscourse as well as the constructive public use to which lies and deceptionare put in a scarcity economy (p. 134). Sensitive to the dynamics ofOdysseus' disrupted household and the resulting restrictions which limitPenelope's manoeuvrability, Winkler argues that she is constrained by thepresence within the great hall of the untrustworthy serving-women fromexplicitly admitting that she entertains the possibility that the beggar isOdysseus. This anthropological analysis of Penelope's actions iscomplemented by a narratological reading which makes use of moderntheoretical discussion of narrative ``secrecy''.<<9>> Winkler suggests thatPenelope colludes with the Homeric narrator in the interview scene of Odyssey 19 to focus our attention on Odysseus' tests of family and retainers, withthe result that the famous test of the bed in Odyssey 23 effectively tricksnot only Odysseus but also the poem's audience (p. 156). Thus Odysseus polumetis, the master-trickster ... is tricked -- not for the first time -- and so in a sense are we. For at that moment we realize that the entire telling has been one-sided, slanted in favor of Odysseus and his enterprises. (p. 158) These remarks lead, in the conclusion of this chapter, to a discussion of thephil-Odyssean stance of the poem (pp. 158-159; cf. 143),<<10>> and thesuggestion that a broadly androcentic bias, characteristic not only of theOdyssey but also of many subsequent readings of the Odyssey, has promotedinquiry into the behaviour of male agents even as it directs our gaze awayfrom the actions of female characters. The sixth chapter is a revised and expanded version of Winkler'spreviously published study, ``Garden of Nymphs: Public and Private inSappho's Lyrics''.<<11>> The newly revised examination of Sappho's poetryincludes greater theoretical discussion in a lengthened introduction, and aninteresting analysis of the sound effects of Sappho's poetry. It remains oneof the most exciting interpretations of the nature of Sapphic poetry. Thefinal chapter, ``The Laughter of the Oppressed: Demeter and the Gardens ofAdonis'', reviews the ancient evidence about the ``women's-only'' [sic ]festivals assembled by M. Detienne.<<12>> Winkler identifies a ``masculinistvision'' (p. 199) in Detienne's study and rejects such unself-consciouslyphallocentric criticism. Instead Winkler undertakes to reconstruct amultiplicity of possible female experiences at these festivals, and hissuggestions are always illuminating. Winkler consistently displays a greatsensitivity to feminist politics and explicitly articulates his concerns inthis area toward the conclusion of the chapter. The resulting account may, I fear, still be overly preoccupied with phallic issues of interest to men: instead of claiming that ``phallic men are central,'' as Detienne's account does, mine claims that ``phallic men are peripheral and their pretensions amusing.'' In both cases the focus is on men. And, in a sense, the energy of this essay has been directed as much or more towards Detienne as towards Demeter, and it may appear to some to be an undignified male squabble rather than the feminist exploration we would really like. But each scholar must contribute what he or she can to the corporate enterprise. (p. 206)<<13>> It seems to me that Winkler has indeed made a substantial contributionto Classical Studies -- without in any way compromising his feministprinciples -- in a book which all Classicists, whatever their particularfield of study, will find both useful and interesting. Winkler's commitmentto uniting an interpretation of what is said about sex and gender with anunderstanding of how all such utterances are culturally constrained,consistently generates new and provocative readings even of much-discussedmaterial. This exciting book will set the standard for debate in many areasof study and will undoubtedly stimulate a great deal of discussion in thefuture. A. M. Keith University of Toronto 1. P. Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, translated by R. Nice(Cambridge, 1977) [originally published in French as Esquisse d''une theoriede la pratique (Switzerland, 1972)]; M. Foucault, The History of Sexuality ,2 volumes, translated by R. Hurley (New York, 1978 & 1985) [originallypublished in French as La volente de savoir (Paris, 1976) and L''Usage desplaisirs (Paris, 1984).] On the significance of silence, see Foucault,History of Sexuality I, p. 27. Classicists have been quick to join in the debate: see P. Brown, The Bodyand Society: Men , Women and Sexual Reunuciation in Early Christianity (NewYork, 1988); D. M. Halperin, One Hundred Years of Homosexuality and OtherEssays on Greek Love (New York, 1989); D. M. Halperin, J. J. Winkler, and F.I. Zeitlin (edd.), Before Sexuality (Princeton, 1990); A. Richlin, TheGarden of Priapus (New Haven, 1983); and A. Rousselle, Porneia: On desireand the body in antiquity , translated by F. Pheasant (Oxford, 1988)[originally published in French as Porneia (Paris, 1983)]. 2. The heated canon-debate which has polarised other literature departmentsin the Academy in the course of the 1980's has barely begun in the field ofClassics, and will receive a welcome spur from Winkler's study. The problemsinvolved in distinguishing competing ideological positions in the study ofliterature are well set out by T. Eagleton, Literary Theory (Minneapolis,1983), pp. 17 - 53 and 194 - 217, and are pursued further in W. J. T.Mitchell (ed.), The Politics of Interpretation (Chicago, 1983). 3. On ``muted group'' theory and its relevance to gender studies, see S.Ardener (ed.), Perceiving Women (London, 1975); M. Crawford & R. Chaffin,``The Reader's Construction of Meaning: Cognitive Research on Gender andComprehension,'' in P. P. Schweickart & E. A. Flynn (edd.), Gender andReading (Baltimore, 1986), pp. 3-30; and C. Kamarae, Women and Men Speaking (Rowley, Mass., 1981). 4. A version of this study appears in Halperin-Winkler-Zeitlin (1990) at pp.171 -209. 5. Halperin (1989) 99 - 112; see now also the forthcoming study of V. J.Hunter, ``Gossip and the Politics of Reputation in Classical Athens'', inPhoenix 45.1 (1991). 6. A shorter version of this study will appear in C. A. Faraone & D. Obbink(edd.), Magika Hiera (New York, forthcoming). 7. A shorter version of this study will appear in B. Silver & L. Higgins(edd.), Rape and Representation (New York, forthcoming). 8. Cf. Chapter Six, pp. 164 - 165. On the prescriptive pedagogical use ofclassical texts in the post-classical world, see further M. Homans,``Feminist Criticism & Theory: The Ghost of Creusa'' Yale Journal ofCriticism 1.1 (1987) 153 - 182; and cf. D. Pope, ``Notes toward a SupremeFiction: The Work of Feminist Criticism'' in Women and a New Academy ,edited by J. F. O''Barr (Madison 1989), 22 - 37. 9. See, for example, F. Kermode on narrative ``secrecy'', in The Genesis ofSecrecy: on the Interpretation of Narrative (Cambridge Mass., 1979), pp.15, 23 - 47, and idem , The Art of TellingJ (Cambridge Mass., 1983) pp. 133- 155. 10. Cf. J. S. Clay, The Wrath of Athena (Princeton, 1983), pp. 34 - 38. 11. H. P. Foley (ed.), Reflections of Women in Antiquity (New York, 1981),pp. 63 - 89. 12. M. Detienne, The Gardens of Adonis: Spices in Greek Mythology,translated by J. Lloyd (Atlantic Highlands, N.J., 1977) [originally publishedin French as Les jardins d'' Adonis: La mythologie des aromates en Grece (Paris, 1972)]. 13. D. M. Halperin, in a discussion of the relevance of Diotima's gender tothe doctrine Plato has her propound in the Symposium [Halperin (1989) 113 -151 = Halperin-Winkler-Zeitlin (1990) 257 - 308], concludes with a similar(though lengthier) critique of male scholarly appropriation of feministtheory: see Halperin (1989) 149 - 151 [= Halperin-Winkler-Zeitlin (1990) 294- 298].