ABSTRACT
In exploring aspects of mystical union with the divine in a lyric mode, the author Hadewijch, active probably in Brabant, and probably around the middle of the thirteenth century, is exceptional. Her oeuvre comprises forms which one might expect in religious writing, such as visions and discursive tracts, but it also includes a group of strophic poems which draw on secular literary traditions. Ovidian metaphors of love as warfare are common in northern French as well as Occitan and German courtly love songs. In focusing on the aspect of love service, Hadewijch therefore uses conventional Ovidian imagery to quite specific effect, especially where knighthood is strongly associated with the willingness to risk adventure. Within Hadewijch's strophic poems, the emphasis is on the hardship and precariousness of the journey. Hunger and satiety offer a third set of contrasting concepts through which such tension in articulating desire is explored within Hadewijch's songs.
