Criseyde: Negligence, Manipulation and the Lack of Willpower :: Essays Papers

Criseyde: Negligence, Manipulation and the Lack of Willpower We all know what it is like to be pressured into a relationship. Okay, maybe we don not ALL know what it is like, but most of the general dating population has had this experience. It works in this way: your friend Susan comes to you and tells you that your other friend Jim likes you, you never really thought about Jim in this way—but begin to think that there could be a little chemistry there. Susan loves playing matchmaker. She is persistent and will not stop until she gets what she wants. In the end, you wind up going on a few dates with Jim, but the relationship never really blossoms. This scenario sounds a little like the story about the forced relationship of Troilus and Criseyde, by Pandarus, in Geoffrey Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde. The only difference between my real life scenario and the relationship of Troilus and Criseyde is that when Criseyde finally falls for Troilus, which alleviates his ‘lovesickness’, she leaves him for another m an. And, although Susan was persistent, she never stood in the bedroom when you and Jim ‘turned off the lights.’ Criseyde changes her mind just after the reader is informed that Criseyde and Troilus are in love, and Troilus has become a better knight and a better man because of this love. Why would a woman leave after getting so emotionally involved in a relationship? As the text says, â€Å"For she began to turn her shining face/Away from Troilus, took of him no heed,/And cast him clean out of his lady’s grace,/† (st. 2, 179)—Criseyde simply turned her head from Troilus, taking â€Å"of him no heed† and moving on to Diomede. I believe that Criseyde was unjust in her actions, yet she was forced into the relationship due to two weaknesses that she possesses: her own negligence to the importance of the situation and a lack of willpower. Criseyde is (seemingly) manipulative, yet Pandarus very easily manipulates her at the same time. From the beginning, the reader realizes that Criseyde is not interested in a relationship, but her eccentric uncle does not take not ice.