Robert Herrick and the Ambiguities of Gender

Abstract

Robert Herrick wrote hundreds of poems about real or imagined women. It is generally conceded that his many fresh and fragrant mistresses were purely imaginary, but understanding how he constructs gender is vital in developing an accurate view of his poetic art. Modern criticism often depicts Herrick as a propagandist for the received standards of his day, yet close examination of his texts reveals that he recognized the ambiguities of gender and the inconsistencies of his era's beliefs pertaining to women, disrupted and interrogated them, and often engaged in outright parodie critique of accepted seventeenth-century gender mores. The stance Herrick takes in relation to gender issues is rooted in the double-coding of female presence that already existed in the English Renaissance. On one hand stood the traditional Christian idea that women should