The “Mighty Voice of Gandersheim”: Hrotsvit’s Didactic Motivation in Her Plays

Abstract

The monastic author of the Saxon Imperial abbey of Gandersheim, Hrotsvit of Gandersheim was a notable woman playwright during the reign of Otto I, who had been crowned Roman emperor by the Pope in 962. Hrotsvit subverts notoriously misogynistic medieval literature and the negative literary depiction of women in her plays composed in the middle of the 10th century. She substitutes the masculine tradition and pagan writers’ themes of shameless indecency of lascivious women with saintly women who verbally and intellectually defeat the male oppressors. Transfiguring the earlier depictions, she is devoted to evangelizing of the world and committed to reorienting the dramatic representation of women. Furthermore, she identifies herself with an educator and moralist and discloses an assertion of intention to constructs a didactic persona. This study analyzes Hrotsvit’s plays Dulcitius and Sapientia by discussing the ways in which Hrotsvit defies the literary conventions in male-authored narratives through her female characters, who simultaneously defy and subvert the male authority through rhetorical skills, moral and intellectual ability, and Christian wisdom. The aim of this study is to show that Hrotsvit elevates the depiction of women and to serve God and spiritual ends by writing.