Lent and Leaky Vessels in Chaste Maid

Lent and Festivity

A Chaste Maid in Cheapside takes place during Lent, traditionally a time of repentance, fasting, and atonement for the past year’s sins. Given these concerns, the actions of the play seem quite removed from the conventional Lenten ideals; this is a play glorying in sexuality, consumption, and monetary/material concerns that seem to belong in the realm of the carnival, not the period of penance that follows. For example, in Act 3 scene 2 Mrs. Allwit lies in her bed, surrounded by the female characters and the Gossips, to celebrate her daughter’s christening. The scene in the Allwit’s home is quite festive, and the christening a chance for the women to glut themselves on food and drink, much to Allwit’s disgust (3.2.58-63). What does the play suggest about this celebration and the notion of festival? What about fertility or femininity and the festive? The scene with the Promoters? In addition, the character of Sir Walter seems to follow the arc of the Christian cycle, reveling in carnivalesque concerns like sex, fertility, and money only to later repent and refrain from his former pleasures (and suffer for them in debtor’s prison). What are we to make of his character, especially considering that although he renounces his sinful ways, in doing so he leaves a wake of children and mistresses with no promises of future support?

“Leaky vessels” in Chaste Maid

Much like The Alchemist, Middleton’s play contains many examples of the grotesque female body. Especially in 3.2, the women are associated with liquids, both with the wine they consume and bodily functions. Gail Kern Paster has written of the characterization of women as “leaky vessels,” unable or too weak to control bodily functions (urination, menstruation, lactation). In this scene, many references are maid to the women’s leakiness [e.g.,“she cannot lie dry in her bed” (3.2.114), “She wets as she kisses” (181), “They have drunk so hard in plate that some of them had need of other vessels” (200-01), “What’s here under the stools? / Nothing but wet…/ Is’t no worst, think’st thou?” (218-220)]. What is the meaning of this emphasis on females and leaking? Paster discusses talking and gossiping as “leaky” as well, which are also evidenced in the scene. What is the relationship between “wet” women throughout the play and the male characters, especially a character like Sir Oliver Kix, who is “dry” (infertile)? How does the wet/dry motif function in other areas of the text?