“Wild for to Hold Though I Seem Tame”: The Paradox of the Phallic Female in Falconry Imagery

This chapter reconsiders the falcon’s dual aspect as female beloved and ruthless killing machine. By reimagining the famous female in Thomas Wyatt’s sonnet “Whoso list to hunt” as a falcon rather than a hind—as hunter rather than quarry—the chapter explores the paradox of the woman-as-weapon which volery makes possible in a way that venery does not. Drawing on literary material ranging from the European Middle Ages to the present, it explores the creative tensions to which this paradox gives rise. In her capacity as man’s hunting tool, the more “phallic” this female is, the better, putting some strain on the otherwise tired “taming” motif. The falcon must not be too tame. On the contrary, if she is to perform optimally, the falcon must retain an essential part of her wildness, and this necessarily problematizes the presumed heterosexuality of the falcon-falconer relation. As evidenced in William Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew, the falcon as ideal “weapon” must precisely be something the man cannot be entirely sure he controls, necessarily endangering any notions of the heteronormative. Likewise, as phallic female par excellence, the falcon gestures not toward women but to a third sex, necessarily endangering any notions of the gender binary.