58 pages • 1-hour read
Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!: Voices From a Medieval Village
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Themes
Content Warning: This section of the guide features discussion of ableism, bullying, child abuse, death, child death, and graphic violence.
The Importance of Human Connection
Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! describes what it took to survive in the difficult period of the Middle Ages. Despite the overarching need to secure safety and sustenance, the characters actively seek out more meaningful connections with each other, and some of these narratives transcend class boundaries and religious differences entirely. By illustrating the many commonalities of the human condition, Schlitz provides a counterpoint to the harsh realities of medieval life.
Many of the author’s most philosophical points are implicit in the structure of the interwoven narratives, and several of the separate but interconnected monologues are specifically designed to highlight the importance of human connection. For example, Otho, the miller’s son, appears in the narratives of Mogg and Jack, and he is not described in a complimentary fashion. Like most of the other children, Mogg hates Otho because his father habitually cheats people of their grain, but Jack, who often finds himself ridiculed for his intellectual disability, forges a genuine, human connection with the miller’s son. Specifically, Jack draws upon his own experience of being beaten and empathizes with Otho’s similar injuries. He even goes so far as to put snow on the boy’s face in a gesture of tenderness, easing Otho’s pain and repeating soothing words to calm him.
In one of the few narratives that is meant to be performed by two actors, Jacob and Petronella’s interactions illustrate the theme of human connection from a religious angle. In the stage directions for this chapter, Jacob and Petronella are initially separated by the physical space of the river, and this placement indicates the abstract separations imposed by their different religions, as Jacob is Jewish and Petronella is Christian. Initially, the narrative form echoes their distance as Jacob speaks for a long period, followed by an equally long monologue from Petronella. However, as they begin to play together by skipping stones on opposite sides of the river, their lines alternate, and they begin to finish each other’s sentences. By the end of the narrative, they begin to speak almost the same words at the same time. In this way, Schlitz uses narrative structure and even typographical form to emphasize the potential for connection despite cross-cultural boundaries.
As these narratives illustrate, Schlitz emphasizes the importance of human connection in a way that shows the village’s interconnectedness despite the rigid social hierarchies that separate lord from villein. As the various characters bond over the harsh realities of life-and-death circumstances, Schlitz uses these examples to suggest that connection is a basic human need, and the drive to find it is a commonality that unites people regardless of their social backgrounds or economic circumstances.
Brutality of Life in the Middle Ages
Good Masters, Sweet Ladies! includes numerous details about the brutal aspects of life that were commonplace in the medieval era, and the author frequently portrays death as a commonplace aspect of daily life. However, the novel’s focus on this theme is complicated by questions of class, for those of different social positions had widely different experiences. At the same time, several of the narratives suggest that the brutality of life can function as an equalizer. As Schlitz lays out several different scenarios to consider, each new situation enhances the novel’s verisimilitude and advances Schlitz’s goal of presenting a varied and non-stereotypical view of life in the Middle Ages.
To this end, Schlitz determinedly represents death itself as a constant aspect of daily life. Most of the young narrators of the book have numerous (and intimate experiences) with death, and they treat the issue matter-of-factly despite their individual sorrows. More importantly, they speak about death as a quotidian part of life. For example, in Taggot’s narrative, her mother comments on the risks of “childbearing and child dying” (6), and Schlitz’s choice to present childhood mortality in the same breath with childbearing suggests that losing children was a common reality during this time frame.
While Schlitz pays homage to the universality of death, she also makes it clear that class differences affect individual outlooks on life and its many risks. For example, Hugo, as the lord’s nephew, is one of the wealthier characters in the book, and although he is deeply traumatized by the rigors of the boar hunt and by his fears of his uncle’s physical abuse, the crux of his problems lies in his need to “prove” himself in his uncle’s eyes, a much loftier issue than the hardscrabble existence of a lower-class character like Nelly. In her narrative, she matter-of-factly describes her father’s attempt at infanticide when she was born, and although it is clear that she considers herself lucky to be alive, the brutality of her family’s outlook reflects the dire pressures of abject poverty. Her father only considered drowning her because the family was “starving poor, and dreaded another mouth to feed” (75). By implicitly contrasting these two narratives, Schlitz suggests that although none of the characters can escape the brutality of their lives, its extremity varies greatly across classes.
At the same time, other narratives suggest that the universal difficulty of surviving in the Middle Ages is a great equalizer. This dynamic becomes most prominent when a commoner named Barbary reflects on the similarities between her life and the upper-class Isobel. Specifically, she notes that although her circumstances are drastically different from Isobel’s, neither of the girls will be likely to escape the dangerous realities of childbirth. As Barbary soberly observes:
The lord’s daughter,
will have to be married,
and squat in the straw,
and scream with the pain
and pray for her life
same as me (49).
Thus, although class differences dictate the specific challenges that the various characters must face, it is clear that difficult and dangerous circumstances are a reality of life for every voice in the narrative. In this way, Schlitz adds detail and realism to her multi-layered representation of life in the Middle Ages.
Parental Influence on Children’s Development
In the rigid and relatively static social structures of the Middle Ages, there was very little possibility for upward mobility or changes to a person’s profession or situation. With very few exceptions, the children in the narrative are preparing to take on the same roles as their parents, and Schlitz makes it clear that in addition to learning the skills of their trade, the children also tend to emulate their parents’ character traits, for good or ill.
A prime example occurs in Thomas’s narrative, which portrays a son self-consciously learning a parent’s trade so that he may carry on the family tradition. The narrative opens with the rhyming couplet, “My father is the noble lord’s physician, / And I am bound to carry on tradition” (18). With this sober declaration, Thomas demonstrates his awareness that he is learning medicine from his father in order to continue to serve the community in the same way. He notes, “With every patient that my father cures, / I learn more medicine” (18). Yet in addition to the details of medical practice, Thomas is also learning how to make sure that his patients pay for the benefit of the doctor's attentions, and he also embraces the duplicitous methods that his father employs to avoid being blamed for the deaths of his patients. In this narrative, Thomas learns both overt skills and implicit character traits from his father.
Notably, Otho’s narrative aligns with Thomas’s emphases upon the importance of carrying on family tradition. However, Otho is much more negative about the prospect, as when he notes:
Father is the miller
As his father was of old,
And I shall be the miller,
When my father’s flesh is cold.
I know the family business—
It’s been drummed into my head:
How to cheat the hungry customer
And earn my daily bread (27).
Just like Thomas, Otho is learning the practicalities of his trade, and it is clear that his father’s business practices leave much to be desired in the way of fairness. In a sharp contrast to Thomas’s optimism, Otho is resigned to the fact that he will eventually take over his father’s role as the miller. With Otho’s pragmatic reference to his father’s eventual death, the boy expresses a deeply jaded view of life, and when he complains about the family business being “drummed into [his] head” (27), the narrative suggests that he does not feel as positively as Thomas about the prospect of learning his father’s trade.
The pattern of children learning their parents’ trades is repeated in many of the narratives. Taggot is a blacksmith’s daughter, and just as Will is learning to be a farmer, Alice works as a shepherdess, Thomas as a doctor, Otho as a miller, Edgar as a falconer, Lowdy as a varlet, and Nelly as a sniggler. In one of the few key exceptions to this hereditary structure, Simon declares that he cannot follow in his father’s footsteps and become a knight, but even this change is a result of financial difficulties, not Simon’s personal choice. The only character to exercise a modicum of agency is the wayward Pask, who has run away in an attempt to avoid being a villein; unlike the other children, who resign themselves to their lot, he hopes to earn his freedom and learn a respectable trade.
Yet despite these individual variations, the narratives collectively emphasize the cyclical, preordained nature of life in the Middle Ages, for inn most instances, the children must become what their parents have always been—in both trade and character. As Otho notes, “God makes the water, and the water makes the river, / And the river turns the mill wheel / and the wheel goes on forever” (27).
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