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The complaint of nature,
English, Latin (translation)
95 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1972
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 9, 2025
The modern reader will naturally have an aversion to the main idea of the book: homosexuality (and other sins more incidentally) is, in its very essence, unnatural. So proclaims Alain de Lille, the writer and narrator of this twelfth-century theological work. Yet as readers of historical works, we must attempt to quell our modern moral anger and go through the work with the intent of understanding it through the intellectual framework of the times. It is this attempt to understand alien modes of thought that is fascinating; the pliable nature of human cosmology, and (by extent?) human morality reminds us of the relativity of worldviews, including our own scientific but still deeply culturally entrenched one.
Very little is known about Alain de Lille. Born sometime around 1117, likely in the Flemish city referenced by his toponym, he attended the Third Council of the Lateran in 1179, taught at the University of Paris in the 1190s, and died in Cîteaux in 1202 or 1203. This is all that is known for certain. Other conjectures have been made by translators Fraçoise Hudry and David Rollo (the latter of which claims that Alain’s homophobia is a deliberate irony and that Alain is, in fact a homosexual, a theory which I find unlikely and perhaps overly reflective of our modern modes of thought), but the 1980 translation by James Sheridan remains the best to my mind (alongside a mammoth German edition by Johanner Kohler).
If calling the work ‘theological’ brings to mind a dry Thomasian style, then you might be surprised by the rich, evocative, and thoroughly visual writing of Alain. After the opening lamentation by Alain the narrator, Natura, the personified goddess of nature, appears teary-eyed. She is first described in great detail (amounting to thirty pages!): from the purity of her skin, to the stars and planets rotating around her diadem, to her rich multi-layered clothing, of which each layer represents an aspect of living creation, from marine life, to terrestrial life, to the plants, each aspect of her physical being respresents an aspect of her realm, of the domain of nature over which she rules. This is all allegorical. We are not to believe in a ‘goddess of nature’ in a pagan sense, but rather must see her as a personification of the Christian idea of nature. Nature is, in this context, first and foremost a reproductive, sexual, cyclical force under God, which produces like from like. Nature is the God-driven force which keeps species in existence. A fascinating passage vividly expresses this:
In other words, Natura, with her iPad, ensures that living beings, which are ephemeral by their very brief existence on earth, gain some form of physical permanence as a species. The metaphor is striking to the modern reader as it evokes a video: a stream of fleeting frames whose transience nonetheless gives rise to a continual whole. If the central aspect of nature is this perpetuation of the species, one can readily see in what way homosexuality Alain de Lille finds homosexuality problematic. He presents it as a logical and morail failing:
The barenness of the homosexual act is thus the central problem. It is not sexuality in general that is being condemned, however. Sexuality is, in itself, is not immoral; quite the contrary, as it is what perpetuates species. Natura herself is intensely eroticised: she is described as a fertile young maiden, accentuating her role as a producer of like from like. Mankind, by their vices, among which homosexuality, have violently torn the clothing of “their own mother”, and have thus forced her “to go like a harlot to a brothel”. It is tempting to read in this some form of proto-ecological thought, of the destruciton of nature by man, but this would be entirely incorrect.
So, should you read this work? Probably not, unless you are invested in the medieval understanding of nature, sexuality, and cosmology, in which case Alain de Lille in general is a rather interesting author.
Very little is known about Alain de Lille. Born sometime around 1117, likely in the Flemish city referenced by his toponym, he attended the Third Council of the Lateran in 1179, taught at the University of Paris in the 1190s, and died in Cîteaux in 1202 or 1203. This is all that is known for certain. Other conjectures have been made by translators Fraçoise Hudry and David Rollo (the latter of which claims that Alain’s homophobia is a deliberate irony and that Alain is, in fact a homosexual, a theory which I find unlikely and perhaps overly reflective of our modern modes of thought), but the 1980 translation by James Sheridan remains the best to my mind (alongside a mammoth German edition by Johanner Kohler).
If calling the work ‘theological’ brings to mind a dry Thomasian style, then you might be surprised by the rich, evocative, and thoroughly visual writing of Alain. After the opening lamentation by Alain the narrator, Natura, the personified goddess of nature, appears teary-eyed. She is first described in great detail (amounting to thirty pages!): from the purity of her skin, to the stars and planets rotating around her diadem, to her rich multi-layered clothing, of which each layer represents an aspect of living creation, from marine life, to terrestrial life, to the plants, each aspect of her physical being respresents an aspect of her realm, of the domain of nature over which she rules. This is all allegorical. We are not to believe in a ‘goddess of nature’ in a pagan sense, but rather must see her as a personification of the Christian idea of nature. Nature is, in this context, first and foremost a reproductive, sexual, cyclical force under God, which produces like from like. Nature is the God-driven force which keeps species in existence. A fascinating passage vividly expresses this:
With the aid of a reed-pen, the maiden called up various images by drawing on slate tablets. The picture, however, did not cling closely to the underlying material but, quickly fading and disappearing, left no trace of the impression behind. Although the maiden, by repeatedly calling these up, gave them a continuity of existence, yet the images in her projected picture failed to endure.
In other words, Natura, with her iPad, ensures that living beings, which are ephemeral by their very brief existence on earth, gain some form of physical permanence as a species. The metaphor is striking to the modern reader as it evokes a video: a stream of fleeting frames whose transience nonetheless gives rise to a continual whole. If the central aspect of nature is this perpetuation of the species, one can readily see in what way homosexuality Alain de Lille finds homosexuality problematic. He presents it as a logical and morail failing:
He [the homosexual man] hammers on an anvil which issues no seeds. The very hammer itself shudders in horror of its anvil. He imprints on no matter the stamp of a parent-stem: rather his ploughshare scores a barren strand.
The barenness of the homosexual act is thus the central problem. It is not sexuality in general that is being condemned, however. Sexuality is, in itself, is not immoral; quite the contrary, as it is what perpetuates species. Natura herself is intensely eroticised: she is described as a fertile young maiden, accentuating her role as a producer of like from like. Mankind, by their vices, among which homosexuality, have violently torn the clothing of “their own mother”, and have thus forced her “to go like a harlot to a brothel”. It is tempting to read in this some form of proto-ecological thought, of the destruciton of nature by man, but this would be entirely incorrect.
So, should you read this work? Probably not, unless you are invested in the medieval understanding of nature, sexuality, and cosmology, in which case Alain de Lille in general is a rather interesting author.
September 28, 2022
jfc with the lists
February 24, 2022
Everytime he claimed an animal didn't commit homosexual acts I went straight to the 'homosexual behaviour in animals' wikipedia page to see what percentage of wrong he was
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June 21, 2022Clever and weird medieval sex
October 2, 2025
Homophobic ass guy
July 13, 2014
The introduction was very in-depth and academic, perhaps not for all tastes. It also had a complete summary of the text, which I can advise future readers to go ahead and skip. Like most academic texts, it seems to footnote the things you don't need footnoted and not footnote some of the things you do, but that's the way it goes. The content is straightforward - Nature comes down to earth to whine about humans not doing as she intended, and this is an excuse to wax poetic on virtue and vice, most specifically on homosexuality, it turns out. What's fascinating is the depth of allusion in the content, and the mysterious glimpses into the mind of the author. Why is he so bent out of shape about gay sex? Why does he furnish Nature with a driver, since apparently he can believe a personification of Nature could take a chariot pulled by doves, but doesn't believe she could do so without an unnamed, unspeaking, never-seen-again-in-the-narative man to hold the reigns?
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews