Carolyne Larrington
- Published in print:
- 1993
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198119821
- eISBN:
- 9780191671210
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198119821.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Poetry
This is a comparative study of Old Icelandic and Old English wisdom poetry. It examines problems of form, unity, and coherence, and how the genre responds to social change, both reflecting and ...
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This is a comparative study of Old Icelandic and Old English wisdom poetry. It examines problems of form, unity, and coherence, and how the genre responds to social change, both reflecting and shaping the thinking of the communities that originate it. The author analyses the differences between the pagan wisdom of Norse, ranging through everyday practical advice, rune magic, and spells, and the Christian, socially oriented ideals of Old English wisdom poetry, strongly rooted in Christian concepts of ‘natural’ order and hierarchy in God’s Creation. Close reading in primary texts, both runic and magical, lays bare the skilful, structural integration of pragmatic, social wisdom with other kinds of knowledge. The book explores the possibility of Christian influence on Norse texts and demonstrates the impact of Christian learning on the ancient pagan genre. The existence of a gnomic ‘key’ in Norse and English narrative verse is also shown. Far from being platitudinous moralizing, the wisdom poets of the two literatures reveal themselves as comic, ironic, dramatic, and grandiose by turns, exploring a gamut of themes unequalled in any other genre of the period.Less
This is a comparative study of Old Icelandic and Old English wisdom poetry. It examines problems of form, unity, and coherence, and how the genre responds to social change, both reflecting and shaping the thinking of the communities that originate it. The author analyses the differences between the pagan wisdom of Norse, ranging through everyday practical advice, rune magic, and spells, and the Christian, socially oriented ideals of Old English wisdom poetry, strongly rooted in Christian concepts of ‘natural’ order and hierarchy in God’s Creation. Close reading in primary texts, both runic and magical, lays bare the skilful, structural integration of pragmatic, social wisdom with other kinds of knowledge. The book explores the possibility of Christian influence on Norse texts and demonstrates the impact of Christian learning on the ancient pagan genre. The existence of a gnomic ‘key’ in Norse and English narrative verse is also shown. Far from being platitudinous moralizing, the wisdom poets of the two literatures reveal themselves as comic, ironic, dramatic, and grandiose by turns, exploring a gamut of themes unequalled in any other genre of the period.
T. M. Charles-Edwards
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780198217312
- eISBN:
- 9780191744778
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198217312.003.0021
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Medieval History
The history of Welsh vernacular literature before the twelfth century suffers from a lack of dated texts. A further problem is the extent to which the close links with other British lands and with ...
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The history of Welsh vernacular literature before the twelfth century suffers from a lack of dated texts. A further problem is the extent to which the close links with other British lands and with Ireland shown by Welsh Latin learning were replicated in the vernacular. A comparison between Welsh and Irish metrics suggests that, even in the vernacular, both countries formed part of one cultural province; the presence of the same metrical features in Insular Latin offers one channel through which this may have been sustained. Three case‐studies are used to show the role of poetry: two poems, Edmyg Dinbych and Echrys Ynys may be datable on historical evidence, as is Armes Prydein Fawr, discussed in chapter 10. The third, the dialogue between Llywarch Hen and his son Gwên, followed by the lament for the death of Gwên, has been dated to the ninth century and illustrates the respective roles of verse and prose.Less
The history of Welsh vernacular literature before the twelfth century suffers from a lack of dated texts. A further problem is the extent to which the close links with other British lands and with Ireland shown by Welsh Latin learning were replicated in the vernacular. A comparison between Welsh and Irish metrics suggests that, even in the vernacular, both countries formed part of one cultural province; the presence of the same metrical features in Insular Latin offers one channel through which this may have been sustained. Three case‐studies are used to show the role of poetry: two poems, Edmyg Dinbych and Echrys Ynys may be datable on historical evidence, as is Armes Prydein Fawr, discussed in chapter 10. The third, the dialogue between Llywarch Hen and his son Gwên, followed by the lament for the death of Gwên, has been dated to the ninth century and illustrates the respective roles of verse and prose.
Carolyne Larrington
- Published in print:
- 1993
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198119821
- eISBN:
- 9780191671210
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198119821.003.0008
- Subject:
- Literature, Poetry
This chapter examines gnomes in Old English and Old Norse narrative verse. It analyses Beowulf, Andreas, and Gudlac to determine the type of gnomes used and the various functions they perform in a ...
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This chapter examines gnomes in Old English and Old Norse narrative verse. It analyses Beowulf, Andreas, and Gudlac to determine the type of gnomes used and the various functions they perform in a narrative verse. The findings reveal that gnomes were used to express themes of courage, kingship, and loyalty and that they may be spoken by characters or the narrators within the poem.Less
This chapter examines gnomes in Old English and Old Norse narrative verse. It analyses Beowulf, Andreas, and Gudlac to determine the type of gnomes used and the various functions they perform in a narrative verse. The findings reveal that gnomes were used to express themes of courage, kingship, and loyalty and that they may be spoken by characters or the narrators within the poem.
Katharine Hodgson
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197262894
- eISBN:
- 9780191734977
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197262894.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Poetry
This book is an examination of a poet whose career offers a case study in the complexities facing Soviet writers in the Stalin era. Ol′ga Berggol′ts (1910–1975) was a prominent Russian Soviet poet, ...
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This book is an examination of a poet whose career offers a case study in the complexities facing Soviet writers in the Stalin era. Ol′ga Berggol′ts (1910–1975) was a prominent Russian Soviet poet, whose accounts of heroism in wartime Leningrad brought her fame. This book addresses her position as a writer whose Party loyalties were frequently in conflict with the demands of artistic and personal integrity. Writers who pursued their careers under the restrictions of the Stalin era have been categorized as ‘official’ figures whose work is assumed to be drab, inept and opportunistic; but such assumptions impose a uniformity on the work of Soviet writers that the censors and the Writers Union could not achieve. An exploration of Berggol′ts's work shows that the borders between ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’ literature were in fact permeable and shifting. This book draws on unpublished sources such as diaries and notebooks to reveal the range and scope of her work, and to show how conflict and ambiguity functioned as a creative structuring principle. The text discusses how Berggol′ts's lyric poetry constructs the subject from multiple, conflicting discourses, and examines the poet's treatment of genres such as narrative verse, verse tragedy and prose in the changing cultural context of the 1950s. Berggol′ts's use of inter-textual, and especially intra-textual, reference is also investigated; the intensively self-referential nature of her work creates a web of allusion that connects texts of different genres, ‘official’ as well as ‘unofficial’ writing.Less
This book is an examination of a poet whose career offers a case study in the complexities facing Soviet writers in the Stalin era. Ol′ga Berggol′ts (1910–1975) was a prominent Russian Soviet poet, whose accounts of heroism in wartime Leningrad brought her fame. This book addresses her position as a writer whose Party loyalties were frequently in conflict with the demands of artistic and personal integrity. Writers who pursued their careers under the restrictions of the Stalin era have been categorized as ‘official’ figures whose work is assumed to be drab, inept and opportunistic; but such assumptions impose a uniformity on the work of Soviet writers that the censors and the Writers Union could not achieve. An exploration of Berggol′ts's work shows that the borders between ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’ literature were in fact permeable and shifting. This book draws on unpublished sources such as diaries and notebooks to reveal the range and scope of her work, and to show how conflict and ambiguity functioned as a creative structuring principle. The text discusses how Berggol′ts's lyric poetry constructs the subject from multiple, conflicting discourses, and examines the poet's treatment of genres such as narrative verse, verse tragedy and prose in the changing cultural context of the 1950s. Berggol′ts's use of inter-textual, and especially intra-textual, reference is also investigated; the intensively self-referential nature of her work creates a web of allusion that connects texts of different genres, ‘official’ as well as ‘unofficial’ writing.
Adrian Armstrong and Sarah Kay
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449734
- eISBN:
- 9780801460586
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449734.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Early and Medieval Literature
In the later Middle Ages, many writers claimed that prose is superior to verse as a vehicle of knowledge because it presents the truth in an unvarnished form, without the distortions of meter and ...
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In the later Middle Ages, many writers claimed that prose is superior to verse as a vehicle of knowledge because it presents the truth in an unvarnished form, without the distortions of meter and rhyme. Beginning in the thirteenth century, works of verse narrative from the early Middle Ages were recast in prose, as if prose had become the literary norm. Instead of dying out, however, verse took on new vitality. In France verse texts were produced, in both French and Occitan, with the explicit intention of transmitting encyclopedic, political, philosophical, moral, historical, and other forms of knowledge. This book explores why and how verse continued to be used to transmit and shape knowledge in France. It covers the period between Jean de Meun's Roman de la rose (c. 1270) and the major work of Jean Bouchet, the last of the grands rhétoriqueurs (c. 1530). The book finds that the advent of prose led to a new relationship between poetry and knowledge in which poetry serves as a medium for serious reflection and self-reflection on subjectivity, embodiment, and time. It proposes that three major works—the Roman de la rose, the Ovidemoralisé, and Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy—form a single influential matrix linking poetry and intellectual inquiry, metaphysical insights, and eroticized knowledge. The trio of thought-world-contingency, poetically represented by Philosophy, Nature, and Fortune, grounds poetic exploration of reality, poetry, and community.Less
In the later Middle Ages, many writers claimed that prose is superior to verse as a vehicle of knowledge because it presents the truth in an unvarnished form, without the distortions of meter and rhyme. Beginning in the thirteenth century, works of verse narrative from the early Middle Ages were recast in prose, as if prose had become the literary norm. Instead of dying out, however, verse took on new vitality. In France verse texts were produced, in both French and Occitan, with the explicit intention of transmitting encyclopedic, political, philosophical, moral, historical, and other forms of knowledge. This book explores why and how verse continued to be used to transmit and shape knowledge in France. It covers the period between Jean de Meun's Roman de la rose (c. 1270) and the major work of Jean Bouchet, the last of the grands rhétoriqueurs (c. 1530). The book finds that the advent of prose led to a new relationship between poetry and knowledge in which poetry serves as a medium for serious reflection and self-reflection on subjectivity, embodiment, and time. It proposes that three major works—the Roman de la rose, the Ovidemoralisé, and Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy—form a single influential matrix linking poetry and intellectual inquiry, metaphysical insights, and eroticized knowledge. The trio of thought-world-contingency, poetically represented by Philosophy, Nature, and Fortune, grounds poetic exploration of reality, poetry, and community.
Brian McHale
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780719099335
- eISBN:
- 9781781708613
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719099335.003.0009
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century and Contemporary Literature
Brian McHale considers the verse form of Only Revolutions, noting that ‘novel or not, Only Revolutions is certainly a narrative text’, and claiming that this aligns it with the mainstream of poetry ...
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Brian McHale considers the verse form of Only Revolutions, noting that ‘novel or not, Only Revolutions is certainly a narrative text’, and claiming that this aligns it with the mainstream of poetry world-wide. Following Victor Shklovsky’s claim that Tristram Shandy is the most typical novel in world literature, McHale provocatively puts the case for Only Revolutions as ‘the most typical poem in world literature’, in the sense that it ‘lays bare the poetics of poetry in something like the way that Tristram Shandy laid bare the poetics of the novel.’ This argument is developed through attention to two particular definitions of poetry: segmentivity (as proposed by the poet Rachel Blau DuPlessis) and parallelism (which emerges from Roman Jakobson’s definition of ‘the poetic function’ of language). Its observance of both these properties makes Only Revolutions, for McHale, not merely a ‘typical’ poem, ‘but something like a hyper-typical one, if that were possible.’Less
Brian McHale considers the verse form of Only Revolutions, noting that ‘novel or not, Only Revolutions is certainly a narrative text’, and claiming that this aligns it with the mainstream of poetry world-wide. Following Victor Shklovsky’s claim that Tristram Shandy is the most typical novel in world literature, McHale provocatively puts the case for Only Revolutions as ‘the most typical poem in world literature’, in the sense that it ‘lays bare the poetics of poetry in something like the way that Tristram Shandy laid bare the poetics of the novel.’ This argument is developed through attention to two particular definitions of poetry: segmentivity (as proposed by the poet Rachel Blau DuPlessis) and parallelism (which emerges from Roman Jakobson’s definition of ‘the poetic function’ of language). Its observance of both these properties makes Only Revolutions, for McHale, not merely a ‘typical’ poem, ‘but something like a hyper-typical one, if that were possible.’
William M. Reddy
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226706269
- eISBN:
- 9780226706283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226706283.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, World Medieval History
This chapter considers the incorporation of the courtly love ideal into the verse narratives of some Arthurian romances. It also examines the question of how widely the principles of courtly love ...
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This chapter considers the incorporation of the courtly love ideal into the verse narratives of some Arthurian romances. It also examines the question of how widely the principles of courtly love were actually put into practice in the twelfth century. The discussions cover the source material of Arthurian romance; a reading of Chrétien's “Lancelot”; aristocratic speech in the Tristan myth; the Lais of Marie de France; more real-life romances of the late twelfth century; and courtly love conventions' satirical treatment in fabliaux.Less
This chapter considers the incorporation of the courtly love ideal into the verse narratives of some Arthurian romances. It also examines the question of how widely the principles of courtly love were actually put into practice in the twelfth century. The discussions cover the source material of Arthurian romance; a reading of Chrétien's “Lancelot”; aristocratic speech in the Tristan myth; the Lais of Marie de France; more real-life romances of the late twelfth century; and courtly love conventions' satirical treatment in fabliaux.
