Tessellae - Birthday Issue for Christine Walde - 11/2020 Annemarie Ambühl (Ed.)
←
→
Page content transcription
If your browser does not render page correctly, please read the page content below
Journal for Transcultural Presences &
Diachronic Identities from Antiquity to Date
thersites 11/2020
Annemarie Ambühl (Ed.)
tessellae –
Birthday Issue for
Christine Walde
w w w. t h e r s i t e s - j o u r n a l . d e
Imprint Universität Potsdam 2020 Historisches Institut, Professur Geschichte des Altertums Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam (Germany) https://www.thersites-journal.de/ Editors Apl. Prof. Dr. Annemarie Ambühl (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz) Prof. Dr. Filippo Carlà-Uhink (Universität Potsdam) Dr. Christian Rollinger (Universität Trier) Prof. Dr. Christine Walde (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz) ISSN 2364-7612 Contact Principal Contact Prof. Dr. Filippo Carlà-Uhink Email: thersitesjournal@uni-potsdam.de Support Contact Dr. Christian Rollinger Email: thersitesjournal@uni-potsdam.de Layout and Typesetting text plus form, Dresden Cover pictures: 1 – Medallion of the Mainz Orpheus Mosaic. Photo by J. Ernst. 2 – Syrian banknote (front of the 500-pound note). Photo by Anja Wieber. Published online at: https://doi.org/10.34679/thersites.vol11 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0). This does not apply to quoted content from other authors. To view a copy of this license visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Journal for Transcultural Presences &
Diachronic Identities from Antiquity to Date
thersites 11/2020 | pp. 370 – 378
Emilia Di Rocco
(Sapienza University of Rome)
Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre. English Poetry
and Literary Criticism in Dialogue with Classical
Scholarship
Bloomsbury Academic (London & New York 2019)
(Bloomsbury Studies in Classical Reception), xii & 256 p.
ISBN: 978-1-350-03932-2, $ 102.60 (hb)
Reception studies in Classics is a fast- they take into account scholarship and
growing and extremely diversified literary criticism “in connection with
terrain, where so far synchronic studies reception studies and its relation to the
focused on the Nachleben of authors study of genres and genre history” (p. 2),
from classical antiquity have prevailed by adopting a diachronic approach.
over diachronic, process-oriented re- The book “aims to map the history and
search. Reading Poetry, Writing Genre development of English poetry and the
is not a book that falls within the most literary history and criticism connected
familiar and popular category of recep- to it as a story of genre discourse in
tion studies, in that it doesn’t trace the dialogue with classical scholarship”
influence of the classics — for example (p. 1). To this end, “the interactions
Homer, Vergil, Ovid — on writers, periods between literary-critical movements
and texts. Rather, the essays collected in and classical scholarship” — which is the
this volume break new ground insofar as main focus of the essays — shows “how
Book
Reviews
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License URL https://thersites-journal.de
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0). DOI https://doi.org/10.34679/thersites.vol11.183
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
370Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
genre is constantly negotiated, reworked tragedy often result in classifications
and contested in dialogue with contem- unfamiliar to the modern scholar. This
porary debates in literary criticism and is evident when we compare the def-
classical scholarship” (p. 6). Approaching inition of tragedy in The Monk’s Tale and
the subject from several perspectives the accessus to the Pharsalia in a manu-
and focusing on different genres and script of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
different periods, the essays weave in Munich. The introduction to Lucan’s
together the multiple threads of a con- poem exemplifies the literary tradition
tinuous and enlarging engagement of on genre by referring to an author-
English literature with genre-formation ity — Seneca — and to a collection of his-
and classical scholarship. To read this torical materials while recalling certain
book means to experience the richness aspects of Aristotle’s Poetics. Yet, despite
of English literature at the intersection its Aristotelian flavour, the accessus can-
of literary criticism, classical scholarship not be traced back to Aristotle directly.
and genre studies. This triangle serves as Rather it results in a classical pastiche
a structuring framework of the different that simplifies the tragic form to tailor
case studies presented in this volume. it to Lucan’s Pharsalia. Evidence from
The history of the continuous re- the marginalia of manuscripts, as well as
workings, rewritings, reinventions the catena commentaries and paratexts,
and influence of the classics in Great suggest that in the Middle Ages the clas-
Britain goes back to Old and Middle sics were used for didactic purposes and
English literature and reaches to con- were the purview of classical training.
temporary literature and culture. Within Gerber reads paratexts as documents
the context of a discourse centred on where early readers’ and scholars’ ap-
genre, the mind goes to Chaucer and his proaches to classical curricular authors
definition of “tragedie” in the Monk’s surface, “to rebuild a paradigm that
Tale. Chaucer’s structural proposition rendered the components of classical
of tragedy in The Canterbury Tales — a genres applicable for both their medieval
sudden fall from fortune — is inspired and Renaissance beneficiaries” (p. 14).
by Boccaccio’s De casibus virorum The dismantling of classical literature
illustrium and both can ultimately be and the subsequent recreation and reas-
traced back to classical commentaries. sembly of these texts in the late Middle
However, as Amanda Gerber demon- Ages resulted in a flexible perception of
strates, the etymological approach to genre that allowed for the coexistence of
the definition of genre favoured by these different genres in the same texts.
commentaries — even though they are Interest in classical genres never
focused on the same material — and, ac- faded and medieval scholars laid the
cordingly, the dissections of terms like foundations for the changes that were
Book
Reviews
371Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
to take place in the Renaissance. In Ulysses redux is a groundbreaking play
the Elizabethan Age poetry “can be a that anticipates later tragicomedy while
speaking picture” and classical literature the author rethinks the relationship be-
can frame “a poetics of virtue” (Emma tween virtue, law and poetics.
Buckley). Ethical issues such as the util- The Homeric and the Vergilian
ity and benefits of poetry are couched traditions are the two pillars on which
in terms of the interaction of neo-Latin the discourse on genre in Reading
literary theory, verse and drama with Poetry, Writing Genre is based. While
the vernacular. Insofar as it is an art of Buckley focuses on Homer and the Latin
imitation — Sidney writes in his Apology tradition of Ulysses, Ariane Schwartz
for Poetry —, poetry “to speak metaphor- looks at translations of Vergil. Schwartz
ically, [is] a speaking picture” that aims aims to explore how the conventions
to teach and delight. As Alberico Gentili of genre guide reader and translator,
remarks in his Commentatio, there is how the genre of translation is defined
a strong moralizing aspect attached to and how changes in poetic form and
that definition whereby poetry can be rhyme affect the genre of a translation.
a powerfully moral force. This ethical In this regard Harrington’s translations
value emerges at its best in performed of Vergil (1658 – 9 ), his poems and his
poetry, where the symbiosis of literature prefaces offer an important perspective
and life produces “the perfect imago of on epic and bucolic poetry as political
excellence” (p. 39). William Gager takes vehicles. In Harrington’s rewriting of
up the issue of performance and virtue the Dido episode from the Aeneid, for
in his Ulysses redux (1592), a tragedy example, Dido “is almost a male figure
that draws on the educative and ethical of civic responsibility with her emotions
model proposed by his friend Gentili. diluted” (p. 62). As a result, Dido’s
Gager builds his play on a tragic-comic lament is turned into a political speech
tension embodied by Ulysses, a tragic for Aeneas, while the Vergilian hero
revenger who is responsible for the becomes a more passionate character
“happy ending of the tragedy” (p. 40), than that of the Aeneid. Harrington
a champion of wisdom in suffering, a achieves this effect also by the end-
trickster and the hero of fraud as well rhyme of his heroic couplet, such as the
as a wily man. In his prologue to his rhyme ‘controul’ and ‘soul’ in his trans-
tragedia nova — “Ad Criticum” — the lation of Aeneid 4,300 – 3 04 that creates
author acknowledges that he is trans- a tension between the two terms. When
gressing generic decorum by presenting compared to contemporary translations
competing models of virtue to respond of the same episode, this eventually
to the central issues of early modern results in a more a balanced portrait of
tragicomedy. From this point of view, Dido, so much so that “‘soul’ and ‘con-
Book
Reviews
372Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
troul’ are the key words that the reader and georgic elements in epic results in a
takes away from the lines” (p. 63). This “tragic turn” that highlights the ability
draws our attention to the importance of epic to capture the richness in suffer-
of the formal elements in Harrington’s ing equal to tragedy. This example from
translation. By choosing the rhyming Paradise Lost, coupled with Milton’s
heroic couplet he emphasises the confrontation with issues of genre in
classical restraint and gives voice to Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes,
his desire to place his translations in the illustrates how through a reflection on
English tradition of Vergilian trans- genre in his epic the poet engages with
lations. his literary predecessors.
A discourse on poetry and genre in Vergil plays a major role in the reflec-
English literature inevitably has to touch tion of classical scholarship on genre not
upon Christian epic and, especially, only as the author of the Aeneid, but also
Milton’s Paradise Lost. Caroline Stark as the poet who wrote the Georgics. Juan
explores the complexities of classical Christian Pellicer traces the influence
genre in this work by putting Milton and of Latin scholarship on the Vergilian
Dryden in “conversation”. Upon its pub- georgic as a genre throughout the
lication (1667) Paradise Lost raised issues 18th century. In this period commentators
over a poetic landscape of genre which sometimes read the Georgics as the work
had political implications and hinted at of an agricultural writer and debate over
latent rivalry. This is exemplified in the the didactic aim and scientific accuracy
debate over rhymed verse in tragedy and of georgic poetry, namely of Vergil’s
epic that polarized the different posi- agricultural lore. On some occasions,
tions of Milton and Dryden. In his 1674 the debate takes place within the frame-
edition of Paradise Lost the poet reorga- work of a wide-ranging process aimed at
nized the material and added a preface clarifying the poem. This is exemplified
to solve issues related to his distaste by John Martyn’s edition of the Georgics.
for rhyme and choice of genre. In the The encyclopaedic approach to Vergil’s
opening lines of Book 9 of Paradise Lost work as well as Martyn’s concern for
(1674 edition) Milton embeds a discourse the factual content and literary value of
on genre that marks his shift from the the poem result in a classical scholarly
heroic to the tragic mode as he narrates and scientific edition of the Georgics and
the Fall. He explains the reasons that make georgic a viable genre for his age.
made him transform Adam Unparadized There are also scholars like William Ben-
into a universal epic and why he privi- son who take the poem as the classic of
leged tragedy over epic by referring to all Europe and claim that people never
Homer while also evoking a Vergilian read the Georgics because they think it is
intertext. The integration of tragedy a book about “husbandry”. Others, like
Book
Reviews
373Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
Holdsworth, defend Vergil as an author The Parting of Hector and Andromache
of didactic epic. In his Dissertation and Morris’ translation of the Odyssey.
Holdsworth maintains that scientific ac- Giving examples of translations from
curacy matters more for literary reasons Pope and comparing them with the
than for utilitarian ones because factual modern ones by Fagles and Lattimore,
mistakes affect the logic structure of Canevaro demonstrates that formulae
the poem. Sometimes preoccupation and the other features of oral poetry
with style triumphs over matter: in function like ‘hooks’ that help to es-
his “Essay on Didactic Poetry” Joseph tablish semantic and metric patterns of
Warton claims that style is Vergil’s responsion between different passages
chief glory and celebrates the poet of in the poems. In their translations Pope
the Georgics for the Lucretian qual- and Dryden opt for flowing English
ities of his poetry. All these examples verse in order to capture the poeticity of
draw attention to a distinctive contrast the English language. In so doing they
between practical concerns and poetic achieve the same effect that in archaic
ambitions that characterizes the recep- poetry was achieved by using metre and
tion of the georgic genre in 18th-century formulaic diction, although they sac-
poetry. rifice adherence to the Greek. Likewise,
This is also the age that sees Pope and by choosing the rhyming couplet Pope
Dryden as major authors engaging with and Dryden reproduce something in-
the classics, particularly with Homer. trinsic in the structure of the Homeric
“To what extent is poetry defined and hexameter. For example, the choice of
demarcated by ‘versification’ ?” (p. 107): rhyme words in Dryden’s The Parting
as Lilah Grace Canevaro writes, this is a of Hector and Andromache reflects the
relevant question to a volume that aims importance of kleos in the Iliad. While
to investigate the relationship between Pope is the last one to celebrate the
classical scholarship and genre for- genius of Homer, “The prince of poets”,
mation. The above question brings about Morris champions the Homeric tradition
other key topics such as the relation- and the new oral-traditional approach
ship between utility and pleasure as to ancient epic — in line with Friedrich
well as the marking of genre by metre August Wolf, who changed the image of
or theme that is brought into focus in Homer for the ages to come. Canevaro
an interesting paragraph on Pope’s claims that Morris’ use of the rhyming
Essay on Criticism. Canevaro dwells on couplet should be reconsidered in view
these issues by concentrating on specific of its potential for traditionality and
features of oral poetry — such as epithets, genre recognition as it appears in his
formulae and rhyming elements — in translation of the Odyssey, alongside his
Pope’s translation of the Iliad, Dryden’s modern approach to formulae.
Book
Reviews
374Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
During the 19th century, there starts typical of the ‘ancient’ epyllion was
to emerge an unprecedented attention partly responsible for the success of
to the oral aspect of Homeric epic that this work. On this basis, later English
gives life to a new field of study and to scholars linked the Elizabethan epyllion
an oral-traditional theory that even- to its classical predecessor and scholars
tually will be developed by Parry and like Rose drew an uninterrupted line
Lord. In his reworking of Homeric from the ancient epyllion to the Eliza-
narratives, for example, Tennyson places bethan and beyond. There is, however,
the reader as an auditor within the no evidence that the Elizabethan age
world of the poem to create a modern considered poems falling within this
adaptation of the oral tradition. This group as “epyllion”. The Elizabethan
ultimately results in a shift from epic to epyllion, in fact, is an exemplary case
dramatic monologue in the Victorian in point that shows how a specific
Age. Starting with Victorian fascination development in classical scholarship
with Homer and ancient epic, Isobel has shaped the perception of a genre in
Hurst illustrates this change by tracing English literature.
the antecedents of the dramatic mono- With the last two essays we are
logue in the epic traditions. A detailed back to Homeric epic: Hauser and Cox
analysis of Tennyson’s rewritings of look at Homer from the perspective of
Homeric episodes demonstrates how female writing. Emily Hauser focuses
“The Hesperides”, “Oenone”, “The on the encoding of genre and gender
Lotos-Eaters”, “Ulysses”, “Tithonus”, norms around Homer to illustrate the
“Lucretius” and “Tiresias” engage with development of female epics vis-à-vis
classical scholarship. classical scholarship. An illuminating
Before the last two essays of the reading of Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth
book, that go back to Homer, Silvio Bär Barret Browning and Helen in Egypt
devotes an interesting essay to the Eliza by H. D. reveals how female epic has
bethan epyllion, mapping its history always engaged with classical scholar-
as well as that of the term “epyllion” ship and contemporary literary criticism
to show how, when and why this term to define its place in the tradition.
was adapted in English literature. In The episode where Aurora Leigh dis-
this regard Crump’s thesis in 1931 — The cards some of her father’s books is
Epyllion from Theocritus to Ovid — was particularly revealing. Not only does
the most influential work both in Clas- the heroine cast aside Wolf and thus his
sics and in English philology. The fact idea of Homeric epic, but she also gives
that Crump for the first time drew a away her father’s Elzevirs and Plato. In
direct line from the Greek to the Roman doing so Aurora Leigh suggests that she
epyllion and established a set of criteria is distancing herself from a patrilineal
Book
Reviews
375Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
tradition of classical scholarship while into the border territory between poetry
placing Homer in a maternal vision and translation”. In Chasing Catullus
of epic poetry. All this gives life to a (2004) the author selects specific pas-
new vision of female epic poetry that sages from the classics that speak to
projects a new type of creative divinely her own emotional state, puts them
inspired authorship. H. D. also engages side by side with original poetry and
with classical scholarship, namely with reworks them in a new context. This is
Parry’s research on orality. Helen in how new poetry is created and becomes
Egypt responds to Parry by emphasising ‘transgression’. Thanks to her trans-
the tension between orality and textu- gressions, Balmer finds a place to hide
ality as well as the slippage between (cf. the title of an essay of hers about
the oral and the textual recreations of her collection: ‘Finding a Place to Hide:
Homer. Both Elizabeth Barrett Browning Chasing Catullus: Poems, Translations,
and H. D. demonstrate how the fluidity and Transgressions’) in the world of the
of Homeric epic can be a site for the re- classics to face the loss of those she
definition of epic by female authors. loves, namely the death of her niece in
“The classics can console. But not Chasing Catullus and that of her mother
enough”, Derek Walcott writes in Sea in Letting Go. In this sonnet sequence
Grapes. Josephine Balmer, however, Balmer goes back to the female-domi-
doesn’t seem to agree on this: as her nated genre of ancient elegy and writes
“Transgressions” reveal, the classics her own modern elegy to modulate
‘can’ console. Fiona Cox focuses on our understanding of male-dominated
Balmer’s ‘transgressions’, a term that epic, “by highlighting the dimensions
highlights the hybrid nature of her of sorrow and loss that are so often as-
response to the classics. Comparing sociated with female characters” (p. 179).
herself to an abstract painter, Balmer The rewriting of Aeneid 2 to describe
blends her own original poetry with the individual personal loss reminds the
translations and rewritings of the clas- readers that in ancient epic — in a world
sics to explore personal experiences of warfare and heroism — we are put in
and emotions. In Piecing Together the front of powerful explorations of the
Fragments (2013) the author maps the grief for parents. In an act of cross-gen-
changing landscape of the classics and dering voices and cross-genre, Balmer
her personal development as a poet by becomes Aeneas as she reworks the epi
placing herself in the long tradition of sode in Book 2 of the Aeneid where the
female translators of the classics. At the Vergilian hero realizes that he has lost
same time, however, she describes her his wife, Creusa. In another poem — ‘Let
personal original approach to trans- Go’ — Balmer goes back to Aeneid 2 and
lation/transgression and her “journey rewrites the apparition of Creusa to
Book
Reviews
376Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
Aeneas during the last night of Troy 2. ‘Poetry is a Speaking Picture’:
to describe a dream where her mother Framing a Poetics of Virtue in Late
appears to comfort her daughter. Yes, Elizabethan England
the classics can console — according to Emma Buckley
Josephine Balmer — and they are enough ! 30 – 5 0
Male-dominated genres such as epic
and history (Cox writes very interesting 3. A Revolutionary Vergil: James
pages on the rewriting of Hannibal Harrington, Poetry, and Political
crossing the Alps episode from Livy) can Performance
offer the female voice a ‘hiding place’ to Ariane Schwartz
negotiate the loss of those we love and 51 – 6 5
write deeply personal poetry.
We must be grateful to Silvio Bär and 4. The Devouring Maw: Complexities
Emily Hauser for putting together such of Classical Genre in Milton’s Paradise
an inspirational and challenging book Lost
that opens up new interesting paths Caroline Stark
for research in the fields of reception 66 – 7 8
studies. Let us hope more will follow.
5. Georgic as Genre: The Schol-
Table of Contents arly Reception of Vergil in
Mid-Eighteenth-Century Britain
Acknowledgements Juan Christian Pellicer
viii 79 – 9 3
List of Illustrations 6. Rhyme and Reason: The Homeric
ix Translations of Dryden, Pope, and
Morris
List of Contributors Lilah Grace Canevaro
x – xi 94 – 1 16
Introduction 7. From Epic to Monologue: Tennyson
Silvio Bär and Emily Hauser and Homer
1 – 1 2 Isobel Hurst
117 – 1 37
1. Classical Pieces: Fragmenting Genres
in Medieval England
Amanda J. Gerber
13 – 2 9
Book
Reviews
377Review of Silvio Bär & Emily Hauser (eds.):
Reading Poetry, Writing Genre
8. The Elizabethan Epyllion: From Index of Passages Cited
Constructed Classical Genre to 253 – 2 56
Twentieth-Century Genre Propre
Silvio Bär URL: https://www.bloomsbury.
138 – 1 50 com/us/reading-poetry-writing-
genre-9781350039322/
9. ‘Homer Undone’: Homeric Scholar-
ship and the Invention of Female Epic
Emily Hauser
151 – 1 71 Emilia Di Rocco
University of Rome “La Sapienza”
10. Generic ‘Transgressions’ and the Piazzale Aldo Moro 1
Personal Voice IT-00185 Rome
Fiona Cox emilia.dirocco@uniroma1.it
172 – 1 86
Notes Suggested citation
187 – 2 17 Emilia Di Rocco: Review of Silvio Bär & Emily
Hauser (eds.): Reading Poetry, Writing Genre.
References English Poetry and Literary Criticism in Dialogue
218 – 2 48 with Classical Scholarship. In: thersites 11 (2020):
tessellae – Birthday Issue for Christine Walde,
General Index pp. 370–378.
249 – 2 52 https://doi.org/10.34679/thersites.vol11.183
Book
Reviews
378You can also read
