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thxnews · 1 year ago

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Unveiling the Timeless Masterpiece: The Canterbury Tales - A Window into Medieval Life

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer is one of the greatest literary works of the Middle Ages and is considered a masterpiece of English literature. Written in the late 14th century, this enlightening work of fiction provides readers with a unique window into life during Medieval England. This collection of 24 stories is written in verse and is set in the context of a pilgrimage to Canterbury. The stories are told by a group of travelers, who are on their way to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket in Canterbury. We will now explore the historical context of The Canterbury Tales, delve into some of the most famous tales, and the impact that the work has had on literature and culture. So, come join us on this journey as we explore the Canterbury Tales.

Canterbury tales volume set and Jeffery Chaucer. Photo by the British Library. THX News.

Context of Medieval England

Political Context Medieval England was characterized by a feudal system where the king held supreme power and granted land to nobles in return for their loyalty and military service. The peasantry, which comprised the majority of the population, worked on the lands of the nobles in exchange for protection and a share of the produce. The political instability of the period, due to frequent wars and disputes over the throne, led to growing dissatisfaction among the common people. The Canterbury Tales reflect this political context in several ways. The tale of the Knight, who is an embodiment of chivalry and loyalty, represents the idealized image of the nobles. The Pardoner, on the other hand, who cheats people for money, is a critique of the corrupt practices of the Church and State officials. Social Context The rigid social stratification of the Medieval period placed the aristocracy at the top and the peasantry at the bottom of the social ladder. Medieval society was patriarchal, and women had limited opportunities for education and employment. The Church played a significant role in the social structure and exerted its influence over all aspects of life, including education, law, and morality. Chaucer’s work reflects this social context in significant ways. The Miller and the Reeve, who are portrayed as buffoons, represent the lower classes, and their crude behavior contrasted with the refined and cultured qualities of the Monk and the Nun’s Priest. Religious Context Religion played a crucial role in the medieval society of England. The Church was viewed as the moral authority and was responsible for providing spiritual guidance to the people. Religious festivals, pilgrimages, and prayer were an integral part of everyday life. Christianity was the dominant religion, and other faiths were not tolerated. The Canterbury Tales reflects this religious context through the character of the Parson, who embodies the virtues of Christianity and represents the ideal spiritual guide. At the same time, the Friar and the Pardoner, who were both connected with the Church, are depicted as greedy and corrupt individuals who exploit the faith of the people for their own benefit.

A highlight of Decorated Gothic art the outer north porch c.1325 of St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol, England. Photo by Spencer Means. Flickr.

Overview of The Canterbury Tales

Historical Background The Canterbury Tales was written in a time that saw a significant transformation of English literature. In the late 14th century, English replaced Latin and French as the main language of literature. It was due in part to the efforts of writers like Chaucer, who sought to make literature accessible to all, regardless of their social status and education. Chaucer’s work marked the emergence of English as a literary language, which further contributed to the English language’s development. Themes and Style The Canterbury Tales is a complex work that incorporates various themes. The tales told by the characters bring out fundamental human endeavors, such as love, greed, and power. Chaucer’s views on social hierarchy and morality also permeate the tales. Humor and satire are other striking elements of the work, which add to its appeal. Each character’s tale is narrated in a distinct style that reinforces their characterization, making The Canterbury Tales a prime example of the art of characterization in literature. The Structure of The Canterbury Tales The structure of The Canterbury Tales is crucial to its style and thematic content. The work comprises 24 stories in total, broken down into tales told by twenty-three pilgrims, along with two tales told by the host. The pilgrims are representative of various sections of medieval society, from the high-ranking aristocrats to the working-class characters like the plowman and the miller. This range of characters and their tales effectively portrays medieval English society.

The Knight of The Knight's Tale. Photo by Ben Sutherland. Flickr.

Characters

The Knight The first character that comes to mind is the Knight, who is the epitome of chivalry and honor. He is described as "a worthy man" and has fought in many battles over the course of his life. His tunic bears the emblem of St. George, suggesting that he is a devout Christian. The Knight's tale is one of adventure and romance, and it explores the themes of love and loyalty. The significance of the Knight's character lies in his representation of the ideal of chivalry, which was highly valued during the Middle Ages. The Wife of Bath Another memorable character is the Wife of Bath, who is a self-proclaimed expert on marriage and love. She has been married five times and is not ashamed of it. In fact, she sees marriage as a means of achieving control over men. The Wife of Bath's tale is a feminist retelling of the story of King Arthur and his queen, and it explores the themes of power and gender roles. The significance of the Wife of Bath's character lies in her representation of unorthodox views on marriage and women's rights, which were radical in the Middle Ages. The Miller The Miller is another colorful character in The Canterbury Tales. He is a rude and vulgar man, who enjoys drinking and stealing. He is described as having a "red beard" and a "wide nostril" and is always ready to pick a fight. The Miller's tale is a bawdy one, which involves a love triangle and a lot of sexual innuendo. The significance of the Miller's character lies in his representation of the lower classes, who were often overlooked in Middle English literature. The Pardoner The Pardoner is a fascinating character, who is both repulsive and alluring. He is a religious figure who sells indulgences, which are supposed to reduce the time spent in purgatory. However, the Pardoner is a fraud, and he often makes up stories to convince people to buy his wares. He is described as having "hair as yellow as wax" and a "smooth, hairless face." The Pardoner's tale is a moral one, which explores the themes of greed and corruption. The significance of the Pardoner's character lies in his representation of the corruption within the Church. The Summoner The final memorable character we will discuss is the Summoner, who is a repulsive and grotesque figure. He is a religious official whose job is to summon sinners to appear before the Church courts. However, he is corrupt and often accepts bribes to let people off the hook. He is described as having a "fierce red face" and a "face full of pimples." The Summoner's tale is a scathing critique of the corruption within the Church, and it explores the themes of hypocrisy and greed. The significance of the Summoner's character lies in his representation of the corruption and moral decay within the Church.

The Two Noble Kinsmen, Palamon and Arcite. Photo by Ben P L from Provo, USA. Wikimedia.

Themes

Social Hierarchy Social hierarchy was a prominent aspect of medieval society. As a result, Chaucer subtly incorporated it into his writing. In the story, The Knight's Tale, the character of Theseus is used to provide us with a glimpse into medieval royalty. He is portrayed as a respected and noble leader that people look up to. His social status gives him power, but also adds a weight of responsibility to his actions. The Boy's Tale is another story that presents us with the importance of social position. This tale focuses on the story of two friends, Arcite and Palamon. The two men are both in love with Emelye, but because Arcite is of nobler birth, his aspirations to marry her are more likely to be approved. The story shows how social status played a role in love and marriage during medieval times. Morality Morality plays a central role in many of the tales in the Canterbury Tales. Chaucer is seen as a master of his craft, capable of dealing with complex moral conundrums in a way that is relatable to readers. In The Pardoner's Tale, we see how greed can drive men to do terrible things. The tale exposes the corrupt nature of humans, who are always tempted by material things. The Wife of Bath's Tale teaches us about the importance of trust and compromise in relationships. She emphasizes how important it is to listen to each other's needs and desires. The tale also portrays a woman who has control over her own life. This was a revolutionary notion during the medieval era, when society was deeply patriarchal. Religion Religion is prevalent throughout the Canterbury Tales. People during the medieval era were devout believers and religion played a central role in everyday life. In The Man of Law's Tale, we see the story of a converted Jew who converts to Christianity. The story shows how religion can change a person's life and beliefs. The Friar's Tale, on the other hand, focuses on the immoral nature of some religious figures. The friar is portrayed as a corrupt individual who uses his position in the church for personal gain. This tale teaches us about the dangers of trusting those who claim to be religious simply because of their position.

Structure

The Canterbury Tales is a frame narrative, with the frame being the pilgrimage to Canterbury. The narrative framework of the tales is a crucial element as it sets the stage for the stories and binds them together. The pilgrims represent all sections of medieval society, from the nobility and the religious to the commoner, making it a unique representation of contemporary medieval life. The structure of the pilgrimage narrative is partly designed to encourage us as readers not merely to observantly read, but to actively participate in the journey. The stories in The Canterbury Tales have multiple levels of meaning, serving as both entertainment and social critique. The tales range from the high-minded Knight's Tale, which deals with questions of honor, courage, and justice, to the bawdy Miller's Tale, which serves as a very down-to-earth contrast. As the tales come to us, we are passive listeners who are participants in the journey, and the storytellers invite us to join the discussion. The tales also reveal a great deal about the people who are telling them, providing rich character studies. For instance, the character of the Wife of Bath is revealed in her story as she justifies her lustful tendencies. Classic Story Telling The story-telling structure is also a characteristic feature of the book's structure. The tale-tellers are introduced in the General Prologue, which provides a brief profile of each pilgrim. As the journey continues, each pilgrim tells one tale, resulting in 24 tales. However, it is the tale-telling structure that makes this book one of the most significant literary works of all time. The structure of the tales is both entertaining and educational, capturing the essence of medieval life. The tales in The Canterbury Tales exemplify the medieval genre of fabliaux, which means "little stories" in old French. Each story is a self-contained narrative, and the tales vary in length and complexity. Some reflect the traditions of romantic courtly love, while others satirize religious and secular institutions. The tales are all very different, and their distinctive storytelling style. The tales reveal the conditions of various medieval groups and offer insights into medieval ethics, morals, and religion. The variety of stories is a reflection of the wide diversity of society, which is a crucial feature of the overall narrative.

FLINT, William Russell 1880-1969. Chaucer's 'The Canterbury Tales', Frontispiece, 1928.. Photo by Halloween HJB. Flickr.

Significance to Literature and History

First and foremost, The Canterbury Tales is considered significant because it is considered a seminal work in the development of English literature. It was written in Middle English, which was the language spoken in England during the 14th century. The stories reflect the cultural and social norms of the time, allowing readers to get a glimpse into medieval life. This historic context provides a unique and insightful interpretation of one of the most significant pieces of English literature. Moreover, The Canterbury Tales is also considered significant for the way it challenges societal norms and the status quo. Chaucer’s works were known for being ‘bawdy’ and controversial. The Canterbury Tales, in particular, features characters who challenge societal norms, such as the Wife of Bath, who was seen as a feminist figure. The words and actions of the various characters in the stories also reflected a range of personalities and themes, providing a more nuanced interpretation of the medieval period. The English Religious and Socio-political Views of the Time The Canterbury Tales were also a reflection of the religious and socio-political situation of England. During the 14th century, English society was undergoing a period of transformation. England was transitioning from a feudal society to a more centralized government. The book includes a commentary on the corruption within the clergy and the institutionalized practices of the church. Chaucer uses his fictional stories to provide social commentary on the injustices of his time, and this provides a unique perspective on a tumultuous period in English history. The Canterbury Tales is a treasure trove of historical information that can be studied and dissected for years to come. The tales provide ample insight into the cultural, religious, social, and economic aspects of medieval life. The figures in the book reflect the interests, conflicts, and priorities of the medieval people, and understanding these figures provides insight into the complex lives of those who lived in these times.

Conclusion

The Canterbury Tales is a timeless classic that has endured for centuries and continues to influence literature, art, culture, and history. It serves as an important reminder of the values of Medieval England while also providing readers with insight into human nature. Through its tales of chivalry and romance, The Canterbury Tales offers us a glimpse into the lives of characters from all walks of life during this period in time. Those who read it come away with a better understanding of how society was structured during medieval times as well as what people valued most then. Whether you are looking for historical context or just want to get lost in some captivating stories, The Canterbury Tales will not disappoint! Sources: THX News & British Library. Read the full article

#CanterburyTales #Chaucer'scharacters #Englishliterature #Historicalcontext #MedievalEngland #Religioninmedievalsociety #Significancetoliteratureandhistory #Socialcritique #Socialhierarchy #Storytellingstructure

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7-milena-trajkovski-7 · 11 months ago

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Art Theory and Criticism - Journal reflection 11

The origins and analysis of Romanticism

When analysing a specific movement and period, one must understand what influenced the artists of the movement from their previous masters of the time and style that came before them. Whether the new style was developed to reject a previous ideology, thus becoming a consequence of the era that came before or was simply adopted based on new discoveries and observations, it is certainly evident that the history of art evolves but always with references. A movement that has a deep history and origin is the Romanticism period. Aside from the movement spreading across all of Europe and later the United States, it did not only involve the visual arts, but also music, literature and even branches of philosophy (Wilder, 2021.)

The origins of the Romanticism movement boil down to the word ‘romantic’ varying from definitions of describing several intermingling languages spoken around Rome during the Classical period along with the associated fantastical stories of knights saving the damsel in distress princess from the dragon (Alliterative, 2016.) further analysing the origins of the Romantic period came the inspiration from the Grimm brothers gathering various German folk tales and huge Gothic architecture with pointed arches directing the eye up to the sky which indicated the heavens.

Figure 1: The Kiss, Francesco Hayez, c. 1859.

According to Alliterative (2016) inspiration from Edmund Burke’s 18th century treatise on aesthetics concerning Sublime represented in the visual arts and landscape painting, made for a breakthrough in rejecting the neo-classical period that came before Romanticism. This rejection stems from the Neo-classical period embracing logic and rationality, which the Romantics replaced with passion, expression, and the individual’s moral qualities. This sparked further reference to the sublime, fairy-tale folklore and fantastical elements of medieval stories that was present in the previous centuries.

Figure 2: John Constable, Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows, exhibited 1831.

However, this knowledge came only to the privileged, as only the wealthy could realistically have time to think about these things and fantasise about them, while also delving into the literature, music and visual arts that broadened their horizons on the matter. Which is why it is very ironic that this class of people would sympathise with these famous stories of the period like Victor Hugo’s ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’, ‘Les Misérables’, and Mary Shelly’s ‘Frankenstein, as stated by Wilder (2021):

All three works are outcries against man's inhumanity to man. To drive home the point, the writers magnify the inhumanity so we can see it better. They do this by directing it against outcasts: a hunchback, an ex-convict, and a manmade monster. The more of an outsider someone is, the more people abuse that person.

Figure 3: Newton, William Blake, c. 1804-1805.

Figure 4: Liberty Leading the People, Eugène Delacroix, c. 1830.

Figure 5: John William Waterhouse, The Lady of Shalott, 1888.

Overall, it was a positive movement that gave hope to its followers by encouraging the belief of one’s morals and the goodness of man that can be hidden under trauma, rejection, and disastrous events. Many of the revolutions and political crises that dragged along in struggle for decades was still fresh in these people’s minds. They wanted to enjoy the bright side of life along with appreciating nature’s sublime quality that reminded them of man’s insignificance of his fruitless struggles in war. In a way, this was their escapism from the darker times that still haunted them, along with humanity's dark side that creeps out in due time.

Reference list:

Alliterative, 2016. Sublime: The Aesthetics & Origins of Romanticism. YouTube. Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=au-z2jVaTNk> [Accessed 7 January 2024].

Wilder, J.B., 2021. Defining Romanticism in the Arts. [online] dummies. Available at: <https://www.dummies.com/article/academics-the-arts/art-architecture/art-history/defining-romanticism-in-the-arts-200515/> [Accessed 7 January 2024].

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history-of-europe · 1 year ago

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Middle ages' literature, well, a bit about it

Question: Ever wondered about the captivating tales that unfolded during the Middle Ages, shaping our understanding of language, storytelling, and the human experience? Join me as we unravel the tapestry of medieval literature, a period spanning from the fall of the Western Roman Empire in AD 500 to the dawn of the Renaissance. Let's explore the works of literary giants like Dante Alighieri, Geoffrey Chaucer, and the anonymous author of Beowulf, and uncover the rich cultural legacy that continues to resonate in our modern world.

I. Key Contributors to Medieval Literature

Dante Alighieri and "The Divine Comedy": Dante's epic poem, "The Divine Comedy," takes readers on a profound journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. Its allegorical nature explores themes of sin, redemption, and the divine, making it a masterpiece of world literature.

Geoffrey Chaucer and "The Canterbury Tales": Chaucer's collection of stories, "The Canterbury Tales," offers a vivid portrayal of 14th-century English society. The diverse narratives showcase the multifaceted nature of medieval life, from bawdy comedies to moral fables.

Anonymous Author of Beowulf: The Old English epic poem "Beowulf" narrates the heroic deeds of Beowulf as he confronts monstrous foes, emphasizing the struggle between good and evil and the significance of honor and heroism.

Thomas Malory and "Le Morte d'Arthur": Malory's compilation of Arthurian legends has left an indelible mark on English literature, captivating readers with tales of King Arthur, his knights, and the quest for the Holy Grail.

Christine de Pizan: Christine de Pizan, a notable medieval writer, significantly contributed to literature with her influential prose works, offering insights into the social and intellectual milieu of the time.

Julian of Norwich: As a Christian mystic, Julian penned the first book written in English by a woman, "Revelations of Divine Love," providing spiritual insights and a unique contribution to medieval literature.

Margery Kempe: Kempe's autobiographical work, considered the first example of autobiography in English, offers a rare glimpse into medieval life from a woman's perspective, contributing to the understanding of personal narratives.

II. Key Works of Medieval Literature

"The Divine Comedy" by Dante Alighieri: Dante's journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven explores profound themes, influencing subsequent literary and artistic traditions.

"The Canterbury Tales" by Geoffrey Chaucer: Chaucer's tales, representing a cross-section of medieval society, provide a vibrant snapshot of life in 14th-century England, showcasing diverse storytelling styles.

"Beowulf" (Author Unknown): An essential work of Old English literature, "Beowulf" explores heroic deeds, loyalty, and the inevitability of fate, shaping the foundation of medieval storytelling.

"Le Morte d'Arthur" by Thomas Malory: Malory's work weaves the tales of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, contributing to the enduring legacy of Arthurian literature.

III. Key Aspects and Elements of Medieval Literature

Religious Writings: Christianity heavily influenced medieval literature, giving rise to religious writings that encompassed saints' lives, sermons, and devotional poetry.

Secular Works: Alongside religious writings, secular works in various genres, such as epics and romances, flourished, offering diverse perspectives on life, love, and morality.

Vernacular Literature: The shift from Latin to vernacular languages democratized literature, making it more accessible to a broader audience.

Epic and Romance: Epic poetry and romance literature, typified by heroic deeds and tales of chivalry, played a crucial role in shaping the medieval literary landscape.

Allegory and Symbolism: Many medieval works were characterized by allegory and symbolism, with authors using symbolic elements to convey deeper moral or religious meanings.

Diverse Genres: Medieval literature embraced a multitude of genres, reflecting the complexity and richness of the literary traditions during this period.

Influence of Classical and Christian Thought: The synthesis of classical and Christian thought formed the basis of medieval interpretation, shaping the symbolic understanding of life and literature.

IV. Distinctive Features of Medieval Literature

Chivalry, Courtly Love, and Pursuit of Honor: Medieval literature often celebrated the ideals of chivalry, courtly love, and the pursuit of honor, exemplified in tales of knights and noblewomen.

Allegory and Religious Themes: Allegory and religious themes permeated medieval literature, with authors conveying moral and spiritual messages through symbolic narratives.

Epic and Heroic Elements: Medieval literature, particularly in epic poems, highlighted heroic elements and explored the struggle between good and evil.

Vernacular Literature: The rise of vernacular literature democratized access to literary works, fostering a more inclusive literary culture.

Impersonality/Anonymity and Derivative Stories: Middle English literature often featured impersonal or anonymous authorship, reflecting the oral tradition and the influence of earlier works.

Religiosity and Oral Quality: The religiosity of medieval literature, combined with an oral quality, underscores the cultural and spiritual influences that shaped literary expression.

V. Influence of Medieval Literature on Society

Modern Imagination: The Middle Ages continue to inspire modern imagination, evident in various art forms, literature, photography, film, immersive reenactments, and video games.

Language and Storytelling: Medieval literature's diverse styles, languages, and themes have left an enduring mark on modern storytelling, influencing language development and narrative techniques.

Religion and History: Medieval literature serves as a vital source for understanding religious beliefs and historical contexts, providing insights into universal human experiences.

Development of Secular Works: The printing press played a pivotal role in making literature more accessible, fostering the development of secular works during the Renaissance.

Imagination: Medieval literature, with its remarkable individuals and intellectual history, continues to inspire and provoke the imagination, contributing to the richness of human creativity.

Conclusion: As we conclude our exploration of medieval literature, we marvel at the enduring impact of the works crafted during this transformative period. From the divine realms of Dante's "The Divine Comedy" to the earthly tales of Chaucer's pilgrims, medieval literature has bequeathed us a cultural legacy that transcends time. Its influence on language, storytelling, religion, and history is palpable in our modern society, serving as a testament to the profound and timeless power of the written word. In the intricate tapestry of medieval literature, we find not only stories of knights and epic quests but also a reflection of the human condition—a mirror through which we glimpse our shared past and the boundless possibilities of the imagination.

#middle ages #literature #europe #history

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torchwood-99 · 2 years ago

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I was thinking about why the inaccuracies in Bridgerton and A Knight’s Tale don’t aggravate me in how they try to be modern. And I think it’s because of a couple of reasons.

One, they aren’t lazy in modernising. They don’t use a basic period template, strip it off everything interesting or old fashioned, wipe it clear of detail and throw in some ‘relatable’ modern stuff instead. The aesthetics are thought out and carried through and make a cohesive world. Not accurate, but immersive and believable.

Second, its because they’ve incorporated elements of modern life that echo realities in the past.

Bridgerton doesn’t have accurate hats and bonnets. It has a regency twist on fascinators. Fascinators are generally associated with fancy events and British upper classes, which is appropriate for the world of Bridgerton, which takes place among the aristocracy during the social season. Using the imagery of modern upper classes to help capture the spirit of the Regency aristocracy, showing that even though this piece is set in the past the underlying drive to fit into this world and advance your family and the class consciousness is still pervasive today,. And while some of the colours, materials and fabrics are not accurate, their intricacy, their obvious expense, is fitting for characters on parade. The clothes are allowed to matter to the characters and make sense for the world they live in.

Furthermore, even though the clothes aren’t accurate, they show signs of research. The dropping off the hems, Eloise’s ribbons, the Queen’s fashions being behind the times, the lighter colours for unmarried girls and the darker tones of the married ladies, all show signs of research. And then the designers take these historical elements, and have fun with them. And instead of toning down interesting historical detail to make the fashions ‘relatable’, they turn the colours and excess right up to make it fun. As a history fan, you can look at the costumes and recognise the influence of regency fashions, even if they aren’t recreated to life. Bridgerton designs are almost a homage, respectful and inspired by regency fashions, as opposed to an attempt to scrub them clean and make them palatable for modern audiences,

A Knight’s Tale recreates the modern sporting world in Medieval Europe, which captures the excitement and thrill of jousting. It merges modern and historical showing how the emotions and passion of competitive sport, the dreams these sports represent, are a constant part of the human experience.

So these works are basically not saying, we want to make a period piece but old fashioned stuff is boring so we’re just going to modernise it. They’re saying that the themes and experiences and; most of all, the people in these works are at heart the same as they were in the past as they are in modern day, so we will blend these worlds together to make a new world to show the timelessness of these themes.

#Bridgerton #A Knight's Tale #Period Films #Period Shows

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blackswaneuroparedux · 3 years ago

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It simply isn't an adventure worth telling if there aren't any dragons.

- J.R.R. Tolkien

Not until the fall of the Roman Empire and the Rise of Christendom does the dragon in western civilization begin to take on the familiar form we know today in bestiaries and myths. It is perhaps the story of Adam and Eve in the old testament and the appearance of Satan in the form of a serpent that first transfixes the medieval imagination. For nearly a thousand years, the dragon represents evil and becomes synonymous with demons. The dragon is also used by medieval knights emblazoned on their shields and standards to strike fear into the hearts of their enemies. Throughout the epics and romantic stories of this period dragons show up to be slain by the virtuous heroes of folklore, legend and religion.

In the epic of Beowulf (ca. 1000 AD.) the great Scandinavian king slays a monstrous fire-breathing dragon and dies in its arms.

Icelandic tales in the Volsungasaga (1250 AD.) transforms the dwarf prince Fafnir into a dragon to be slain by Seigfried.

The Welsh Epic of The Mabinogion (1400 AD.) depicts the great Red Dragon of Wales battling a White Dragon and causing earthquakes.

In the Christian faith Satan routinely appears a dragon to tempt the saints. The Golden Legend (1200 AD.) illustrates St. George and St. Margaret as well as several other saints, confronted by dragons.

By 1500 ad. the mystical apex of catholicism combined with the ever-increasing craft of the visual artists finds the archetypal fire-breathing dragon in its full splendor. This is well documented when Edmund Spenser describes his titanic monster in The Fairie Queene (1590)

After the Protestant Reformation and the advent of the Age of Reason the dragon becomes more a creature of entertainment rather than of spiritual belief. Protestant artists are prohibited from depicting scenes from the bible and the stories of the saints are abandoned as idolatry. Dragons and other beasts take on a decorative nature, and as subjects of classical illustration. During this period it is the first evidence that the dragon is being treated as a fantasy creature.

The 19th century sees a resurgence in the dragon as archeologists, historians and the stories of the “Pre Raphaelite” age are studied and adopted as acceptable subject matter, through Bullfinch, The Brother’s Grim and new translations of the classics and folklore. Throughout this period the dragon stories of the dark past are fodder for artists and writers alike. By the second half of the nineteenth century the neo-isms (Neoclassical, neo-gothic, neo-egyptian, neo-romanesque) of the beaux-arts academic style return to using the dragon as a decorative embellishment.

With the dawn of the Industrial Age twentieth century science and technology usurps romantic notions of the arts, pushing the stories of dragons into the genre of mythology and the realm of children’s stories. Painting and literature had embraced Realism and analytical minimalism throwing off all superstitions of the past to try to make a New kind of art. Any depiction’s of dragons during this period (and there are few) become an outward representation of the artist’s inner psyche. Psychology has replaced the dragon with the Id and the Ego.

By the 1970’s, however the art world was ready to once again re-embrace spirituality, mythology and the dragon. Post-Modern artists found the writings of J.R.R. Tolkein and Joseph Campbell. The mythologies they had drawn from had a renaissance.

In 1976 TSR introduced Dungeons and Dragons to a world hungry for fantasy and monsters, becoming a popular phenomenon. McCaffery’s Dragonriders of Pern 1970, Dragonslayer 1981 were all introduced to a mesmerized audience. Since then the dragon has entered into the popular consciousness in a way not seen since the Middle Ages. Everything from Harry Potter to World of Warcraft and Skyrim have adopted the dragon as their go-to monster to inspire awe and magic.

What is it about the dragon that has captivated us for all of civilization? Is it the sheer power of nature that cannot be tamed. Is it a psychological metaphor for primal fear? Is it perhaps a innate memory of our long lost primitive prehistory? Whatever the reason, in all cultures around the world the dragon , in all its forms has haunted our minds and our imaginations and will continue to do so in the century to come.

**Medieval artwork of a leaf from Harley’s Bestiary, made from Gerald of Wales’ topography in around 1250–1350AD.

#tolkien #jrr tolkien #quote #dragons #medieval #christianity #myth #legend #art #literature #europe #folklore

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dwellordream · 3 years ago

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“During the years of Eleanor of Aquitaine’s captivity, 1174–89, she disappears almost entirely from sight. According to one account, Henry II ordered her confined in “well guarded strong places”; and she was first housed under close supervision in the royal castle at Sarum, or Old Salisbury, although later she can be located occasionally at other royal castles in southern England. As a woman, Eleanor received more lenient treatment than men captured while taking part in an armed rebellion; and Henry may have chosen Salisbury Castle for her detention as a gesture of leniency, for its residential quarters, a large quadrangle next to the keep, had been one of her favored abodes during her earlier years as queen.

According to a chronicler at Limoges, Henry imprisoned his queen at Salisbury Castle, “on guard against her reverting to her machinations.” The king’s fear was Eleanor’s continued involvement in the intrigues of their quarrelsome sons, and he tried to ensure that no communication passed between them. Yet he could not afford to treat her too harshly, for that would only have added to the hatred that Young Henry, Richard, and Geoffrey already felt for him. Earlier, both Anglo-Norman monarchs and counts of Anjou had not hesitated to imprison defeated nobles, including near-relatives, for years, often under such harsh conditions that they lost their health, if not their lives.

A queen’s long captivity was startling, but imprisonment of great ladies was not unprecedented. In medieval vernacular literature, tales were not uncommon of aristocratic ladies locked away for years, many of them by their own families, and history records many noble maidens whose fathers were forced to turn them over to their lords as hostages. Henry II could have made other choices for ridding himself of the threat presented by Eleanor to the stability of his rule. She could simply have disappeared during her captivity at Chinon, but young Arthur of Brittany’s mysterious disappearance from Rouen Castle later during John’s reign shows that such a solution would have created more problems than it solved.

Rumors that John had murdered his nephew with his own hands quickly spread, and it sapped his subjects’ loyalty to him, crippling him in his contest with his archenemy Philip of France. Certainly rumors of Eleanor’s death while in Henry’s hands following his suspected role in the murder of Becket would have had a similar effect. His wife’s murder would have aroused revulsion throughout Europe, and it would have so enraged the Poitevins that Plantagenet rule over them would have been impossible. In any case, Henry’s character had little in common with that of the insecure and overly suspicious John, and although severe and vengeful, he lacked his youngest son’s depraved cruelty that surfaced once he was king.

An option that great men had often chosen in earlier centuries for dealing with wayward or unwanted wives was immuring them in convents. Henry II considered such a step in 1175��76, when his adulterous affair with Rosamund Clifford was at its most passionate stage. A contemporary writer claimed that Henry, having imprisoned his queen, no longer tried to hide his adultery, and publicly displayed as his mistress, “not a rose of the world (mundi rosa) . . . , but more truly might be called the rose of an impure husband (immundi rosa).”

Apparently Henry was not worried that dissolution of his marriage to Eleanor would threaten his authority over her duchy of Aquitaine. Despite Louis VII’s loss of Aquitaine as a result of his divorce, Henry seemed confident that Richard’s formal installation as duke of Aquitaine and count of Poitou would keep Eleanor’s lands safely in Plantagenet hands. Henry saw an opportunity to secure a divorce from Eleanor at the time of a mission to England by a papal legate, sent from Rome to settle one of the endless quarrels between the kingdom’s two archbishops. On the papal representative’s arrival in England in autumn 1175, the king received him with honor, showering him with gifts and flattery.

Henry assumed that the cardinal would agree readily to a dissolution of his marriage on grounds of consanguinity, since Louis VII had won a divorce for that reason, and Henry’s kinship to Eleanor was even closer than her relationship to her first husband. The English king allegedly offered his queen release from her captivity during his Easter court at Winchester in 1176, if she would agree to enter a religious house, no doubt Fontevraud Abbey, probably with the prospect of becoming abbess there. The abbey had a reputation as a residence for noble ladies seeking refuge from wordly affairs, but Eleanor was unwilling to join them, not even if installed as abbess, and she and her sons resisted Henry’s plan.

She even appealed to the archbishop of Rouen against being packed off to Fontevraud, and he refused to give his consent to Henry’s plan. As the archbishop of Rouen’s role shows, the Church’s opposition was another obstacle to Henry in ridding himself of Eleanor, and his projected divorce was not to be easily accomplished. After Becket’s martyrdom, the English king had little credit with the papacy or with churchmen in England or elsewhere in Europe. He was in no position to pressure a pope firmly opposed to approving a divorce, particularly one who was doubtless aware of rumors that he desired the divorce in order to marry his mistress.

Whatever the possibility of Henry II setting his queen aside and taking Rosamund Clifford as his wife, events intervened to prevent it, for his beloved mistress died late in 1176 or in 1177. His fair Rosamund was buried at Godstow Priory in Oxfordshire only a few miles from their trysting place at Woodstock. Around the time of Rosamund’s death the patron of Godstow, an Oxfordshire baron, assigned his patronage rights over the house to Henry in order that it should be held “in chief of the king’s crown, as the Abbey of Saint Edmund and other royal abbeys throughout the kingdom of England are constituted.” This elevation in Godstow’s status reflects Henry’s deep feelings for his mistress, a desire to honor the convent that housed her tomb and to place the nuns watching over it under royal protection.

In the years following Rosamund’s death, Henry showed great generosity to the Godstow nuns, making them cash grants and giving them timber for their building projects. Soon gossip was circulating that Henry II’s desire for an annulment of his marriage was not in order to wed Rosamund Clifford, but so that he could marry instead the sixteen-year-old Alix of France, a maiden whom he had already “unchastely, and with too much want of faith, dishonored.” Alix’s father Louis VII had betrothed her to Richard at the Montmirail settlement of 1169, and he had handed her over to be raised at her future father-in-law’s court.

Henry’s ravishing of young Alix was far more shameful to contemporaries than his affair with Rosamund Clifford, for he had taken advantage of a girl entrusted to him as his ward when she was only nine to remain in his household until she reached the proper age for marrying Richard. In taking her to his bed, he had not only violated her trust, but also the trust of her father, his lord the French king, as well as that of his own son. This affair had begun during the queen’s absences from court, but given the rapid circulation of rumors from the royal court, Eleanor heard of the scandal almost at once, whether still in Poitou or sequestered in England later.

The queen would learn that Henry did not limit his adulterous affairs to Alix of France while she was in captivity. He sired another illegitimate son by a Welsh woman, Nest, married to one of his knights from southwestern England. He acknowledged the boy, named Morgan, who became a cleric and eventually was named provost of Beverley, Yorkshire, a lucrative ecclesiastical living that English kings often granted to high-ranking royal servants. News of the king’s liaison with Alix must have left Eleanor appalled, for the king’s conduct not only grossly violated aristocratic standards of honorable behavior, but also betrayed and humiliated her favorite son.

It gave both Eleanor and Richard yet another grievance against Henry. According to a courtier’s hostile account, the king hoped by means of new heirs born to his new favorite that he might “be able effectually to disinherit his former sons by Eleanor, who had troubled him.” The story of Henry II’s seduction of Alix is not simply another scurrilous tale told by his enemies, for several sources corroborate it. Henry was curiously reluctant to carry out the princess’s long-delayed marriage to Richard, despite periodic protests from Louis VII and Philip II and from high-ranking churchmen including the pope complaining on their behalf.

Strongest evidence for the accusation’s accuracy, however, is Richard Lionheart’s own resistance to marrying Alix. Roger of Howden, a chronicler with access to court circles, records Richard’s excuse offered to Philip, her half-brother, for refusing to marry his betrothed of many years at the outset of the Third Crusade. He quotes Richard as telling the French king, “I do not reject your sister; but it is impossible for me to marry her, for my father had slept with her and had a son by her.” Richard then added that he could present many witnesses capable of testifying to the truth of his statement.

At the time, the English king was in the embarrassing position of preparing to take a Spanish princess as his bride, and he needed a potent excuse for breaking off his engagement to Alix. The Lionheart’s most respected modern biographer finds it difficult to discount Howden’s “explicit statement.” Furthermore, the Lionheart need not have lodged such a bitter accusation against his own father in order to justify his rejection of Alix; he could simply have declared that she had borne another man’s child without naming the father.

…As years passed Eleanor was allowed to make sojourns at other castles, certainly to Winchester and Windsor and perhaps as far west as Devonshire, where she had held substantial lands. Within Winchester Castle was a series of buildings that together formed the equivalent of a royal palace; and during Henry II’s reign repairs and additions to the residential quarters were constantly under way. At Winchester, the queen probably encountered her daughter-in-law, Margaret, wife of the Young King, who was a frequent visitor there, for works undertaken in 1174–75 included construction of an addition “where the young queen hears mass.”

In 1176, Robert Mauduit received a payment of almost three pounds by the king’s order, apparently for Eleanor’s expenses during Henry’s Easter court held that year at Winchester. That court marked the last time that she would see all four of her sons together. Richard and Geoffrey had crossed from France for the feast, and they returned to the Continent with their father. Henry the Young King and his queen also left England after Easter, and he would be away from the kingdom for three years before returning for another Easter court at Winchester.

The dullness of Eleanor’s life was brightened by the betrothal of her youngest daughter Joanne in 1176. The captive Eleanor had no voice in negotiations for the eleven-year-old girl’s hand, but she would have been filled with pride at Joanne’s selection as the bride of William II, king of Sicily. William’s kingdom was the creation of eleventh-century Norman adventurers incorporating both Sicily and the southern Italian mainland and heir to traditions of the island’s previous occupiers, Greeks, Romans, and Arabs.

Years earlier Eleanor had seen first-hand the island’s splendors at their height under King Roger II, when her ship from the Holy Land, blown off course, landed her at the cosmopolitan city of Palermo in 1149. By the time William succeeded to the throne, however, Sicily’s greatness was fading into a sort of “Indian summer.” Henry II had sought a Sicilian marriage for one of his daughters earlier, and the project was revived in May 1176, when ambassadors from the Sicilian royal court came to England. They were entertained at Winchester, where Joanne was residing and where Eleanor had remained for a time after the Easter court.

The young princess’s beauty impressed the envoys, and Henry agreed to her betrothal to the young Sicilian ruler. English emissaries set off for Sicily to negotiate the marriage settlement, arriving at Palermo in early August. Perhaps the queen helped in readying her daughter’s trousseau and prepared her for life at the Sicilian royal court by recalling her own visit there years earlier. After Joanne’s departure for her new home, her mother could not have expected to see her ever again, but chance would reunite them on two occasions many years later. In September 1176 Joanne left Winchester for Palermo, loaded with clothing, gold and silver plate, and other impressive gifts to take to her new island home; the cost of one of her robes, no doubt her wedding dress, was over £114.25

In February 1177 in the Palatine Chapel at Palermo, she married William, a young man of twenty-two, and her coronation as his queen quickly followed. Joanne’s Sicilian marriage aroused greater interest among the English than had her two elder sisters’ marriages earlier to foreign princes. English adventurers journeyed south to seek their fortunes, attracted by accounts of the island kingdom’s riches. Artistic and literary inspiration flowed northward from Sicily; mosaics in Sicily’s Byzantine-style churches influenced English wall-paintings and manuscript miniatures, and the Sicilian kingdom became a setting for English romances.”

- Ralph V. Turner, “A Captive Queen’s Lost Years, 1174–1189.” in Eleanor of Aquitaine: Queen of France, Queen of England

#eleanor of aquitaine #eleanor of aquitaine: queen of france queen of england #henry ii of england #alys of france #joan of england #high middle ages #history #medieval #richard i of england #ralph v. turner

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rottenbrainstuff · 3 years ago

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I saw the Green Knight last night! (spoiler-ish discussion towards the end)

What a great big pile of stuff to think about. I haven’t been this surprised by a movie in a long time. It’s a very strange movie in almost every single way, incredibly interesting, and it’s received really glowing critical reviews. I’m torn though. Although it is a striking, strange movie, I feel a lot of the strangeness is style over substance, and amounts to strangeness for the sake of being strange, and I don’t think the movie is able to tie its themes up in the end to make a really emotionally coherent journey. It felt a bit like watching a student film (with a big budget), where it’s this totally fresh, exuberantly experimental thing that is so interesting and different… but needs a bit more polish on the plot to make it an actual story in its own right and not just a stylish experiment. A basic summary: if you want to see something totally different, this movie is for you, just don’t go in expecting an easy, polished Hollywood thriller.

Setting: gorgeous. It’s anachronistic medieval England, and despite the fact that it’s not trying to be historically accurate at all, oddly I feel it captures a better medieval vibe than anything else I’ve seen, period movie or medieval fantasy. At least in terms of the supernatural aspects??? The location: gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous, haunting shots of trees and forests and countryside. (why are there so many shots that are way too dark though?) Sound design: Amazing. Beautiful. I can’t remember a movie that made as much or as effective use of quiet. The scoring is incredibly strange, a mix of haunting vocals of medieval songs, and spooky thrumming sound design. Quite striking. Quite interesting. (the intertitles are an interesting idea but I think they could be more effectively integrated, especially in a movie with so much visual creativity - thinking of, for instance, the subtitle joke in The Man who Killed Don Quixote)

But let’s emphasize one thing very clearly: this movie is in a surrealist style, and that’s not going to be for everyone, it just isn’t. I think it either “clicks” with you, or it simply doesn’t, and that’s ok. I like surrealism. My brain gets it. It’s a fantastic way to tell a story, and creates ambiguity that means everyone who watches it takes away something different. And here, a surreal approach is SO suitable because it’s based on this very old… story, mythology, fairy tale, whatever you want to call it. These old stories do have a strange, absurd, surreal quality to them. It’s perfectly fine when a modern adaption smooths out the strange corners of a story into something that feels more familiar to a modern audience. But it is DELIGHTFUL to watch a movie instead try to embrace that strangeness. I’ve never seen a movie that felt as much like an old fairy tale as this one does. It’s delightful.

HOWEVER.

As I said I’m not 100% sure it all works in the end. It’s a movie that looks absolutely gorgeous, certainly. It’s a movie that is different in almost every way from every single Hollywood movie I’ve seen in years and years, certainly. But without a stronger focus and ESPECIALLY a much tighter ending, I feel it really loses itself in its own strangeness sometimes, and becomes a series of very cool scenes that are fun to think about… but not really a solid story that people will go away talking about. And that is a huge, huge shame, because there IS a strong story in there that wanted to be told, that could have been told with just a little bit more finesse.

And here’s my last big surprise with this movie (spoiler discussion below):

This movie subverts the plot of the original story in an extremely interesting way, but here’s the dealio: I think this movie relies on the audience being familiar with the original plot. Although I don’t know for sure, I would be willing to bet that a significant portion of the audience will not be. I would say probably even the majority. The only reason I actually know the plot of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is that it was a story included in a book I bought for my kids a few years ago. So like. First of all, how can you effectively subvert a story, if a portion of the audience doesn’t even know how it differs? Maybe that’s fine in the end. Even if that’s fine though, there’s like. Great! Big! Huge! Plot points!!! that do not get explained or addressed! There will be a lot of people who have no idea that in the original story, the lord Gawain stays with is actually the Green Knight, who has been transformed by magic. His entire stay there is going to have an ENTIRELY different context to someone who has no familiarity with the story. The Lady’s brilliant and disturbing monologue about how she hates green and what the colour represents to her will have an extra layer of significance for a viewer who knows she is talking about her husband, and what that says about their relationship. The belt! The freaking green belt!!! It is extraordinarily surprising that Gawain decides to take it off at the end! If a viewer doesn’t understand exactly what the belt is supposed to do, that it DOES really, literally protect him and he absolutely WOULD survive the axe blow with it, would they understand how significant it is that he decides to take it off?

I think you COULD make a movie that doesn’t require the audience to know the story… I think you COULD make a movie where the two audience groups will have two very different experiences and each experience will be satisfying in its own way… I just think they didn’t pull it off in this case.

So.

I think there’s a really great story hiding in here about what makes an honorable man, what makes a meaningful life, and how a real man may or may not compare to a fairytale hero. I think there is a very very interesting and very different movie here that was really delightful to see, in a time when movie studios are churning out the same slick and safe formulaic crap. I think it has great performances, great production values. I just can’t necessarily say that it is a *good* movie.

#movie nerdery #the green knight

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jasminewalkerauthor · 8 months ago

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Deep dives into folklore: Gwaine and the green knight

The tale of Gawain and the Green Knight is a captivating narrative deeply rooted in medieval literature, encompassing elements of chivalry, honor, temptation, and redemption. Written anonymously in the late 14th century, it stands as one of the finest examples of Arthurian legend, rich with symbolism and moral complexity. Through a deep dive into its themes, characters, and historical context, we unravel the layers of this timeless story.

To understand Gawain's journey, it's essential to grasp the historical backdrop of the Middle Ages, characterized by feudalism, courtly love, and the code of chivalry. Arthurian legend was particularly popular during this period, serving as a moral compass for knights and nobles. Written in Middle English, Gawain and the Green Knight emerged within this milieu, reflecting the societal norms and values of its time.

The story begins with a mysterious figure, the Green Knight, challenging the knights of King Arthur's court to a game. Gawain, Arthur's nephew and a paragon of chivalry, accepts the challenge. He beheads the Green Knight, who then picks up his severed head and reminds Gawain of their agreement: in one year, Gawain must seek him out to receive a blow in return. The narrative follows Gawain's journey to fulfill his promise, encountering various trials and temptations along the way.

Themes:

Chivalry and Honor: Gawain's adherence to the code of chivalry is central to the narrative. He embodies virtues such as courage, loyalty, and honesty, striving to maintain his honor even in the face of adversity. The Green Knight's challenge tests Gawain's commitment to these ideals, presenting him with moral dilemmas that reveal the complexities of knighthood.

Temptation and Redemption: Gawain's encounter with Lady Bertilak and her attempts to seduce him add layers of psychological depth to the story. The exchange of kisses and the gift of a magical girdle challenge Gawain's fidelity and integrity. His moment of weakness underscores the human struggle between virtue and temptation. However, Gawain's confession and acceptance of the green girdle as a symbol of his fallibility demonstrate his capacity for redemption.

Nature and the Supernatural: The Green Knight's otherworldly nature blurs the boundaries between reality and the supernatural. His resilience after being beheaded and his association with nature suggest a deeper connection to the natural world. This mystical element heightens the sense of wonder and mystery surrounding the narrative, inviting interpretations that transcend the confines of reality.

Characters:

Gawain: As the protagonist, Gawain embodies the ideals of knighthood while also grappling with his humanity. His journey from valor to vulnerability showcases the complexities of his character, making him a relatable and compelling figure for audiences across generations.

The Green Knight: A symbol of the unknown and the enigmatic, the Green Knight serves as a catalyst for Gawain's quest. His unconventional appearance and supernatural abilities challenge conventional notions of heroism, adding an element of intrigue to the narrative.

Lady Bertilak: Lady Bertilak represents both temptation and agency within the story. Her seductive allure tests Gawain's resolve and complicates his moral journey. Despite her role as a temptress, she is also a fully realized character with her own desires and motivations.

Gawain and the Green Knight endures as a timeless masterpiece of medieval literature, captivating readers with its rich tapestry of themes, characters, and symbolism. Through its exploration of chivalry, honor, temptation, and redemption, the story resonates with audiences across cultures and generations, inviting reflection on the complexities of human nature and the eternal struggle between virtue and vice.

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readingaway · 3 years ago

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(Backlisted) Danielle Babbles About Books - The Life and (Medieval) Times of Kit Sweetly by Jamie Pacton

Rating: 5/5 stars

Sensitive content: I don’t remember a lot but it is written about and for people around 16-20 so, proceed with a little caution if you’re younger.

Review: Oh this was darling. It’s been over a year and a half but this book definitely earned its rating which, if you know me, I rarely give out. (The rest of this review was written for an assignment last year and then lost in the endless stream of work and avoiding work.)

Jamie Pacton’s debut novel The Life and (Medieval) Times of Kit Sweetly begins with several conflicts being set up. The first, and most important, is a moral and legal conflict: Kit, the main character, organizes with coworkers to fight for women in her theater dinner workplace to be allowed to work as “knights,” thereby allowing them the opportunity to hold positions with higher pay. This starts with her having to fill in for her older brother, who has the knight job she covets, on the fly. Her display during and after that performance winds up going viral on social media, giving her the momentum to start the fight. Her obstacles are the manger (her uncle), a couple of sexist coworkers, and the corporate board who set the rules in the first place.

There are also several contributing subplots put into play. There’s a conflict over where Kit should go to college – if she gets in anywhere – because her family’s financial situation makes both funding a college education and keeping her mother afloat nearly impossible. Her family’s dire financial straits have to do with her father’s abandoning the family some years before. Kit is also in love with her best friend and regrets a compact to never date him.

The novel doesn’t stray far from many well-worn tropes in the Young Adult genre. Kit is a highly motivated young woman who takes far too much responsibility upon herself. I’d find it unbelievable if I hadn’t known so many girls with similar resolve when I was that age. Kit has a few close friendships and has to make more friends for her dream of knighthood come true. As a teenager and a person there are some problems she can solve with creativity and hard work. And there are other problems that she can’t solve herself. She faces opposition to her attempts to change her workplace’s rules, family issues and emergencies, and the consequences of her own actions varying from chapter to chapter.

I came in worried that this story would be full of heavy-handed performative feminism but was pleasantly surprised. While I still question the validity of many of Kit’s claims about the medieval period in Europe being less rampantly sexist than is popularly believed, it’s useful for the plot. The story also goes well beyond that simplistic idea that girls should be able to do whatever boys do and brings intersectionality into the tale. Kit’s close friends are both people of color. The band of employees who get together to train for a demonstration in order to put greater pressure on the company to change the policy is diverse, representing not just the right of white women to participate in the same activities as white men, but equality for all genders, sexual orientations, and ethnicities. The characters are fleshed out and believable. It’s a delightful book and I look forward to reading more of Pacton’s work in the future. (I have read Lucky Girl now and it’s also great.)

Favorite Quote: can’t find one because my copy is 5,000 miles away and nobody’s pulled or posted quotes.

#the life and medieval times of kit sweetly #jamie pacton #danielle babbles about books #my reviews #book reviews #booklr #backlisted reviews

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human-enthusiast · 3 years ago

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Absurd Person #1 - Monkey D. Luffy (kid)

Let’s start with not only the main protagonist of One Piece but also the first character to give Luffy any sort of injury...

...his dumb, seven-year-old self...

*Disclaimer: I don’t own this image - screenshot from Episode of East Blue

The last time I wrote this, I forgot to hit save and my browser just reloaded the page and lost everything. After that I just went “I’m done” and rage quit Tumblr for the night (which I normally don’t do). That’s how my Sundays usually go😒🥴

Now Onward!

Basic Classifications

Real World Ethnicity/Nationality: Brazilian

Class: farm / country / lower class

Culture (the one he grew up around): Dawn Island - Sea-side village

Fishing community

Farming / Ranching community

Hard work ethic

Small and close community members; relatively friendly; little to non-existent conflict

Selective mix of being open towards strangers (especially with merchant vessels for better trading opportunities) and weariness towards those they expect to be harmful (likes Pirates; I’d imagine the people of Windmill Village were understandably unnerved with the Red-Haired Pirates first showing up).

Core values (personal to Luffy): pride, physical strength, adventures on and outside his home village,

Relation to authority: neutral - shifting slightly towards negative (no clear basis of opinion; can only go off on Luffy’s fascination with pirates as the main viewpoint)

(The added information feels a little scatter-shot but figured I give it a try based on little information from the manga panels and how it lines up with real-world similarities. Most information is based on logical speculation and could change with new information in later chapters.)

I know that the Romance Dawn arc consists of the chapters up until he meets Coby and Alvida (I think...), but the depiction of Luffy’s character in the first chapter seems different from when he is seventeen and setting out to sea. So, I’ll treat kid Luffy as a separate character for the first analysis.

First Impressions and Introduction

Now, I am an anime watcher, first and foremost, so my first impression of this character stems from the Anime. My introduction towards this ball of chaos was when he popped out of a barrel, that he put himself into after realizing that a whirlpool suddenly appeared (how he missed it? - It’s Luffy), and then inexplicably took a nap in. That was the absurd reason I was able to stick with One Piece in the first few arcs (until Baratie became one of the major reasons I stuck with it - I’ll explain why when we get there).

And since the first chapter was used for episode four in the anime, I was already somewhat familiar with how the story started and who Luffy was as a kid. However, reading the first chapter felt....different than what I would’ve expected. And because the anime cut out a few details from the chapter, there definitely are some things to take from kid Luffy at that point.

So my first impression was, as follows:

The kid is unhinged...That explains some things...

Complete wild child of a backwater village from Day 1.

LIKE-- The anime episode DID NOT explain how he got that scar and the guy didn’t bring it up ever. To be fair, that wasn’t a big focus because the anime didn’t make it a focus. Reading that part though did more for his character and a little of his upbringing, through speculation, making it a rather slow-building but also fascinating introduction into this series.

Just a bit of an add-on, but if the manga introduced Luffy in the same level of neutrality as what the Anime did, It may not have fully made it clear if Luffy was going to be the main protagonist. Then again, it’s a shounen manga, maybe it was rather obvious to everyone else. Regardless, his introduction served to

(1) Make his entrance memorable

(2) Establish his character that could either compare or set him apart from his teen self.

(3) Act as a sort of precursor towards the introduction of Luffy’s world and upbringing (which isn’t completely established until the last few arcs of Pre-Time Skip)

Personality

The best way I could describe Luffy at this point is a stereotypical kid...

Energetic, short-tempered, adventure-seeking, easily impressed, and ignorant...

That last description is actually something I brought up in a separate post about the “Fluid themes” of One Piece. Because I found that a small but overarching part in many (almost all) themes and world issues that One Piece reflects has some level of unawareness or apathy. Jimbe put it best during the Fishman Island Flashback when they found Koala (paraphrasing)

“They are afraid of us because they don’t know us.”

Know us referring to acknowledging them as people on the same level as humans.

Because of that and plenty of other instances from the East Blue, it can be a potential center for many characters who go up against or wish to explore the world and find that they are a frog in a well.

And that’s what kid Luffy represents. A rather aggressive frog in a well that wants out.

Granted, he is a seven-year-old, whose schooling has a closer equivalent to the 16th and 17th centuries of our world, living in what appears to be a farming community, so I’d imagine his education only focuses on at least the basic levels of reading/writing, mathematics, etc. A small, unexciting farming village probably has more concerns over their melon crops rather than what the world has going on. Adding in Luffy, you get a kid who dreams about being a pirate and adventuring outside the isolated village, making him avidly interested in a world he has no experience with. Or in a world he thinks is all fun and games.

That’s pretty standard for any child that has a mild and peaceful life. No doubt Shanks and his crew would tell him stories about their adventures. Not as a sort of attempt to make him a pirate, but because he was easily entertained by it, building up this expectation with stereotypical pirate personas. And whether he has his “destructive” tendencies before they became a fixture in Windmill Village, they definitely seemed to amp it up enough for Luffy to try and prove he was “man enough” to be a pirate at seven years old.

Then when you add in this idealistic expectation with the selfishness of a young child, it creates an opportunity to learn. Because, as any kid may go through, will find that their fantasy of the world won’t be what they expected, and will often react negatively. Luffy’s expectation of Shanks is that he is the strongest man worthy enough to be a pirate.

Now, Luffy’s view of a “real man” stems a lot from this stereotype of men solving their problems through fighting only. Which also embodies this rather damaging philosophy of never running away or backing down from a fight (which I refer to as stupid bravery - something that comes up in a certain other character).

The amazing thing about all the combined aspects of this kid is the ability to create a learning lesson for Luffy. Which can become a motivational factor in his pursuit as a pirate.

His easily impressed nature makes it known both when the Red-Haired Pirates talk positively about piracy adventures and when Shanks leaves the village. The difference between the moments can be showcased by the difference in determination and will to make an effort to achieve his dream. As he declared he wants to be King of The Pirates, he sets himself to work at it, rather than try and go with others.

How He Shapes the Story / World Around Them

I don’t know if anybody else made a similar connection (I wanna say someone DID but I can’t remember where) but in combination with Luffy’s general enthusiasm growing up hearing wild stories, his narrative reminds me so much of Don Quixote De La Mancha.

It’s been a while since I last read that story-- and by read I mean translate some paragraphs from Spanish to English during my Spanish I class in freshman year of high school. Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed the story. Part I entails an old man who, after indulging himself with various stories of knights and valor, decides he wants to partake in his own adventures. Under various delusions and misadventures, his story becomes a rather well-known one.

Don Quixote was called the first “modern book”. That was something my Spanish teacher mentioned regarding its acknowledgment by the world and always stuck with me. It was one of the first stories of the early medieval period to focus on a regular man. Other stories before this tended to be about legends, gods, demigods-- individuals who often were referred to as legends because they were born into high status (often above humans). Either through original texts (often for religious purposes) and then through varying interpretations (such as the Arthurian Legends), these tales were a part of the status quo.

Kid Luffy is a person that reflects so much of the Don Quixote story (And not just because his village has windmills-- the most iconic scene about the knight’s story). He is that simple, normal boy that longs for his own adventures when there seemingly is already a well-talked-about story about someone who achieved infamy. In place of that is a man named Gold Roger whose execution we see in the manga’s opening. At this point, we don’t have much understanding about how it impacts the world as of yet, we just know it is setting up for something significant to the story.

Luffy becomes that “regular” person from a small-town with big expectations for a grand adventure.

That perspective can slowly build into the story by starting in a simple setting with a character going through one of the first dynamic changes in his life. Luffy’s experience with Shanks’s sacrifice sets a course in his own adventure. A story that trails into a rather bonkers adventure at the end of chapter 1.

His development is what shaped his world. It’s the way he learns when as it stems from the consequences of his actions. Especially ones where the smaller ones turn out to be very costly, making it a hard lesson that ingrains into the young kid. His actions created by his old ideologies sparked an intense reaction in the people around him. Especially Shanks, who felt he was worth losing an arm towards.

How The WORLD Shapes HIM

So, for the sake of the fact that kid Luffy’s “World” in Chapter 1 mostly consists of Windmill Village, I’m adding in Shank’s and his crew’s influence to extend and further give credence to his influence. Because, as of this point, Shanks represents a glimpse into the life of a pirate that Luffy strives for.

With Luffy being in a quiet environment all seven years of life, there is growth through basic schooling and healthy child development (theoretically since Makino seems to be the most likely one acting as his guardian), instead of doing things outside that norm. Now Shanks is the odd factor that creates new development into Luffy’s dreams and future ambitions.

The crew’s stories, charisma, and connection towards the kid actively (and probably unintentionally) created a positive expectation if he chose to pursue his dream. While that sounds inspiring, there were also negative aspects. Such as driving his ignorance and impatient nature to seek it out too early in his life.

Shanks then became a mediator. Luffy often has mixed feelings with Shanks as the man begets a level of encouragement while verbally making fun of Luffy for being a kid constantly. Despite that, it doesn’t completely deter Luffy’s ambitions. All it does is slowly drop his high expectations in Shanks after the first bar incident. This is again done by his childish outlook of physical strength and bravery equating to his ideal of a real man.

With Higama, Luffy learns about real-world dangers, and how bravery won’t always be enough to win battles. The same can be said for physical strength but at that moment it doesn’t apply to Luffy.

Shanks’ and the crew’s involvement helped Luffy’s views change. His expectations are fulfilled, which in turn reveal that he was wrong about them.

Finally, seeing Shanks’ sacrifice unfold drove Luffy into a pang of newfound guilt. By then, he was able to change one part of his world views from a childish fantasy into the beginnings of a mature way of thinking.

He gains some level of patience. Along with a set goal to work with. Attributes which are identifiable with Luffy in the chapters last few panels.

Patience = Luffy took time to train and learn to set sail at age seventeen.

Set goal = Be King of the Pirates

Add-Ons

When I say that kid Luffy, after Shanks’ sacrifice, gained a level of patience, it is meant as a deduction during that chapter. By no means am I insinuating that it became a permanent trait for his character. Because as of chapter 1, all of Luffy’s personality has yet to be revealed.

And this will apply to other posts for various characters. They may behave in ways during or in response to a particular event but it doesn’t necessarily equate to that becoming a whole personality trait. Calling Luffy patient, with having full acknowledgment of his personality during the bulk of One Piece, is completely off. But, there can and will be moments where Luffy will act patient when he deems it necessary.

This is a little hard to articulate but I hope it makes enough sense.

🏴‍☠️🐒

After-Notes

Here’s my first attempt at this analysis. It felt scattered even after editing everything. Breaking down characters sounds easy (and most times it is) but articulating and connecting things takes a lot of work.

Here's to hoping it gets easier with the next character. And maybe shorter paragraphs.

Up Next: Shanks (East Blue)

#OPA #One Piece #East Blue Saga #Romance Dawn Arc #Monkey D. Luffy #Chapter 1 #One Piece Characters #Worldbuilding #Analysis

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sunnymusingsao3 · 3 years ago

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⭐ please mr director! release the morgwen cut....(where'd your headcanons for gwen come from, what are some challenges you have re: writing them)

Behind the Scenes: Fanfic Edition

Essay incoming! This one got long as well!

Oh bless you for asking me about this; she once was a true love of mine is one of my favorite things I've ever written, and I am always 110% ready to scream about the things that inspired it!

So the answer to your second question goes hand-in-hand with the answer to the first actually, so I'm gonna answer these out of order!

The biggest challenge with these two is mostly just how little we have in canon in regards to their relationship, background, history, and other such information that would typically be very helpful for writing a canon character-- or how two of them relate-- for a fanfic!

With Morgana, we have a little bit, but she's also not often allowed-- in the show, at least-- to be a character outside of being a villain for our heroes to fight, so one challenge with her is understanding what she does in her day-to-day life. What is she doing when she isn't advancing the plot via attempted fratricide, or directly opposing Merlin in some way? Since she can't possibly always be sitting in her tower rubbing her hands together maniacally (or pulling a BBC Merlin and smirking in full view of everyone who suspects her) I want to know what kinds of things she likes to do when she's not in court, or tackling the Big Themes Of The Show.

She's clearly moved on from lessons with Merlin, so she is not spending all her time studying-- though I do think she must be self-taught in shadow magic, so perhaps some days are spent on magic study-- and ToA is set before Morgana starts being a general-purpose villain to throw into your knight's tale (because as any medieval male writer will tell you, there is nothing scarier than a woman with power).

The way I see it, then, is that in order to establish this close friendship that Wizards says Guinevere and Morgana have, a good chunk of Morgana's time must be spent around Guinevere. And for a Guinevere who, in my headcanon, married Arthur for strategic reasons? For a Guinevere who's got a crush on Morgana the size of Arthur's ego? Spending that much time with her is bound to cause some good old fashioned yearning.

And this is where we get into my headcanons for Guinevere. As I said above, the biggest challenge is how little information we have about Guinevere. She's fallen victim to the Disposable Woman trope, and while I don't inherently fault ToA for that (they have plenty of other very strong and developed ladies), it does leave her with very little character beyond "she was Arthur's wife," and "she was Morgana's best friend." (Short sidenote: I really appreciate the Crusading Widower page on TV Tropes's site, for pointing out that the crusading widower is often an anti-hero or even an anti-villain because I think that's absolutely right when it comes to Arthur).

Anyway, all this to say, since there's so little canon, it's basically a perfect sandbox for fanfic writers to come in and have the time of their lives lol, so this is what I have done!

I am a huge Arthuriana nerd (though I am hardly an expert by any means; I'm just a simple fan who enjoys the stories) so when I saw Wizards utilize wildly famous Arthurian characters, I rather lost my mind over the potential.

I have so many headcanons about how to merge ToA and a bunch of Arthuriana plot points/tropes/characterizations, but for the purposes of this, I will stick to Guinevere!

The main way I went about making headcanons for ToA's Guinevere, was to look at what legends I knew about her and see what could apply to the Wizards canon, without contradicting it, in order to fill in these huge gaps.

For example, we know absolutely nothing about where Guinevere came from, so I kept her father and her home city from legend. Since her mother is not even mentioned in the legends, I also translated that over to an absence of her mother in the story, while also giving her at least a mention, as I think she'd be important to Guinevere, even if she hadn't really gotten to meet her properly. I really wanted this story to highlight the responsibilities that Guinevere has within her roles as wife and medieval royal woman, and I think having her consider what her mother would have done in her shoes tied into that theme of Guinevere wondering "what kind of woman do I want to become?" as she grew up. This is also why Igraine is given a moment in the fic as well; Guinevere's relationships with the women around her is something which I think deserves attention, even in a fic where I'm mostly just trying to establish a general timeline and characterization for Guinevere as a whole.

The idea for Guin's mother to have fallen in battle, in fact, came from ToA establishing that some of the background Camelot knights are men, and some are women, and it's treated as perfectly normal, as far as I noticed. Claire has that one line about a "boy's club," but I do think that it's actually just that she couldn't compete because she wasn't registered as a knight. I might be wrong about that, but I really liked the idea of there being knights in Camelot who are women, and I wanted to keep that in the fic I was writing. Therefore, I think that Guinevere's mother was both a queen and a knight, or, at least, a skilled warrior. Similarly, I also think that Guinevere's father is most known for his relationship with the Pendragons in legend. This then translated to her father being the diplomat, to tie in with her mother being the fighter. I didn't dwell too much on that because, again, the fic was meant to focus on Guinevere, and it had already gotten longer than I'd meant for it to. But, I tried to give a hint at that in the way that Guinevere's father is the one who physically takes Guin's bow, and puts a crown in her hands instead. He's not saying she can't be a fighter, but he is emphasizing that she also needs to be ready to appear in other kingdoms in a formal setting. I like to think that Leodegrance would have wanted Guinevere to have both options, to be a bit more well-rounded than he or her mother were.

Brief addition before I move on to the next phase of the fic: I chose a bow because when the stalkling advances on her, she tries using a stick to fight it off, but shows a bit of an ineptitude at using a weapon like that. Since I didn't want that to turn into "she's a weak royal who couldn't fight at all," especially since it seems to me that most of the time, being royal in the Middle Ages also meant receiving fight training, I chose for her to be better at ranged weapons, like bows, crossbows, maybe even spear throwing.

At any rate, my headcanons from there were created in a similar fashion to the ones mentioned above; I used a mixture of ToA canon (ex: Arthur, Morgana, and Guinevere being shown as childhood friends; Morgana and Guinevere spending time in the woods) and Arthuriana (ex: pulling the sword in the stone, losing it, getting it reforged by Nimue; Leodegrance bringing the round table as Guinevere's dowry; Merlin being a royal advisor).

Now, since this isn't much of a Morgwen cut just yet (so sorry omg), I wanted to skip ahead to the Morgwen pining moments, to talk about them!

The juxtaposition between a burning candle flame representing her love for Morgana, and an uncomfortable midnight cuddle from Arthur (where she can't even bring herself to scratch her nose-- an irritant meant to heighten that feeling of discomfort) representing her relationship with him, is one of my favorite ways to examine the wild difference in how Guinevere sees both relationships. One is untouchable but beautiful, interesting. It burns, and it's bright, and getting too near it hurts too bad.

And then on the other hand, one is there always, it's inescapable, but mostly sweet, though it comes up short of providing comfort. It's not bad, and it's even gentle, and Arthur does love her, but she married him for diplomacy. She married him because it's expected, and it keeps her safe.

(Which, sidenote: I think some stories work well with period-accurate homophobia, and others do not. This is one I would not have put period-accurate homophobia in, as it's fantasy and legend, and I think it's more interesting if Guinevere can't pick Morgana not because of Morgana also being a woman, but because Guinevere is bound by her duties as a royal).

The last thing I wanna talk about is that I have considered writing another Morgwen fic, but I'm just not sure what kind of plot hook or idea I'd like to pursue. So, if there's interest, or any requests that someone might have for these two, please do feel free to ask away! I think their relationship is really interesting, and I'd be delighted to keep writing for them. Guinevere is a fascinating character in particular, and is one who I think, even in legend, sometimes gets boiled down a lot, so I wanna add some depth back into her character, and give her a chance to shine!

Thank you so much for asking, and if there's anything else you're curious about, don't hesitate to send it my way! Like I said, I am always happy to holler about Guinevere and Morgwen! <3

#answered asks #sidhewrites

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danielmouradjensen · 4 years ago

Text

Canterbury Tales - in a historical/social context

In this essay the reader will be enlighten with an extremely short introduction to Canterbury Tales and the skillful poet behind this unique master piece, written in Middle English. Due to the size and focus of the paper, the Pardoner’s Tale, the Parson’s Tale and the wife of Bath’s Tale, including the prologues, will be selected among the 24 stories in Canterbury Tales. It will therefore be these three tales, which will be placed in a historical and social context. The main question in the essay is, “Which historical events are worth mentioning when discussing, the three specific tales, in Canterbury Tales?”

In Canterbury Tales (1387 - 1400.), the readers are introduced with a variety of personalities, like the Pardoner, the Parson, the Clerk, the Knight and the Wife of Bath. These mentioned characters are all pilgrims heading towards Canterbury. The tales are not written in Latin or French, which were languages preferred at that time but in Middle English. The Canterbury Tales were meant for a specific group of people and not the whole population in England1. Reading aloud was regarded as a social event in the time Chaucer.

It is also presumed that Geoffrey Chaucer did not write to achieve the benefits of fame. Canterbury Tales were of course handwritten on various manuscripts because it was much later, more specific, in the year 14762, that William Caxton introduced the first printing press in England. When the tales, which are quite amusing, were written, it was in a time or period of war, sickness and despair. It is from within the tales that the reader learns more about the society in the late Middle Ages. It is worth mentioning, that Chaucer had an advantage among his peers, in that he was a member of the court of King Richard II of England (1367-1400).

Furthermore, it is quite important to take notice that Chaucer the Poet uses a light satirical tone when introducing the many characters, in the different tales. Geoffrey Chaucer, as the genius he was, created a persona who is himself, in order to be part of the tales. In Canterbury Tales, the author and the narrator merge - another unique feature in the tales.

The Pardoner’s tale, the Parson’s tales and the Wife of Bath

As promised, the three tales will be placed in a historical (social) context: the role of the Church in England, the Great Western Schism, the Lollards, and the Hundred Year’s War as well as the Black Death. The Peasants’ Revolt, in 1381, will unfortunately not be discussed in this essay. This historical event would be interesting in connection with especially the Knight’s Tale.

The Pardoner’s tale

But, sirs, one thing that slipped my memory when I spoke my tale: I've relics, pardons in My pouch, in England none could finer be, The pope's own hand entrusted them to me. If anyone devoutly has resolved To make a gift and by me be absolved, Come forth at once and meekly on your knees Receive my pardon. Or, if you so please, Take for yourself a pardon as you go--One fresh and new at every town--just so You offer to me, all the while we ride, Some pence and nobles that are bonafide. (l. 919 – 930, Canterbury Tales, “the Pardoner’s Tale”)3

Is the Pardoner a charlatan or a true holy man? Geoffrey Chaucer describes this character as a man more interested in selling relics and enjoy life’s pleasures than helping others of the goodness of his heart. As an example from “The Pardoner's Portrait”: “He'd make more money in one day alone Than would the parson two months come and gone. So he made apes, with all the tricks he'd do, Of parson and of congregation too.” (l. 703 – 706, Canterbury Tales, “General Prologue”)4. However, in line 708 Chaucer writes: “In church he was a fine ecclesiastic”. The theme in the Pardoner´s tale is that the root to all evil is money. And money is what the pardoner likes. A greedy man who speaks about greed. Again, it becomes evident that Chaucer does not find the Pardoner worthy of his position as a man of the Church. Because of irony, the reader has to read between the lines.

In the late Middle Ages many historical events occurred, among them was the Western Schism (1378-1417), which resulted in a slit of the Roman Catholic Church. During a very long period, rivalries for the papacy led to a deep political crisis within the Church. Even after the truce with France, in 1389, England continued, very firmly, to support Rome, not Avignon, and would not offer any real solutions to end the Schism5. In the tales, it is also from Rome where the church authority derives from.

It is here, it is very interesting to talk about the role or status of the Church in England, during the lifetime of Chaucer. Was the Church in England strong or weak? At the time of Chaucer, the church was weak due to the Western Schism, mentioned above, the Black Death (1346–1353) and greedy/selfish churchmen6.

In England, the Black Death, which almost killed half of the population and the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453), led to an increase of self-serving churchmen – like the Pardoner in Canterbury Tales. The people of England were in pain and needed help and guidance, which meant a great opportunity for greedy and self-absorbed men of the church to exploit it. To further elaborate on the Hundred Years' War, which Geoffrey Chaucer himself participated in, even more death and suffering befell the people of England. France was also hurting and bleeding. The long war did not only bring serious social and economic changes in the English and French societies but also affected the writing of Geoffrey Chaucer.

The Black Death had a huge impact on the English society as a whole, not only were people dying but the way they died was horrific. There is a line/phrase saying: “there were hardly enough living to care for the sick and bury the dead”7. The plague affected the economy, politics and religion. It also had an impact on culture and arts. What is quite interesting is that the plague as well as the Hundred Years' War actually empowered the people.

Geoffrey Chaucer knew because of his place in the higher classes, the realities of the church and the abuses of the clergy. This gave Chaucer the opportunity to use humorous irony in the tales. Making fun of the mischiefs of the clergy was not something new at that time8. In addition to this, Chaucer was acquainted with John Wyclif, theologian and reformer, which contributed to a harsher stand towards the clergy in England.

No institution in fourteenth-century England was so often the object of satire as the Church. The great organization, with its wealth, its power, and its conservative traditions, might have been expected to offer a safeguard against social decay; but the Church itself was a fruitful breeding-ground for the very things, which were disorganizing feudal society. (A Chaucer handbook, p. 35)9

Going in depth with the Pardoner’s Tale, Death has a vital role, and might be viewed as the plague, which, stated above, ravaged England. Death, or the personification of Death, was something that Chaucer’s audience could identify with. The Pardoner’s Tale is the only tale set during the Black Plague.

The Parson’s Tale

There was a good man of religion, too, A PARSON of a certain township who Was poor, but rich in holy thought and work. He also was a learned man, a clerk; The Christian gospel he would truly preach, Devoutly his parishioners to teach. Benign he was, in diligence a wonder, And patient in adversity, as under Such he'd proven many times. And loath He was to get his tithes by threatening oath; For he would rather give, without a doubt, To all the poor parishioners about From his own substance and the offerings. (l. 477 – 489, Canterbury Tales, “General Prologue”)10

In the Parson’s Tale, the reader is now introduced to a different character than the Pardoner. It is the last and longest tale in Canterbury Tales. The funny thing is that, the tale is not even a tale:

It is a penitential manual, a curious choice because nearly all such vehicles of religious instruction were prepared by the clergy or by mystics. It is largely derivative, using material common to so many treatises that only a few of the actual sources can be established with some certainty. (Sermon and Penitential in The Parson’s Tale and their Effect on Style, p. 125)11

The Parson tells the others that he does not want to amuse them and therefore he chooses instead a sermon. From the Prologue: “You won't get any fable told by me; For Saint Paul, as he writes to Timothy, Reproves those who abandon truthfulness for fable-telling and such wretchedness.” (l. 31 - 34, Canterbury Tales, “The Parson's Tale PROLOGUE”)12

He could definitely be viewed as a more positive face of the church, according to Chaucer, than the persona, which the Pardoner represented. It is also worth noticing that, from the descriptions in the Prologue, the Parson, the Knight and the Ploughman represent the three traditional spheres of medieval society13.

It could also be worth placing “the Parson’s Tale” in context with the Lollards. As mentioned before, Chaucer was in contact with John Wyclif, who was convinced that the Bible and God had the highest authority and that the clergy should not own property. He also translated the Bible into Middle English14, which made it a lot easier for those who did not understand Latin. The Lollards followed John Wyclif and in the beginning, his supporters were from Oxford University and the royal court but the “movement” became increasingly popular outside “the inner circle”. The Lollards were critical towards the Church, which of course made them quite unpopular with the established clergy. The monastic leaders were not keen to follow or abide the views of John Wyclif and his followers. During the Black Death, Wyclif saw many flaws and weaknesses in the Church. It was believed that Rome was the enemy, and that the devote Christian only needed the local pastor and congregation15. The Lollards also saw sacraments as fake, which meant the reformers wanted to change the core in the Catholic Church. Wyclif died naturally even though the Church wanted him executed for heresy.

There could also be links between Parson’s tale and the ideas of the Lollards. According to Frances McCormack,16 there could be some similarities with the vocabulary in the tale and that of the Lollards. As also stated in the beginning that Chaucer did not write to a large group of people, he had a specific audience (like the royal court) and among these members were those who, in one way or another, supported the ideas of the Lollards.

The Wife of Bath’s Tale

She was a worthy woman all her life: At church door with five men she'd been a wife, Not counting all the company of her youth.(No need to treat that now, but it's the truth.) She'd journeyed to Jerusalem three times; Strange rivers she had crossed in foreign climes; She'd been to Rome and also to Boulogne, To Galicia for Saint James and to Cologne, And she knew much of wandering by the way. She had the lover's gap teeth, I must say. With ease upon an ambling horse she sat, Well wimpled, while upon her head her hat Was broad as any buckler to be found. (l. 459– 471, Canterbury Tales, “General Prologue”)17

Another very interesting character and pilgrim in Canterbury Tales is the Wife of Bath who sounds more like a modern woman and a feminist from the late 20th century than a woman from the late Middle Ages. This eccentric character, actually named Alison (line 804, The Wife of Bath's Tale PROLOGUE), is not afraid to speak her mind about former husbands, marriage and her sex-life. She does not sound like what a typical pilgrim should be and act. As an example, in the following quote, the reader learns what men’s “instruments” are actually used for:

That learned men I not provoke to oath, I mean to say that they were made for both--That is, both for relief and for our ease To procreate, so God we not displease. Why else should men into their ledgers set That every man yield to his wife her debt? And how can he pay this emolument Unless he use his simple instrument? That's why upon all creatures these are set, To urinate and also to beget. (l. 125 - 134, Canterbury Tales, “The Wife of Bath's Tale PROLOGUE”)18

She is one of the few women among the pilgrims, but she is not afraid to speak her mind and rebel against the patriarchal powers19. The Pardoner tries to interrupt her by flatter, but it does not work and she continuous:

The Pardoner spoke up immediately. "Now dame, by God and by Saint John," said he, "As a noble preacher on the case you'll pass. I almost wed a wife, but then, alas, Why buy it with my flesh, a price so dear? I'd rather not get married, not this year." "Abide," she said, "my tale is not begun! No, you'll be drinking from another tun, Before I'm through, that tastes much worse than ale. (l. 163 - 171, Canterbury Tales, “The Wife of Bath's Tale)20

In “Feminist Readings in Middle English Literature”, a very important point is made: “Recognition of the cultural meanings that are spoken through female voices can be a starting place for the exploration of forms of power and power relations in the Middle Ages.”21 The Wife of Bath (still looking for husband number six), is also a woman who has been on several pilgrimages. Furthermore, she is a woman who travels alone. In her tale, the readers learn about the knight, who rapes a fair maiden and as a punishment/challenge must answer what it is women what most of all. The queen who offers the knight a second chance is none other than Guinevere, the wife of King Arthur. What is important to point out, is that stories of King Arthur were quite popular at the time of Chaucer. Alison speaks of magic and magical creatures, which at that time, the established Church viewed as pagan beliefs. The tale begins with:

In the old days of King Arthur, today Still praised by Britons in a special way, This land was filled with fairies all about. The elf-queen with her jolly little rout In many a green field often danced. (l. 857 - 861, Canterbury Tales, “The Wife of Bath's Tale)22

When exploring the Wife of Bath’s tale in a historical context, it is also interesting to look at the Beguines in the mid and late Middle Ages. The Beguines were women who devoted their lives to God. In a time where there were more women than men, this specific life of a Beguine provided a safe haven for women without husbands.

The conclusion of the essay

When the Geoffrey Chaucer created the 24 spectacular tales, which were not only amusing and ironic/satirical, it was in a period of war, illness and despair. It is from within the tales and prologues that the reader has the opportunity to study the English society in the late Middle Ages. It is also worth mentioning, that Chaucer had an advantage among his countrymen, in that he was a member of the court of King Richard II of England (1367-1400).

A crucial religious and historical event took place in the western Christian world, which without doubt affected the religious thoughts and views of many people, in the different layers of the societies, in the late Middle Ages. The Western Schism (1378-1417) resulted in a slit of the Roman Catholic Church. During a very long period, rivalries for the papacy and/or authority led to a deep political crisis within the Church.

At the time of Chaucer, the church was weak due to the Western Schism, mentioned earlier, the Black Death (1346–1353) and corrupted churchmen.

In England, the Black Plague, which almost exterminated half of the population and the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453), led to an increase of self-serving churchmen – like the greedy Pardoner in Canterbury Tales. The people of England were in pain and were in seek of help and guidance, which meant a great opportunity for greedy and self-absorbed men of the church to exploit it. As mentioned in the essay, the Black Death had a huge impact on the English society as a whole, not only were the population dying but the way they died was unbelievable. There is a line/phrase, to further illustrating the Black Plague, saying: “there were hardly enough living to care for the sick and bury the dead”. The Black Death affected the economy, politics and religion. It also changed the culture and arts (including, the writing of Chaucer).

Placing “the Parson’s Tale” in context with the Lollards, makes som sense. As mentioned before, Chaucer was in contact with John Wyclif, who was convinced that it was only God and the Bible, which had the real authority. That the clergy should not possess property, which they indeed did. The Lollards were critical towards the Church, which of course made them quite unpopular with the clergy. The monastic leaders were not keen to follow or abide the radical views of John Wyclif and his supporters. During the Black Death, Wyclif saw many flaws and weaknesses in the established Church. Geoffrey Chaucer knew, due to his status and as member of the royal court, the realities of the church and the abuses of the clergymen. This gave Chaucer the opportunity to use humorous irony in the tales. Chaucer had an idea on how the clergy should act and was frustrated with how they actually acted, as an example the Parson vs. the Pardoner.

It is also worth recalling that, from the descriptions in the Prologue, the Parson, the Knight and the Ploughman represent the three traditional spheres of medieval society. Another very interesting female character and pilgrim in Canterbury Tales is the Wife of Bath. She sounds more like a modern woman and a feminist from the late 20th century than a woman from the late Middle Ages. She might even represent some women in this specific period.

Bibliography

Blades,William. The Life and Typography of William Caxton, England's First Printer - With Evidence of his Typographical Connection with Colard Mansion, the Printer at Bruges. Cambridge University Press, 2014.

Byrne, Joseph. Encyclopedia of the Black Death. ABC-CLIO, 2012.

Creighton, James Joseph. Chaucer's Presentation of the Church in the Canterbury Tales. Master’s theses, Loyola University Chicago, 1957

Evans, Ruth and Leslie Johnson. Feminist Readings in Middle English Literature: The Wife of Bath and All Her Sect. Routledge, 2005.

French, Robert Dudley. A Chaucer handbook. New York, 1947.

Manly, John Matthews. Some New Light on Chaucer. Henry Holt, 1926.

McCormack, Frances Mary. Author of Chaucer and the Culture of Dissent: The Lollard Context and Subtext of the Parson's Tale Four. Courts Press, 2007.

Palmer, J. J. N.. England and the Great Western Schism, 1388-1399”, The English Historical Review Vol. 83, No. 328 .Jul., 1968.

Rowland, Beryl. Sermon and Penitential in The Parson’s Tale and their Effect on Style. Florilegium 9, 1987.

Black Death: The lasting impact by Professor Tom James, last accessed Monday, October 24, 2016, http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/middle_ages/black_impact_01.shtml

General Prologue, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, english.fsu.edu/canterbury/general.html

John Wycliffe and The Lollards, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/special/varia/lollards/lollards.html

The Pardoner's Tale, last accessed Friday, October 21, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/pardoner.html

The Parson's Tale PROLOGUE, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, english.fsu.edu/canterbury/parsonpro.html

The Wife of Bath's Tale, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/wife.html

The Wife of Bath's Tale PROLOGUE, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/wifepro.html

1 John Matthews Manly, Some New Light on Chaucer (Henry Holt, 1926), 76.

2 William Blades, The Life and Typography of William Caxton, England's First Printer - With Evidence of his Typographical Connection with Colard Mansion, the Printer at Bruges (Cambridge University Press, 2014), 62-63.

3 The Pardoner's Tale, last accessed Friday, October 21, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/pardoner.html

4 General Prologue, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, english.fsu.edu/canterbury/general.html

5 J. J. N. Palmer, ”England and the Great Western Schism, 1388-1399”, The English Historical Review Vol. 83, No. 328 (Jul., 1968): 516

6 James Joseph Creighton, “Chaucer's Presentation of the Church in the Canterbury Tales”, (Master’s theses, Loyola University Chicago, 1957): 13

7 Black Death: The lasting impact by Professor Tom James, last accessed Monday, October 24, 2016, http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/middle_ages/black_impact_01.shtml

8 James Joseph Creighton, “Chaucer's Presentation of the Church in the Canterbury Tales”, 11

9 Robert Dudley French, A Chaucer handbook (New York, 1947)

10 General Prologue, last accessed Sunday, Monday 24, 2016, english.fsu.edu/canterbury/general.html

11 Beryl Rowland, “Sermon and Penitential in The Parson’s Tale and their Effect on Style”, Florilegium 9 (1987): 125

12 The Parson's Tale PROLOGUE, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, english.fsu.edu/canterbury/parsonpro.html

13 Black Death: The lasting impact by Professor Tom James, last accessed Monday, October 24, 2016, http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/middle_ages/black_impact_01.shtml

14 John Wycliffe and The Lollards, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/special/varia/lollards/lollards.html

15 Joseph Byrne, Encyclopedia of the Black Death (ABC-CLIO, 2012), 214

16 Frances Mary McCormack, Author of Chaucer and the Culture of Dissent: The Lollard Context and Subtext of the Parson's Tale (Four Courts Press, 2007)

17 General Prologue, last accessed Sunday, Monday 24, 2016, english.fsu.edu/canterbury/general.html

18 The Wife of Bath's Tale PROLOGUE, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/wifepro.html

19 Ruth Evans and Leslie Johnson, Feminist Readings in Middle English Literature : The Wife of Bath and All Her Sect (Routledge, 2005), 1.

20 The Wife of Bath's Tale, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/wife.html

21 Ruth Evans and Leslie Johnson, Feminist Readings, 2.

22 The Wife of Bath's Tale, last accessed Sunday, October 23, 2016, http://english.fsu.edu/canterbury/wife.html

#geoffrey chaucer #history #litterature

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homosexualisopod · 4 years ago

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Manifesto of the Communist Party

A spectre is haunting Europe — the spectre of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Pope and Tsar, Metternich and Guizot, French Radicals and German police-spies.

Where is the party in opposition that has not been decried as communistic by its opponents in power? Where is the opposition that has not hurled back the branding reproach of communism, against the more advanced opposition parties, as well as against its reactionary adversaries?

Two things result from this fact:

I. Communism is already acknowledged by all European powers to be itself a power.

II. It is high time that Communists should openly, in the face of the whole world, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies, and meet this nursery tale of the Spectre of Communism with a manifesto of the party itself.

To this end, Communists of various nationalities have assembled in London and sketched the following manifesto, to be published in the English, French, German, Italian, Flemish and Danish languages.

Chapter I. Bourgeois and Proletarians(1)

[German Original]

The history of all hitherto existing society(2) is the history of class struggles.

Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master(3) and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.

In the earlier epochs of history, we find almost everywhere a complicated arrangement of society into various orders, a manifold gradation of social rank. In ancient Rome we have patricians, knights, plebeians, slaves; in the Middle Ages, feudal lords, vassals, guild-masters, journeymen, apprentices, serfs; in almost all of these classes, again, subordinate gradations.

The modern bourgeois society that has sprouted from the ruins of feudal society has not done away with class antagonisms. It has but established new classes, new conditions of oppression, new forms of struggle in place of the old ones.

Our epoch, the epoch of the bourgeoisie, possesses, however, this distinct feature: it has simplified class antagonisms. Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes directly facing each other — Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.

From the serfs of the Middle Ages sprang the chartered burghers of the earliest towns. From these burgesses the first elements of the bourgeoisie were developed.

The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonisation of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.

The feudal system of industry, in which industrial production was monopolised by closed guilds, now no longer sufficed for the growing wants of the new markets. The manufacturing system took its place. The guild-masters were pushed on one side by the manufacturing middle class; division of labour between the different corporate guilds vanished in the face of division of labour in each single workshop.

Meantime the markets kept ever growing, the demand ever rising. Even manufacturer no longer sufficed. Thereupon, steam and machinery revolutionised industrial production. The place of manufacture was taken by the giant, Modern Industry; the place of the industrial middle class by industrial millionaires, the leaders of the whole industrial armies, the modern bourgeois.

Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. This development has, in its turn, reacted on the extension of industry; and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation, railways extended, in the same proportion the bourgeoisie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the background every class handed down from the Middle Ages.

We see, therefore, how the modern bourgeoisie is itself the product of a long course of development, of a series of revolutions in the modes of production and of exchange.

Each step in the development of the bourgeoisie was accompanied by a corresponding political advance of that class. An oppressed class under the sway of the feudal nobility, an armed and self-governing association in the medieval commune(4): here independent urban republic (as in Italy and Germany); there taxable “third estate” of the monarchy (as in France); afterwards, in the period of manufacturing proper, serving either the semi-feudal or the absolute monarchy as a counterpoise against the nobility, and, in fact, cornerstone of the great monarchies in general, the bourgeoisie has at last, since the establishment of Modern Industry and of the world market, conquered for itself, in the modern representative State, exclusive political sway. The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.

The bourgeoisie, historically, has played a most revolutionary part.

The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors”, and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”. It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom — Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.

The bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honoured and looked up to with reverent awe. It has converted the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science, into its paid wage labourers.

The bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation to a mere money relation.

The bourgeoisie has disclosed how it came to pass that the brutal display of vigour in the Middle Ages, which reactionaries so much admire, found its fitting complement in the most slothful indolence. It has been the first to show what man’s activity can bring about. It has accomplished wonders far surpassing Egyptian pyramids, Roman aqueducts, and Gothic cathedrals; it has conducted expeditions that put in the shade all former Exoduses of nations and crusades.

The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.

The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the entire surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connexions everywhere.

The bourgeoisie has through its exploitation of the world market given a cosmopolitan character to production and consumption in every country. To the great chagrin of Reactionists, it has drawn from under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood. All old-established national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new industries, whose introduction becomes a life and death question for all civilised nations, by industries that no longer work up indigenous raw material, but raw material drawn from the remotest zones; industries whose products are consumed, not only at home, but in every quarter of the globe. In place of the old wants, satisfied by the production of the country, we find new wants, requiring for their satisfaction the products of distant lands and climes. In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal inter-dependence of nations. And as in material, so also in intellectual production. The intellectual creations of individual nations become common property. National one-sidedness and narrow-mindedness become more and more impossible, and from the numerous national and local literatures, there arises a world literature.

The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation. The cheap prices of commodities are the heavy artillery with which it batters down all Chinese walls, with which it forces the barbarians’ intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate. It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilisation into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image.

The bourgeoisie has subjected the country to the rule of the towns. It has created enormous cities, has greatly increased the urban population as compared with the rural, and has thus rescued a considerable part of the population from the idiocy of rural life. Just as it has made the country dependent on the towns, so it has made barbarian and semi-barbarian countries dependent on the civilised ones, nations of peasants on nations of bourgeois, the East on the West.

The bourgeoisie keeps more and more doing away with the scattered state of the population, of the means of production, and of property. It has agglomerated population, centralised the means of production, and has concentrated property in a few hands. The necessary consequence of this was political centralisation. Independent, or but loosely connected provinces, with separate interests, laws, governments, and systems of taxation, became lumped together into one nation, with one government, one code of laws, one national class-interest, one frontier, and one customs-tariff.

The bourgeoisie, during its rule of scarce one hundred years, has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together. Subjection of Nature’s forces to man, machinery, application of chemistry to industry and agriculture, steam-navigation, railways, electric telegraphs, clearing of whole continents for cultivation, canalisation of rivers, whole populations conjured out of the ground — what earlier century had even a presentiment that such productive forces slumbered in the lap of social labour?

We see then: the means of production and of exchange, on whose foundation the bourgeoisie built itself up, were generated in feudal society. At a certain stage in the development of these means of production and of exchange, the conditions under which feudal society produced and exchanged, the feudal organisation of agriculture and manufacturing industry, in one word, the feudal relations of property became no longer compatible with the already developed productive forces; they became so many fetters. They had to be burst asunder; they were burst asunder.

Into their place stepped free competition, accompanied by a social and political constitution adapted in it, and the economic and political sway of the bourgeois class.

A similar movement is going on before our own eyes. Modern bourgeois society, with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells. For many a decade past the history of industry and commerce is but the history of the revolt of modern productive forces against modern conditions of production, against the property relations that are the conditions for the existence of the bourgeois and of its rule. It is enough to mention the commercial crises that by their periodical return put the existence of the entire bourgeois society on its trial, each time more threateningly. In these crises, a great part not only of the existing products, but also of the previously created productive forces, are periodically destroyed. In these crises, there breaks out an epidemic that, in all earlier epochs, would have seemed an absurdity — the epidemic of over-production. Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation, had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed; and why? Because there is too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce. The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property; on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions, by which they are fettered, and so soon as they overcome these fetters, they bring disorder into the whole of bourgeois society, endanger the existence of bourgeois property. The conditions of bourgeois society are too narrow to comprise the wealth created by them. And how does the bourgeoisie get over these crises? On the one hand by enforced destruction of a mass of productive forces; on the other, by the conquest of new markets, and by the more thorough exploitation of the old ones. That is to say, by paving the way for more extensive and more destructive crises, and by diminishing the means whereby crises are prevented.

The weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled feudalism to the ground are now turned against the bourgeoisie itself.

But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons — the modern working class — the proletarians.

In proportion as the bourgeoisie, i.e., capital, is developed, in the same proportion is the proletariat, the modern working class, developed — a class of labourers, who live only so long as they find work, and who find work only so long as their labour increases capital. These labourers, who must sell themselves piecemeal, are a commodity, like every other article of commerce, and are consequently exposed to all the vicissitudes of competition, to all the fluctuations of the market.

Owing to the extensive use of machinery, and to the division of labour, the work of the proletarians has lost all individual character, and, consequently, all charm for the workman. He becomes an appendage of the machine, and it is only the most simple, most monotonous, and most easily acquired knack, that is required of him. Hence, the cost of production of a workman is restricted, almost entirely, to the means of subsistence that he requires for maintenance, and for the propagation of his race. But the price of a commodity, and therefore also of labour, is equal to its cost of production. In proportion, therefore, as the repulsiveness of the work increases, the wage decreases. Nay more, in proportion as the use of machinery and division of labour increases, in the same proportion the burden of toil also increases, whether by prolongation of the working hours, by the increase of the work exacted in a given time or by increased speed of machinery, etc.

Modern Industry has converted the little workshop of the patriarchal master into the great factory of the industrial capitalist. Masses of labourers, crowded into the factory, are organised like soldiers. As privates of the industrial army they are placed under the command of a perfect hierarchy of officers and sergeants. Not only are they slaves of the bourgeois class, and of the bourgeois State; they are daily and hourly enslaved by the machine, by the overlooker, and, above all, by the individual bourgeois manufacturer himself. The more openly this despotism proclaims gain to be its end and aim, the more petty, the more hateful and the more embittering it is.

The less the skill and exertion of strength implied in manual labour, in other words, the more modern industry becomes developed, the more is the labour of men superseded by that of women. Differences of age and sex have no longer any distinctive social validity for the working class. All are instruments of labour, more or less expensive to use, according to their age and sex.

No sooner is the exploitation of the labourer by the manufacturer, so far, at an end, that he receives his wages in cash, than he is set upon by the other portions of the bourgeoisie, the landlord, the shopkeeper, the pawnbroker, etc.

The lower strata of the middle class — the small tradespeople, shopkeepers, and retired tradesmen generally, the handicraftsmen and peasants — all these sink gradually into the proletariat, partly because their diminutive capital does not suffice for the scale on which Modern Industry is carried on, and is swamped in the competition with the large capitalists, partly because their specialised skill is rendered worthless by new methods of production. Thus the proletariat is recruited from all classes of the population.

The proletariat goes through various stages of development. With its birth begins its struggle with the bourgeoisie. At first the contest is carried on by individual labourers, then by the workpeople of a factory, then by the operative of one trade, in one locality, against the individual bourgeois who directly exploits them. They direct their attacks not against the bourgeois conditions of production, but against the instruments of production themselves; they destroy imported wares that compete with their labour, they smash to pieces machinery, they set factories ablaze, they seek to restore by force the vanished status of the workman of the Middle Ages.

At this stage, the labourers still form an incoherent mass scattered over the whole country, and broken up by their mutual competition. If anywhere they unite to form more compact bodies, this is not yet the consequence of their own active union, but of the union of the bourgeoisie, which class, in order to attain its own political ends, is compelled to set the whole proletariat in motion, and is moreover yet, for a time, able to do so. At this stage, therefore, the proletarians do not fight their enemies, but the enemies of their enemies, the remnants of absolute monarchy, the landowners, the non-industrial bourgeois, the petty bourgeois. Thus, the whole historical movement is concentrated in the hands of the bourgeoisie; every victory so obtained is a victory for the bourgeoisie.

But with the development of industry, the proletariat not only increases in number; it becomes concentrated in greater masses, its strength grows, and it feels that strength more. The various interests and conditions of life within the ranks of the proletariat are more and more equalised, in proportion as machinery obliterates all distinctions of labour, and nearly everywhere reduces wages to the same low level. The growing competition among the bourgeois, and the resulting commercial crises, make the wages of the workers ever more fluctuating. The increasing improvement of machinery, ever more rapidly developing, makes their livelihood more and more precarious; the collisions between individual workmen and individual bourgeois take more and more the character of collisions between two classes. Thereupon, the workers begin to form combinations (Trades’ Unions) against the bourgeois; they club together in order to keep up the rate of wages; they found permanent associations in order to make provision beforehand for these occasional revolts. Here and there, the contest breaks out into riots.

Now and then the workers are victorious, but only for a time. The real fruit of their battles lies, not in the immediate result, but in the ever expanding union of the workers. This union is helped on by the improved means of communication that are created by modern industry, and that place the workers of different localities in contact with one another. It was just this contact that was needed to centralise the numerous local struggles, all of the same character, into one national struggle between classes. But every class struggle is a political struggle. And that union, to attain which the burghers of the Middle Ages, with their miserable highways, required centuries, the modern proletarian, thanks to railways, achieve in a few years.

This organisation of the proletarians into a class, and, consequently into a political party, is continually being upset again by the competition between the workers themselves. But it ever rises up again, stronger, firmer, mightier. It compels legislative recognition of particular interests of the workers, by taking advantage of the divisions among the bourgeoisie itself. Thus, the ten-hours’ bill in England was carried.

Altogether collisions between the classes of the old society further, in many ways, the course of development of the proletariat. The bourgeoisie finds itself involved in a constant battle. At first with the aristocracy; later on, with those portions of the bourgeoisie itself, whose interests have become antagonistic to the progress of industry; at all time with the bourgeoisie of foreign countries. In all these battles, it sees itself compelled to appeal to the proletariat, to ask for help, and thus, to drag it into the political arena. The bourgeoisie itself, therefore, supplies the proletariat with its own elements of political and general education, in other words, it furnishes the proletariat with weapons for fighting the bourgeoisie.

Further, as we have already seen, entire sections of the ruling class are, by the advance of industry, precipitated into the proletariat, or are at least threatened in their conditions of existence. These also supply the proletariat with fresh elements of enlightenment and progress.

Finally, in times when the class struggle nears the decisive hour, the progress of dissolution going on within the ruling class, in fact within the whole range of old society, assumes such a violent, glaring character, that a small section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the revolutionary class, the class that holds the future in its hands. Just as, therefore, at an earlier period, a section of the nobility went over to the bourgeoisie, so now a portion of the bourgeoisie goes over to the proletariat, and in particular, a portion of the bourgeois ideologists, who have raised themselves to the level of comprehending theoretically the historical movement as a whole.

Of all the classes that stand face to face with the bourgeoisie today, the proletariat alone is a really revolutionary class. The other classes decay and finally disappear in the face of Modern Industry; the proletariat is its special and essential product.

The lower middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant, all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not revolutionary, but conservative. Nay more, they are reactionary, for they try to roll back the wheel of history. If by chance, they are revolutionary, they are only so in view of their impending transfer into the proletariat; they thus defend not their present, but their future interests, they desert their own standpoint to place themselves at that of the proletariat.

The “dangerous class”, [lumpenproletariat] the social scum, that passively rotting mass thrown off by the lowest layers of the old society, may, here and there, be swept into the movement by a proletarian revolution; its conditions of life, however, prepare it far more for the part of a bribed tool of reactionary intrigue.

In the condition of the proletariat, those of old society at large are already virtually swamped. The proletarian is without property; his relation to his wife and children has no longer anything in common with the bourgeois family relations; modern industry labour, modern subjection to capital, the same in England as in France, in America as in Germany, has stripped him of every trace of national character. Law, morality, religion, are to him so many bourgeois prejudices, behind which lurk in ambush just as many bourgeois interests.

All the preceding classes that got the upper hand sought to fortify their already acquired status by subjecting society at large to their conditions of appropriation. The proletarians cannot become masters of the productive forces of society, except by abolishing their own previous mode of appropriation, and thereby also every other previous mode of appropriation. They have nothing of their own to secure and to fortify; their mission is to destroy all previous securities for, and insurances of, individual property.

All previous historical movements were movements of minorities, or in the interest of minorities. The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority. The proletariat, the lowest stratum of our present society, cannot stir, cannot raise itself up, without the whole superincumbent strata of official society being sprung into the air.

Though not in substance, yet in form, the struggle of the proletariat with the bourgeoisie is at first a national struggle. The proletariat of each country must, of course, first of all settle matters with its own bourgeoisie.

In depicting the most general phases of the development of the proletariat, we traced the more or less veiled civil war, raging within existing society, up to the point where that war breaks out into open revolution, and where the violent overthrow of the bourgeoisie lays the foundation for the sway of the proletariat.

Hitherto, every form of society has been based, as we have already seen, on the antagonism of oppressing and oppressed classes. But in order to oppress a class, certain conditions must be assured to it under which it can, at least, continue its slavish existence. The serf, in the period of serfdom, raised himself to membership in the commune, just as the petty bourgeois, under the yoke of the feudal absolutism, managed to develop into a bourgeois. The modern labourer, on the contrary, instead of rising with the process of industry, sinks deeper and deeper below the conditions of existence of his own class. He becomes a pauper, and pauperism develops more rapidly than population and wealth. And here it becomes evident, that the bourgeoisie is unfit any longer to be the ruling class in society, and to impose its conditions of existence upon society as an over-riding law. It is unfit to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help letting him sink into such a state, that it has to feed him, instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society.

The essential conditions for the existence and for the sway of the bourgeois class is the formation and augmentation of capital; the condition for capital is wage-labour. Wage-labour rests exclusively on competition between the labourers. The advance of industry, whose involuntary promoter is the bourgeoisie, replaces the isolation of the labourers, due to competition, by the revolutionary combination, due to association. The development of Modern Industry, therefore, cuts from under its feet the very foundation on which the bourgeoisie produces and appropriates products. What the bourgeoisie therefore produces, above all, are its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.

Chapter 2: Proletarians and Communists

1. By bourgeoisie is meant the class of modern capitalists, owners of the means of social production and employers of wage labour.

By proletariat, the class of modern wage labourers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labour power in order to live. [Engels, 1888 English edition]

2. That is, all written history. In 1847, the pre-history of society, the social organisation existing previous to recorded history, all but unknown. Since then, August von Haxthausen (1792-1866) discovered common ownership of land in Russia, Georg Ludwig von Maurer proved it to be the social foundation from which all Teutonic races started in history, and, by and by, village communities were found to be, or to have been, the primitive form of society everywhere from India to Ireland. The inner organisation of this primitive communistic society was laid bare, in its typical form, by Lewis Henry Morgan's (1818-1881) crowning discovery of the true nature of the gens and its relation to the tribe. With the dissolution of the primeval communities, society begins to be differentiated into separate and finally antagonistic classes. I have attempted to retrace this dissolution in The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State, second edition, Stuttgart, 1886. [Engels, 1888 English Edition and 1890 German Edition (with the last sentence omitted)]

3. Guild-master, that is, a full member of a guild, a master within, not a head of a guild. [Engels, 1888 English Edition]

4. This was the name given their urban communities by the townsmen of Italy and France, after they had purchased or conquered their initial rights of self-government from their feudal lords. [Engels, 1890 German edition]

“Commune” was the name taken in France by the nascent towns even before they had conquered from their feudal lords and masters local self-government and political rights as the “Third Estate.” Generally speaking, for the economical development of the bourgeoisie, England is here taken as the typical country, for its political development, France.

#communist manifesto

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justadram · 6 years ago

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Meta Monday: Dragons

“Dragons are fire made flesh, and fire is power.”--Quaithe to Daenerys in A Clash of Kings

In honor of all things ghastly, this week we’re talking about the fantasy genre beast to end all beasts, the dragon, and examining its role in ASOIAF and medieval history. Good or bad, it’s not entirely clear yet the role dragons will play in Westeros, but one thing is for certain: they feature heavily in modern fantasy and have been the stuff of nightmares for centuries.

Indeed, the presence of dragons in modern fantasy is one of the biggest holdovers from the medieval imagination. Medievals loved a damn dragon tale. You could talk dragons with just about anyone in Western Europe, and they’d know what you were yammering on about. What a dragon looked like, however, differed from place to place. Some of them were snake like creatures that slithered and killed via constriction, some had limbs and wings, some spewed venom, others fire. The Beowulf dragon, for example, is serpent like. The Norse Fáfnir is a slithering, venomous serpent too. While Chrétien de Troyes’ Yvain slays a fire-breathing dragon.

The main types of dragons were the Continental dragon or fire-breathing dragon we all know that inspires modern fantasy writers, the mostly wingless Lindworm of Germanic tradition, the limbless and wingless Germanic sea serpent, and the two-legged and winged wyvrn.

A variety of dragon-like creatures can be found in ASOIAF as well. The wyvern is a dragonish beast from Sothoryos that doesn’t breathe fire, but is still one of the reasons that continent is sparsely populated. The firewyrm, on the other hand, is a wingless fire-breathing underground creature, which tunnels through earth and stone. Additionally, there are two legendary species: sea dragons and ice dragons. The former might still be found in the Sunset Sea; the latter in the Shivering Sea and White Waste.

The ice pressed close around them, and he could feel the cold seeping into his bones, the weight of the Wall above his head. It felt like walking down the gullet of an ice dragon.--Jon Snow, A Storm of Swords.

Depictions of scales, four legs, wings, and fire breathing are the norm in modern fantasy. GRRM’s dragons differ in one key area: they have two legs and use their wings in the same way a bat does--both to fly and as forelegs. Another agreed upon detail from the past and our present is dragon size: they end up big, but they start out small. Daenerys’ dragons start out the size of cats and firewyrm brood are the size of a human arm. Likewise, the dragons in Ragnars saga loðbrókar (hello, Vikings fans) start out small enough to be put in a jar. All end up large enough to do major damage. Many modern fantasy and medieval dragons are also treasure hoarders, who prefer to live underground in caves, a predilection not shared by ASOIAF dragons, who require open spaces to grow and aren’t greedy for anything but food seemingly.

Medieval dragons were also fantastical in that they happened to other people, often far away and in the distant past. Christendom tended to think of dragon-slaying as happening in the distant east. St Elizabeth the Wonderworker slayed a dragon by stomping it to death in Constantinople in the 6th c.; St Margaret was eaten by a dragon in Antioch and burst from its stomach by God’s grace, killing it in 303; St Theodore killed a dragon in Asia Minor before 306; St George slew his famous dragon in Cappadocia or Libya before 303. Many of these accounts were popularized in the west in the 11th and 12th centuries, the same time as Chrétien de Troyes was popularizing the knight errant, who sometimes slew dragons. These saintly dragon-slayings supposedly happened in the east, because the east was viewed as pagan and dragons were stand-ins for the devil.

Although dragons are presently in Westeros on HBO and soon on their way in the books, they similarly originated elsewhere, far away, long ago. There are competing claims as to the origin of dragons in the world. Valyrians claim they spawned from the volcanoes on the Valyrian peninsula. In Assai, they say ancient people tamed dragons and brought them to Valyria. They also might be from the Shadow Lands. Or Valyrian bloodmages could have created dragons from wyverns.

We shall not pretend to any understanding of the bond between dragon and dragonrider; wiser heads have pondered that mystery for centuries. We do know however, that dragons are not horses, to be ridden by any man who throws a saddle on their back.--The Princess and the Queen, GRRM

The Targaryens, who originally hail from Valyria, are dragon-riders. So, while many people rightfully fear dragons, Targaryen power is built upon the relationship between rider and dragon. There is a positive relationship between the beast and rider. Dragon riding is modern fantasy fare--but not all medieval dragons were considered purely evil. Most famously, the Welsh are represented in their mythology by the red dragon, who will ultimately defeat the Anglo-Saxons or white dragon: not an evil portend, but one of future victory.

Some were also not so far away. In England, dragons happened closer to home with some regularity. Anglo-Saxons settled Knotlow (now in Derbyshire) in 700 and called the hill there Wormhill, the lair of a dragon. The Bisterne Dragon of Hampshire was dispatched by a Sir Maurice Berkeley in the 15th c., saving the village from its milk thieving ways. Celtic legend surrounds Bignor Hill in Sussex. The Lambton Worm in Durham was dispatched by John Lambton upon his return from the crusades. A similar legend exists of the Linton Worm, along the Scottish borders. Etc, etc.

Elsewhere, they also could make trouble closer to home, often during the period of conversion from Germanic paganism to Christianity. St Clement of Metz tamed the Graoully, a foul dragon, in return for the local population’s conversion. St Olaf killed a sea serpent in Valldal, Norway by chucking it into the mountains. Umbria had a few troublesome dragons, including a wyvern in Terni and a dragon in Fornole, respectively dispatched by a knight and a pope. Holy men and women often feature as dragon-slayers, since dragons became symbols of Satan after the Christianization of Europe.

Dragons were by and large something to be dispatched, defeated by the hero either in pagan or Christian tradition. And while Daenerys looks upon her dragons as children, even she has trouble controlling Drogon and locks the other two up, when a man claims Drogon ate his daughter. Not everyone looks kindly upon them: they are to be an instrument of conquest, as they were in the Wars of Conquest against the Seven Kingdoms. To those about to be conquered, they are feared, as much as they were feared as Satanic symbols.

However, for all the long history of dragons being better off dead, they are also creatures steeped in surprising magic. For example, in Germanic tradition, Siegfried is gifted with invulnerable skin after he kills and is bathed in the blood of a dragon. Their magic can be expansive.

This is no doubt true in Westeros as well. We are told that when dragons went extinct in the world of ASOIAF, the winters became longer and the summers shorter. Their magic is tied to the seasons, tied to the very thing which now threatens Westeros, as surely as their flames do. And they may play a key role not in the subjugation of Westeros to Targaryen rule, but in the fight for Westeros, as they face the undead army that approaches from beyond the Wall.

“Necromancy animates these wights, yet they are still only dead flesh. Steel and fire will serve for them. The ones you call the Others are something more.”--Melisandre, A Storm of Swords.

After all, dragonglass, which the smallfolk say is made by dragons, is one of the few things that can kill an Other. The other is dragonsteel, which Jon and Sam believe is Valyrian steel, the outcome of a lost process of forging with magical properties, possibly forged by dragon. All things dragon seem to point to the possible defeat of the Others, which means we might want to keep those dragons around just a little bit longer.

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#got meta #asoiaf meta #daenerys targaryen #dragons #medieval history #meta monday

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