Extra Credit Blog (Worth Two Blogs): Old English Poem

hwæt! sēo hererinc mægen
Lo! the hero's strength

be miccle hlisa
is in much fame

hē beot of his blaed
he boasts of his glory

ēac gielp tō eal
and is pride to all

Shifts in the Development of the English Language

There have been many shifts in the English Language, which, when thought about, is quite extraordinary. In Old English much of the language was influenced by the Germanic languages and the Celtic. This produced a very guttural sounding language: “Nu sculon herigean heofonrices Weard/Meotodes meahte and his modgeþanc” (25). As we moved into Middle English, we still contained some of the same influences as previous language, but we also now were influenced by French. Much of the guttural intonations began to drop away and something much smoother arrived in its place: “Ki Deu ad Dune escience/E de parler bon’ eloquence” (142). Lastly, things like Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales emerges. This, influenced by the universal language, was probably one of the gateways to “modern” English. Continual shifts in the development in languages such as these would make way for the language we speak today: "Whan that April with his showres soote/The droughte of March hath perced to the roote" (218).

Oral/Arual vs. Literary Experiences

Oral pieces, such as ones like Beowulf, are quite interesting because of the fact that they have survived, at one point, almost solely by word-of-mouth. These stories survived by being passed on from generation to generation, person to person. However, things that were important to the culture at the time were also able to shine through in these pieces. They were also very dependent on things like a cyclic plot, so that the story tellers would be able to remember what the sequence of events in a story were. The only drawback to this was the fact that much can be lost during these transitions. Things like war and personal editing could very much affect the outcome of a story; things such as these make it difficult to determine what the original story could have held. Literary, pieces, are different. While they are influenced by many of the same things that Oral pieces were, it was much easier to keep tract of an original piece because of the fact that there were written down.

Figurative Language

Figurative Language is displayed throughout stories in all different ages. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight not only is the Green Knight figurative – in the instance, for the Harvest – but the animals in which Bertilak hunts are also figurative of Gawain. Even something as seemingly simple as a title can be quite figurative, take A Modest Proposal for example. When reading the text, it is quite obvious that this is anything but a “modest” proposal. Even Beowulf, contains figurative language in regards to its many kennings. When, in Doctor Faustus, our protagonist, Faustus, continually uses figurative language; for example, he states “These metaphysics of magicians/And necromantic books are heavenly” when such a thing truly would not be heavenly (1026). Lastly, “Dream of the Rood” is very much figurative in the sense that the entire piece takes place within a dream, and it is a cross telling the tale.

Meter and Rhyme

When looking at meter and rhyme, several stories contain different uses of each, while some a very similar in their uses. To begin, A Handbook to Literature states that meter is “the reoccurrence in poetry of a rhyming pattern, or the rhythm established by the regular occurrence of similar units of sound," while rhyme is "identity of terminal sound between accented syllables, usually occupying corresponding positions in two or more lines of verse" (323, 449). In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, it displays a bob and wheel rhyme scheme; this consists of an irregular number of four stressed, unrhymed, alliterative, long lines, followed by the bob and wheel, which contains an ABABA rhyme scheme. Lanval by Marie de France has a rhyming couplet, which follows and AABB scheme. Displaying the Anglo-Norman influence of the French in his work, Chaucer also has a rhyming couplet in The Canterbury Tales, as does Eloisa to Abelard. Also, Doctor Faustus displays a rhyming pentameter. Not to mention that Beowulf contains a scheme that consists of two accents, a caesura, followed by two accents.

The Seven Deadly Sins

The prevalence of the Seven Deadly Sins has been prominent throughout many different ages and tales. In The Canterbury Tales, The Wife of Bath is ruled by lust, which is shown by her love of sex and men. Doctor Faustus’s sin is greed, as he works to have all the wealth and power that one man can possibly gain with the assistance of demons such as Mephastophilis and Lucifer. Wrath is the sin of Grendel in Beowulf, as he rips, tears, and destroys any man or thing that he should come in contact with. Surprisingly enough, all characters in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight are ruled b gluttony. Each of the characters that show themselves is often preoccupied with feasting and merriment. Last, each of the deadly sins shown themselves during Doctor Faustus at the order of Lucifer, each tell the tale of how they were made and are presented as a warning to Faustus.

The Four Humours

A Handbook to Literature describes the four humours as “disease resulted from the dominance of some element within a single humour or from a lack of balance or proportion among the humours themselves. The humours gave off vapors that ascended to the brain” (263). So when glancing at the four humours, and what they symbolized, in terms of text, it is amazing to see which characters in the stories that have been discussed were ruled by certain humours. Take Beowulf, for example. It is quite obvious that Grendel was ruled by yellow bile – throughout the story, he was easily angered, obstinate, and very vengeful. All of these things eventually lead up to his downfall. Queen Guinevere of Lanval also could be said to have been controlled by an excess of yellow bile, as she became very angry and obstinate when the good knight, Lanval, refused her advances; so much so that she had him imprisoned on a false charge. As for Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Bertilak was quite joyful and overly amorous, therefore contained a dominance of blood. Blood is also most noticeable in the Wife of Bath from The Canterbury Tales. She is very joyful, almost to the point of being boisterous, and was quite amorous – shown most obviously by her love of men, sex, and marriage. Lastly, Wagner of Doctor Faustus had quite the surplus of phlegm. He was cowardly throughout the tale, and on page 1029 even says “But that I am by nature phlegmatic.”