Предлагаемые вниманию учителя и учащегося «Тетради по истории английской литературы» имеют своей целью знакомство с английской литературой учеников старших классов школ с достаточным преподаванием английского языка. Составляя данное учебное пособие, мы руководствовались мыслью о необходимости для культурного молодого человека иметь представление о христианской культурной традиции, которая проявляется, кроме иных форм творческой деятельности человека, и в литературе народа, говорящего на изучаемом языке.
История английской литературы представлена здесь в хронологическом порядке в лице основных авторов, на примере основных произведений и оригинальных отрывков из них. Более подробное рассмотрение литературных примеров и их исторических контекстов нам представляется неуместным в рамках осуществления поставленной задачи.
Исходя из соображения о том, что английский язык данного пособия должен быть примером безошибочного литературного языка, мы пользовались многочисленными сочинениями литературной критики, которые отвечают этому представлению. Таким образом, текст «Тетрадей», составленных для учебных целей, является полностью компилятивным, а самостоятельность составителя проявляется в композиции и расположении частей пособия, внесении необходимых с точки зрения составителя литературных параллелей и лингвистических пояснений.
Литературные параллели представляются полезными для демонстрации единства культурного пространства как внутри анголоязычного мира, так и в перспективе англо-русских связей.
Учитывая высокий уровень отечественного перевода в 20 в., в пособии даются примеры литературных переводов некоторых произведений на русский язык, которые можно было бы использовать для сравнительного анализа языковых единиц и стилистических приемов. Например, LX сонет Шекспира представлен, кроме оригинала, одиннадцатью переводами на русский, неравнозначными в своем соответствии оригиналу и в художественном достоинстве, что может позволить преподавателю применить самые разные методики сравнения для воспитания языкового чутья и вкуса учащихся.
Некоторые пояснения предложены на русском языке, чтобы избежать излишнего усложнения материала.
В общем, мы надеемся, что предлагаемое пособие даст полный простор творческой деятельности преподавателя, позволяя осваивать информацию, читать и слушать, петь и инсценировать, интерпретировать и версифицировать и даже рисовать или писать маслом те образы и символы эпох, которые предстанут взору учащегося.
Мы не можем не выразить нашей благодарности авторам и исследователям литературы, чьи тексты легли в основание предлагаемого пособия. Это прежде всего Генри Пэнкоуст (Henry S. Pancoast), чей основательный труд, дающий глубокий и ясный анализ и снабженный литературными картами и индексом упоминаемых христианских общин, с удивительной скромностью называется Введением в английскую литературу – An Introduction to English Literature.
Мы благодарны всем авторам великолепной антологии английской литературы под общей редакцией М. Абрамс – The Norton Anthology of English Literature, а также многочисленным источникам «сети», в особенности тем, чья работа вызвала у нас неподдельное уважение. Это:
В первую часть Тетрадей включены следующие авторы и безымянные произведения:
Беовульф
Кэдмон
Видение Крестного Древа
Беда Досточтимый
Альфред Великий
650-750 AD
Beowulf
Beowulf is the oldest surviving epic of any Teutonic people, older than the sagas of the Scandinavians, older than the German epic the Song of the Nibelungs, it is far older than the great epics and the romances of the Middle Ages – the Song of Roland or the poem of the Cid. Therefore, Beowulf stands in a unique relation to the literature of the Middle Ages.
We know almost nothing definite about this venerable poem. We do not know who was its author, nor are we certain just when or where it was composed.
different elements. Part of it appears to be largely mythical, part of it seems to have grown out of actual history. It is essentially heathen; yet it contains passages that show an acquaintance with the Bible. The monster Grendel, for instance, a demon of the waters and fen, although plainly a creature of the old heathendom, is yet said to be descended from Cain, the first murderer.
The story of the poem.
The scene of the poem is laid on the Continent somewhere near the old home of the English, and Beowulf is not an Englishman but the Prince of a Teutonic tribe called the Geats.
Beowulf is a poem of battle; the battle of a man against three monstrous and mysterious incarnations of the powers of evil. The poem naturally divides itself into three parts.
Hrothgar, a Danish king, builds for himself a splendid mead-hall, Heorot, wherein he sits feasting with his thanes. A fiendish monster, Grendel, is tortured by the sounds of minstrelsy that reach him from the hall. In jealous hate he enters Heorot by night and slays thirty sleeping companions of the king. Again and again he comes to destroy. After twelve years Beowulf, a prince of the Geats, or Goths, endowed with the strength of thirty men, comes in a ship to rid Hrothgar of his scourge. When Grendel strides into the hall, he attacks Beowulf, and they close in deadly grapple. The hero is using no weapon, but trusting solely in his mighty strength. The hall trembles with the fierceness of the contest; the massive benches are splintered. Then Grendel, howling, strives to escape, but Beowulf crushes him with his terrible handgrip. The demon, with the loss of an arm, flies to the fens to die. All crowd round Beowulf, rejoicing.
But the next night Grendel’s mother comes to avenge her son. Beowulf resolves to conquer this new foe. With his thanes he tracks the woman-fiend over murky moors to a stagnant pool, frothing with blood and over-hung by gloomy trees. It is a place of terror. Beowulf fights the water-fiend in her cave under the flood. He falls, and his fiend is above him, her knife drawn. Then the hero snatches from the pile of arms a mighty sword, and slays his adversary. Again there is mirth and praise at Heorot.
In the last part of the poem Beowulf has become King of the Goths and has ruled over them for fifty winters. At this time the land is worried by a dragon, who sets men’s homes aflame with his fiery breath. Beowulf seeks him and gives battle, trusting “in the strength of his single manhood.” The old king is again victorious, but is mortally hurt. He bids a follower bring out the dragon’s treasure hoard, and as the glistening gold and jewels are spread on the grass, he gives thanks that he has won them for his people. So Beowulf dies, and a lofty mound is raised in his honour on the high cliff, which sailors, in voyaging upon the deep, could behold from afar.
Beowulf, the one central figure, moves in his courtesy, his vast strength, his quiet courage, his self-reliance, his submission to fate, he may stand as the pattern of the early English ideal of manhood, as Achilles of the early Greek. Beowulf is essentially heathen. But at the time preceding the introduction of Christianity, English heathenism seems to have largely consisted in the absence of any definite religious belief. Old superstitions are indeed present: water-spirits, giants, dragons, but little or nothing of gods or life hereafter. The real ruler of man’s life is not Odin, or Thor, but Fate. These men could feel something of the burden and the mystery of a world that they could not understand, and they faced life and death with reverence but without fear. The truth seems to be that the English had outgrown the crude mythology of an earlier time and when Christianity was first preached in Nothumbria, the chief priest himself advised the king to listen to the new teaching.
TEXT
Beowulf. Chapter XVIII. The original text in Old English
Him ða gegiredan Geata leode
ad on eorðan unwaclicne,
helmum behongen, hildebordum,
hynðo ond hæftnyd. Heofon rece swealg.
Geworhton ða Wedra leode
hleo on hoe, se wæs heah ond brad,
wægliðendum wide gesyne,
ond betimbredon on tyn dagum
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beadurofes becn, bronda lafe
wealle beworhton, swa hyt weorðlicost
foresnotre men findan mihton.
Hi on beorg dydon beg ond siglu,
eall swylce hyrsta, swylce on horde ær
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niðhedige men genumen hæfdon,
forleton eorla gestreon eorðan healdan,
gold on greote, þær hit nu gen lifað
eldum swa unnyt swa hit æror wæs.
þa ymbe hlæw riodan hildediore,
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æþelinga bearn, ealra twelfe,
woldon ceare cwiðan ond kyning mænan,
wordgyd wrecan ond ymb wer sprecan;
eahtodan eorlscipe ond his ellenweorc
duguðum demdon, swa hit gedefe bið
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þæt mon his winedryhten wordum herge,
ferhðum freoge, þonne he forð scile
of lichaman læded weorðan.
Swa begnornodon Geata leode
hlafordes hryre, heorðgeneatas,
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cwædon þæt he wære wyruldcyninga
manna mildust ond monðwærust,
leodum liðost ond lofgeornost.
Chapter XVIII. Translation
THEN fashioned for him the folk of Geats
firm on the earth a funeral-pile,
and hung it with helmets and harness of war
and breastplates bright, as the boon he asked;
and they laid amid it the mighty chieftain,
heroes mourning their master dear.
Then on the hill that hugest of balefires
the warriors wakened. Wood-smoke rose
black over blaze, and blent was the roar
of flame with weeping (the wind was still),
till the fire had broken the frame of bones,
hot at the heart. In heavy mood
their misery moaned they, their master's death. Wailing her woe, the widow old,
her hair upbound, for Beowulf's death
sung in her sorrow, and said full oft
she dreaded the doleful days to come,
deaths enow, and doom of battle,
and shame. – The smoke by the sky was devoured.
The folk of the Weders fashioned there
on the headland a barrow broad and high,
by ocean-farers far descried:
in ten days' time their toil had raised it,
the battle-brave's beacon. Round brands of the pyre
a wall they built, the worthiest ever
that wit could prompt in their wisest men.
They placed in the barrow that precious booty,
the rounds and the rings they had reft erewhile,
hardy heroes, from hoard in cave, –
trusting the ground with treasure of earls,
gold in the earth, where ever it lies
useless to men as of yore it was.
Then about that barrow the battle-keen rode,
atheling-born, a band of twelve,
lament to make, to mourn their king,
chant their dirge, and their chieftain honor.
They praised his earlship, his acts of prowess
worthily witnessed: and well it is
that men their master-friend mightily laud,
heartily love, when hence he goes
from life in the body forlorn away.
Thus made their mourning the men of Geatland,
for their hero's passing his hearth-companions:
quoth that of all the kings of earth,
of men he was mildest and most beloved,
to his kin the kindest, keenest for praise.
SUMMARY: Then, on Beowulf's funeral pyre, they laid on the helmets and armour of war. On that hill, the largest of fires was lit sending black smoke into the air and the flames roared until the burned to the bones and heart. Wailing, the widow sang a sorry song dreading the days to come and the imminent doom that battle would bring. The smoke was swallowed by the heavens.
The Geats built a mound to be seen by passing seafarers. Ten days later they completed the monument with a wall surrounding the remains of the fire. Their gold was buried in the barrow for the earth to keep safe; useless to the men now as it was before. Twelve of the best warriors rode around the barrow to mourn their dead king and to honour him.
So it is proper that they honour their lord after his passing. The men of Geatland the mildest, the most loved, the most kind to his own, and most worthy of praise.
General linguistic commentary
The manuscript and its editions always present us with a linguistic obstacle: Old English has a different kind of grammar from Modern. Old English is like Latin or Russian, or many other languages whose grammar is expressed by inflection: that is, affixes on a root word can stand in for function words like pronouns, so that a noun like "stow" will indicate its grammatical place in a sentence or clause by a series of endings: "... nis Þaet heoru stow!" (That is not a pleasant place!); or "He het þa þa stoweDominus videt" (He named that place Dominus videt; or "on manegum stowum" (in many places). In an Old English sentence, especially in the poetry, the order of words is much more fluid than in Modern. Spelling will seem inconsistent; the alphabet contains some unfamiliar letters derived from runes.
Runes
The Runic alphabets are a set of related alphabets using letters known as runes, formerly used to write Germanic languages, mainly in Scandinavia, and the British Isles. In all their varieties, they may be considered an ancient writing system of Northern Europe. The Scandinavian version is also known as Futhark (derived from its first six letters: 'F', 'U' 'Th', 'A', 'R', and 'K'), and the Anglo-Saxon version as Futhorc (also so named after its first letters). The earliest runic inscriptions date from ca. 150, and the alphabet was generally replaced by the Latin alphabet with Christianization, by ca. 700 in central Europe, and by ca. 1200 in Scandinavia. However, the use of runes persisted for specialized purposes, mainly in Scandinavia, in rural Sweden until the early 20th century (used mainly for decoration as Dalecarlian runes, and on Runic calendars.
The most likely candidates for the origins of runic scripts are the 5th to 1st century BC Northern Italic alphabets, Lepontic, Rhaetic, and Venetic, all closely related to each other and themselves descended from the Old Italic alphabet. These scripts bear a remarkable resemblance to the Futhark in many regards.
Alliterative Verse
In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal structuring device to unify lines of poetry, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. Alliterative verse, in various forms, is found widely in the literary traditions of the early Germanic languages.
The core metrical features of traditional Germanic alliterative verse are as follows:
* A long line is divided into two half-lines. Half-lines are also known as verses or hemistichs; the first is called the a-verse (or on-verse), the second the b-verse (or off-verse).
* A heavy pause, or caezura, separates the verses.
* Each verse usually has two strongly stressed syllables, or “lifts”.
* The first lift in the b-verse must alliterate with either or both lifts in the a-verse.
* The second lift in the b-verse does not alliterate with the first lifts.
One modern author who studied alliterative verse and used it extensively in his fictional writings and poetry, was J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973). He wrote alliterative verse in modern English, in the style of Old English alliterative verse (he was one of the major Beowulf scholars of his time). Examples include the verse written by him for the Rohirrim, a culture in The Lord of the Rings that borrow many aspects from Anglo-Saxon culture.
Sources:
Wikipedia
www.chambermusictoday.blogspot.com
www.biocrawler.com/encyclopedia/Rune
Caedmon(7 c. AD)
The story of Caedmon
The 17 manuscripts of Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum (finished in 731), dated from the 8th to the 15th centuries, contain the Anglo-Saxon version of the first poem by the first known English poet, Cædmon. The two earliest of these manuscripts render the poem in a Northumbrian dialect.
It was while Saint Hildaruled the monastery of Whitby as mother-Abbess, that there was employed, on the estate, a simple cowherd, named Caedmon. He was almost certainly of British origin, as his name is an Anglicisation of the Welsh, Cadfan. Though advanced in years, this man had learned not. Wherefore, says Bede, being sometimes at feasts, when all agreed for glee's sake to sing in turn, he no sooner saw the harp come towards him than he rose up from the board and went homewards.
Once, when he had done this and gone from the feast to the stable, where he had that night charge of the cattle, he laid himself down to rest at the proper time and there appeared to him in his sleep one who said, greeting him by name, "Caedmon, sing some song to me."
"I cannot sing," he answered, "and for that reason I left the feast and came hither, because I could not sing."
He who talked with him answered, "However that may be, you shall sing to me."'
"What shall I sing?" rejoined Caedmon.
"Sing the beginning of created things," said the other. Having received this answer, the abbey's cowherd began to sing, to the praise of God the Creator, verses which he had never heard before, and afterwards awaking from his sleep, he remembered all that he had sung in his dream and added more to the same effect in verse worthy of the Deity.
In the morning, Caedmon came to the steward, his superior, and, having acquainted him with the gift which he had received, was conducted to the Abbess. Lady Hilda ordered him, in the presence of many learned men, to tell his dream and repeat the verses, that they might all give their judgment what it was and whence his verse proceeded. They all concluded that heavenly grace had been conferred upon him by Our Lord. They explained to him a passage in Holy Writ, ordering him, if he could, to put the same into verse. Having undertaken it, he went away and, returning the next morning, gave it to them, composed in the most excellent verse. Whereupon the Abbess, understanding the Divine grace in the man, instructed him to quit the secular habit and take upon him the monastic life.
He sang the Creation of the World, the Origin of Man and all the history of Genesis; the departure of the Children of Israel out of Egypt and their entering into the Land of Promise, with many other histories from Holy Writ; the Incarnation, Passion and Resurrection of Our Lord and his Ascension into Heaven; the coming of the Holy Ghost and the preaching of the Apostles; also the terror of a future judgment, the horror of the pains of hell and the delights of heaven; besides many more about the Divine benefits and judgments. By all of these, he endeavoured to turn away men from the love of vice and to excite in them the love of good actions. Thus, Caedmon passed his days, dedicating his gift to the glory of God. "He never," says Bede, "could compose any trivial or idle song, but, as he recognized that it was God who had opened his lips, therefore, till his dying day, did his mouth show forth his praise."
How long Caedmon lived after he had received his gift is not recorded; but as he was already advanced in years, it was probably not long. His last illness lasted only for a fortnight and was not deemed serious by those about him. So slight it seemed that he was able to walk and talk all the time. But, on the evening of 11th February AD 680, he begged to be carried into the infirmary of the monastery, to rest there that night. His request was granted and, far into the night, he sat talking with those around him. Suddenly, he asked for the Eucharist. "What need of the Eucharist?" said those around him, "you are not like to die, since you talk so joyfully with us, as if you were in perfect health."
"However," said he, "bring me the Eucharist." Having received the same into his hand, he asked whether they were all in charity with him, and without any ill-will or rancour? They answered that they were all in perfect