Daily Archives: November 10, 2011

The Nightingale as a Source of Love in Laustic

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We talked in class yesterday about Laustic and the way in which the nightingale was simply used. First, it was used as an excuse to stand at her bedroom window, and then as a vehicle to “relate the adventure” (Line 134) to her love. More care was shown toward the samite and embroidery and casket than to the actual life of the bird. After it is killed and its dead body thrown upon her, the wife is upset, but only because her excuse is gone.
Though we talked about the way in which the nightingale misrepresented the couple because it was much more beautiful than their “convenient” love, I couldn’t help but think there must be something more to the nightingale than simply being a harbinger of symbolism. Is there significance beyond that placed upon it by the humans?
I keeping thinking there must be, firstly because of the title which literally means “the nightingale.” Is this simply in homage to the nightingale for its sacrifice as a result of their love? Even if this is the case, doesn’t that imply an inherent significance simply by its presence? Although the nightingale didn’t have a choice in the matter, it had an effect on the humans like the rocks Dorigen was so frightened of, or the deer in Guigemar. In this case, the birds (seemingly nightingales) inspire happiness (instead of fear) when they sing in the trees: “He listened to them intently / and to the lady on the other side” (Lines 66-67). He listens to the birds first, and his love second. It seems as though the nightingale is in between them, somehow connecting them. Was their love borne out of inspiration from the nightingale’s song? Once the nightingale is dead, it seems as though their love is also dead. As we pointed out in class, it doesn’t mean they can’t still see each other at least sometimes. So, why does the death of this beautiful bird mean the death of their less than beautiful love? Is it because without the bird’s song to spur them to feel love, they are not really in love?

Knightly Oaths Gone Wrong

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If there is one major idea that I came away with after reading Eliduc, the issue of mismanaged promises was the the highlight of the lai. Throughout the piece, the knight’s imprudent attitude toward making chivalrous oaths leads him into immense complexities in what would otherwise be a rather simple tale.  Although such mismanagement and foolish behavior would make the knight prone to being labeled as the antithesis of knightly values, it seems as though the knight’s misfortune really underlines the impossibility of living to such a strict code of values.  In other words, Marie seems to be providing an account of the overreaching aspects of chivalry, which can be seen in the complex assemblages that she builds throughout the tale.

Through an intricate web of promises and oaths, Marie sheds light on the difficult and seemingly absurdly loyal role a knight must fulfill, and one of the key methods of conveying this idea is through marriage. As he is exiled from his homeland, the knight assures his wife that he will be “faithful to her,” which seems to be a reasonable action. However, the lack of details Marie gives us —in regard to his marriage— seem to make the knights promise more of an obligation, for his only barrier for not cheating on her is “Christianity,” which he claims “would not allow it” (602).  Therefore, it seems that religion manifests itself as a force that ultimately forces the knight to retain empty promises that ultimately complicate the plot.

Moreover, the assemblage that the knight forms wife his wife provides a somewhat of a parallel to the relationship that he forms wife his lord.  For example, the act of the old lord trying to regain the knight’s assistance seems to show how there is a constant wavering inside the knight’s mind, for despite the offer of “a third of his inheritance / and the whole of his treasure” the knight still has an intense bond with his original lord, whom he “must go to help him in his need” (637).  Not only does his response show a perplexing loyalty to someone who wrongfully treated him, but it also shows a bond that pointlessly holds the knight in the service of another.

Such assemblages seem to clash with each other, for they are constructed apart from each other, yet the knight inadvertently brings them in contact with one another. Moreover, they seem to reveal how the medieval system of chivalry held a great deal of incompatibility with free-will or an individuals desires, which often come and go on a whim.  Therefore, it seems that Marie is giving us a case study into when oaths go wrong.

A Different Sort of “Happily Ever After”

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In this class we have learned much about mideval society, honorable knighthood, King-knight relationships and agreements, and courtly love. In almost every lai that we have read in this class the story concludes with the knight overcoming his barrier, and riding off into the sunset with his damsel. However, in Eliduc, the lai’s happy ending is one we have never seen before, devotion to God. From the time we meet Eliduc’s wife, she is a role model character, never demanding his devotion, being concerned about her husband’s sadness, assuming the best of him but not being ignorant, wishing the best for her husband and his new love, knowing to imitate the weasel to revive the girl, and finally: honorably bowing out and leaving the system of the knight/King/courtly world and joining the church.

Then, surprisingly I thought, shortly after their happy marriage Eliduc founds a church, sends his wife away to the convent his wife joined to become a nun, and finally finds “true love”. Could it be that this is the best possible ending to Marie? That the rest of the victorious knights we have read were too nearsighted to see this spiritual possibility? The wife is one of the most noble, respectable characters we have met in Marie and in this way I think that she shows us that devoting oneself to God and finding a holy love was the most honorable thing a person could do in that time.

 

Love is grand…

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Marie de France seems to praise the grandness of love in most of her lais by depicting love as something that brings great happiness as well as great suffering. This is a characterisitic seen in most tales about courtly love. Love’s intensity exists in romantic relationships as well as platonic relationships. We see intense love between Sir Cleges and his King even after he has fallen from grace. Cleges’ love for his King demands that he still defend the right and justice in the name of his King in order for the kingdom to represent these moral rights. In class we discussed how the love seen in Laustic is somewhat bland because the lovers have no real barrier between them and their love is orientated towards the physical rather than the abstract idea of love as something beyond the physical. While we discussed the lack of love between the lovers there also seems to be a lack of love between two men of the same court as well as a lack of love for the beautiful. The absence of the love between noble neighbors and of beauty is unusual when compared to other lais.

These two noblemen live as neighbors and are favored by the same king but little is said of their relationship and it could probably assumed that their relationship hardly exists since one of the neighbors is so content to have an affair with his fellow nobleman’s wife. Although, throughout the lais we see several affairs of married individuals we see fee in which a knight or nobleman of one kingdom has a relationship with a fellow knight or nobleman’s wife. Most of the affairs occur far from their home kingdom. In other lais their have been great love between neighbors and fellow individuals with noble blood. For example in Le Fresne by Marie de France  the two neighbors have such a close bond that when one of them has twin sons he basically names his neighbor as his son’s godfather. There is no such strong bond of friendship and love seen in Laustic.

Love between romantic lovers and friends is clearly diminished of status in this text but there is also a lack of appreciation and love for beauty. Beauty is embraced and revered in many of the lais. In Milun this beauty is seen in the swan that the lovers use to exchange letters. The beauty of the nightingale is destroyed in this text when the wife uses it as a way to fulfill her need for an explanation. This in itself is crime against the beauty of the nightingale.

 

epitaph to a nightingale

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This week talking about Emaré I really came to understand what Jeffery was saying about Laustic while he was here. The two stories have a single object that represents a powerful source of action within the story and while the two stories run very different courses, but are fundamentally symbolic tokens that have come to have a kind of agency that is outside the original token status that they were originally meant to be a symbol of. Both were created by women as tokens of love to give to their lovers. While in Emaré the cloak is a successful token that goes on to have a rich life after it leaves the possession of the lovers for whose love come to represent, the casket in Laustic seems in many ways to become more vibrant than the relationship that it was meant to represent. Both tokens have a life and agency that transcends the purely symbolic one that it was originally vested with but the difference lies in at what cost such agency comes.

In Emaré the cloak has an agency that comes from the beauty and craft with which it was made. The symbolic nature of this cloak as a token is vested in the fact that the wife who made it spent a lot of time, energy, and care in crafting it and this level of commitment to detail visible in the intricate beauty that make the cloak so alluring to everyone who comes in contact with it. This is in contract to the casket in Laustic that was created through the jealous killing of a innocent nightingale by the husband of the adulterous wife. Instead of being vested with beauty  that is intrinsic because of time and love, the casket is vested with a beauty that comes out of a superficial kind of love that is in fact overshadowed by the death of the bird that died for it. The symbol becomes more meaningful than the thing it is trying to symbolize.

 

 

Viruses as Backstabbing Allies: A Fever-Induced Rant on the Definition of LIFE and the End of TIME

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We just can’t get through a class discussion recently without mentioning alliances or networks, now can we?  Alliances with objects are inescapable in the lais we’ve read, including “Emare,” whose plot is driven by letters, a ship, and a robe, among others.  Emare’s “alliance” with the robe had its up and downs, as it both led to her love with her husband and led to her banishment by the mother.  But in the end, as in all lais, the story ended with Emare on top, with the net result of her alliance leading to fortune and a happy life.  Does this suggest that all alliances with things are for the best?  Perhaps, but a happy ending is an essential quality of the British lai, and perhaps not all networks and alliances end for the better.  Especially since I’ve entered into an alliance with a special “thing” this week, a virus.

Now, the “thingness” of viruses has been up to debate for a while now.  In short, they are composed of organic matter, eat, and reproduce, yet they do not autonomously self-reproduce and are thus damned by the scientific community to the level of “thing,” as opposed to the vibrant level of organism.  Yes, we have beaten to death the idea that all matter is on the same level of existence, as things (anything, really) are only judged by their ability to act as actants, to influence or redefine other things.  And this virus certainly is an actant, which led to my absence yesterday and has directed my discussion towards its existence.  Does that mean the virus has agency?  It certainly changed my plans for this week, limiting my actions and “forcing” me to feel rather miserable.  I’m really not sure how to answer that question at this point, but hopefully I’ll be able to when my body is done hosting this rude guest.  Whether the virus “wants” to or not, it’s destroying my cells and making clones of itself.  In fact, that is its very purpose- to inject its RNA and produce clones of itself.  But calling this agency is the same as claiming that a river chooses to flow into the ocean.  This is its natural predisposition, and consciousness may be far removed from the virus and its natural life choices.

Is my alliance with this actant going to be beneficial in the end?  I’m full of questions today, and I’m afraid that this one in particular may be impossible to answer.  Who knows, maybe missing class was for the best, and allowed me to avoid some tragic end the other day, maybe I’ll emerge from this sickness with a greater appreciation for life, and do great things because of it and change the world.  Maybe my changes will lead to a post-apocalyptic dystopia far after I’ve passed away and become one with the grass.  With lais or any writing, there is a clear ending point in the text.  A last word, a final page.  But in life, there is none, at least none that I can comprehend.  The net result of my life, or actions I took while under the influence of an actant, are an eternal mystery that can only be judged at the end of time.  But for now, I judge this actant as harmful to my alliance with things, yet I think it for helping me create these thoughts as I type in a feverish delirium.

Similarities Between Marie de France’s Lais

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When reading Marie de France’s Milun, I realized that it shared many characteristics with other lais that we have read, but most notably Le Fresne. Not only are the plots similar, but also the concept of unwanted children who are sent off to be raised by others, as well as leaving them with objects that ultimately become a major part of their identity.

In Le Fresne, Fresne is born with a twin sister, and the mother, believing that having twins will ruin her reputation and she will be thought of as an adulterer, sends Fresne to a monastery to be raised by a nun, and keeps one of the children. This is very similar to Milun, as he gets his lover pregnant, but because they are not married, she decides to send the baby to her sister to be raised because having a child out of wedlock would ultimately ruin her reputation. So, in both stories, children are not only sent off, but their mother’s reputations become more important than keeping their children, probably reflecting just how important one’s reputation was in a given medieval society. Also, in Le Fresne, Fresne is given a number of fine garments by her mother when she is given away. The garments become a major asset of her identity, and ultimately they define her when her mother sees them towards the end of the story and realizes that this is her daughter. In Milun, the child is given a ring, and once this is seen by his father, he goes from wanting to “put him to shame,” for having a reputation that is as strong as his, to being so happy that he kisses him. In both cases, these objects are not only crucial to the plot, but define their owner’s identities. There are also key differences between Milun and Degare. Degare is too born illegitimately, and is given a broken sword that he keeps throughout his lifetime. In the end, like in Milun, he is fighting his father, who notices the sword, and the two are happily united.

Reputation

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Reputation, Reputation, Reputation. Reputation is a huge theme in all the medieval Breton Lais it seems. Lanval’s reputation is slighted when he doesn’t receive a gift from his lord King Arthur. Again his reputation is sullied when Guinevere lies and says he tried to sleep with her. We see the importance of reputation in Eliduc, when he has given his word to his wife that he will be faithful. Reputation is huge in Milun because the girl has gotten pregnant without being married. Almost the entire first part of Milun, a love story, focuses on her reputation and the worry she has if anyone finds out about the baby. The love part of the story takes a backseat. In fact love takes a backseat to reputation more often then I would have guessed. Milun and Eliduc are two lais in which this happens so I wanted to explore the agency of reputation in some of the lais we’ve read.

First off reputation in the romantic court is quite possibly the most important aspect of a knight. Every deed, action, adventure a knight does is done for his reputation. The same can be said of the woman in the court; they can’t have their reputations sullied. The society of the time of these lais stress reputation beyond anything. Reputation travels throughout the land. In Eliduc and Milun the love interests hear of Eliduc and Milun before they have ever laid eyes on them. The reputation of the two knights is what draws the knights and woman to each other. I think I can say that the woman fall in love with the knights’ reputation.

Reputation drives the society. The livelihood of the knights is dependent on reputation. When Eliduc’s reputation is slighted by the lies told to the King, he is kicked out of the King’s service and goes over seas to find a lord. The power of reputation to me is above even the power of love. Reputation has a higher relevance than religion or God in these lais. Reputation, Reputation, Reputation.

The Transcendent Power of Love in “Eliduc”

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What is the significance of the weasel scene in Marie de France’s Eliduc? Eliduc’s complicated love life comes to a head when his wife finds out about his affair with another woman. Surprisingly, her reaction is one of acceptance rather than anger. In fact, she goes so far as to bring his love back to life in an imitation of how the weasel brought his companion to life with the red flower.

It is significant that the weasels exemplify love’s power in this scene—its power to heal or destroy. In resituating its mate, the weasel also embodies the importance of loyalty or fidelity in the relationships between Eliduc and the two women. It is interesting that weasels would be used as the medium to express the ways in which love can overcome potential pettiness or jealousy and even death itself. The weasels’ love is not inferior; the love between the two weasels is analogous to the love between the two humans.

The wife’s reaction (i.e. to imitate their actions rather than dismiss them) shows how love transcends the divide between human and nonhuman. The exhibition of loving traits, even in the bodies of animals, does not alter the meaning of love itself but reaffirms the power of love to transcend body, space, and time. There are certainly different forms of love (and a ‘divine’ love may indeed be more important than an earthly one), but the fact remains: the weasels show how, in at least one respect, animal behavior mirrors its human counterparts.

The weasels may be important in and of themselves but, in renewing life through an act of love, they almost rise above the animal body itself—that kind of power is no respecter of artificial bodily boundaries. In portraying the scene as charming rather than ridiculous, the story illustrates the agency of love and the implied agency of the nonhuman actants as well.