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Sažetci djela za 16.

stoljeće

1. Marie de France: Lais


Marie de France, francuska pjesnikinja.Rođena u Normandiji i živjela u Engleskoj; o njezinu
životu nema drugih podataka. Obrazovana i kultivirana: poznavala je latinski, navodila klasične
autore, napose Ovidija. S latinskog je prevela Čistilište Svetoga Patricka, čudesan opis putovanja
irskog apostola na drugi svijet. Sastavila je Isopet, zbirku basni u kojoj, umjesto prijevoda Ezopa
i Fedra, najvjerojatnije književno razrađuje pučku pripovjednu predaju. Njezino su glavno djelo
veći broj lais, pjesama dugih od stotinjak do tisuću stihova, koje opisuju »avanturu«, odnosno
više ili manje vilinsku epizodu neke ljubavne priče, smještene u čudesni udvorni svijet kralja
Artura i njegovih vitezova (tzv. bretonska građa). Nadahnjivala se dugom keltskom tradicijom
toga žanra (lais bretons) i oplemenjivala ju. Među njezinim djelima, Lanval opisuje ljubavne
kušnje vitezova zaljubljenih u vile, Guigemar pripovijeda trijumf ljubavi mladoga viteza nad
simboličkim preprekama, Lai o slavuju (Lai du Laostic) ponešto mračno tematizira ljubavnu
prijevaru i osvetu. To su iznimno tankoćutna i osjećajna djela, koja nude razrađenu sliku
udvornih osjećaja, prigušenu tragiku ljubavi i istančanu psihologiju likova u ozračju tajnovitosti i
začaranosti keltskih šuma. Ubrajaju se u najbolje primjere srednjovjekovne udvorne
književnosti.

Marie de France živjela je u drugoj polovici 12. stoljeća, vjerojatno na dvoru engleskoga kralja
Henrika II. Plantageneta (1154. – 1189.), čiji je dvor bio okupljalište najsjajnijih intelektualaca
onoga doba. Marie de France bila je odgojena na klasičnoj literaturi i kulturi, prevodila je
latinske knjige, savršeno je poznavala klasičnu mitologiju. Prevela je Čistilišta svetoga Patrika,
latinsko djelo u kojem se opisuje bajkovito putovanje irskoga apostola na drugi svijet. Napisala
je zbirku basni Isopet. U svojim Pjesnima nadahnjivala se bretonskim i galskim pučkim izvorima.
Bretonski (keltski) izvori dali su osobitu draž onim njenim pjesnima u kojima se, pored
temeljnoga – prirodnoga, javljaju magični, čudesni i fantastični elementi.

Pjesni obiluju vilinskom začaranošću bretonskoga svijeta, a istodobno pružaju i prikaz


srednjovjekovnoga dvorskoga života u 12. stoljeću. Marie de France u europsku je kulturnu
baštinu trajno smjestila likove poput Tristana i Izolde te kralja Artura i viteza Lanvala,
metaforičke slike prirode (kozja krv) i elemente fantastike (vukodlak).

2. G.Lorris: Le roman de la rose

Roman o Ruži (Le Roman de la Rose), francuska poema iz 13. st., prvi put tiskana 1526. Napisali
su ju Guillaume de Lorris u razdoblju 1230–40 te Jean de Meung oko 1280. Zbog toga Roman o
Ruži nije jedinstveno djelo. Lorrisov dio sinteza je srednjovjekovne poetike i ideologije koncepta
udvorne ljubavi s razrađenom alegorijskom strukturom uokvirenom pjesnikovim snom; do Ruže
kao simbola ljubavnog ideala može se doći samo kroz kušnje i zapreke (koje simboliziraju likovi
kao što su Mržnja, Požuda, Strah, Stid), a taj dio (prekinut Lorrisovom smrću) završava
junakovom tužaljkom o beznađu. Meung je preuzeo Lorrisovu alegorijsku strukturu i
karakterizaciju, ali je promijenio smisao djela pa su junaci umjesto Ljubavi postali likovi Razuma
i Prirode; oni dovode junaka do Ruže, ali istodobno služe kao nositelji autorske koncepcije
nesmiljene (i eruditske) kritike okoštalog i licemjernoga feudalnog ideala viteštva čime
Meungov dio nazire veliku civilizacijsku krizu. Roman je sve do XVI. st. bio najčitaniji francuski
književni tekst.

Le Roman de la Rose (Romansa ruže ) srednjovjekovna je pjesma na starofrancuskom ,


stilizirana kao alegorijska vizija snova . Kao poezija, Romansa ruže značajan je primjer dvorske
literature namijenjene zabavi i podučavanju o umjetnosti romantične ljubavi . U cijelom
narativu riječ Rose koristi se i kao ime naslovne dame i kao apstraktni simbol ženske
seksualnosti . Imena ostalih likova funkcioniraju i kao osobna imena i kao metonimi koji
ilustriraju različite čimbenike koji dovode do i čine ljubavnu vezu .

Romansa ruže napisana je u dvije faze. U prvoj fazi kompozicije, oko 1230. godine, Guillaume de
Lorris napisao je 4058 redaka opisujući pokušaje dvorjana da se dodvori svojoj voljenoj ženi.
Prvi dio priče pjesme smješten je u obzidan vrt, primjer locus amoenus , tradicionalnog
književnog toposa u epskoj poeziji i viteška romansa . Četrdeset i pet godina kasnije, oko 1275.
godine, u drugoj fazi kompozicije, Jean de Meun napisao je 17.724 dodatnih redaka, u kojima
alegorijske ličnosti, kao što su Razum, Priroda i Genij, raspravljaju o filozofiji ljubavi i ljubavi.
ljubavnik postiže svoj cilj.

3. Alain Chartier: La belle dame sans mercy

"La Belle Dame sans Merci "(" Lijepa dama bez milosti ") je balada u produkciji engleskog
pjesnik John Keats 1819. Naslov je izveden iz naslova pjesme iz 15. stoljeća Alain
Chartier pod nazivom La Belle Dame sans Mercy .

In the poem, a knight tells the story of how he becomes obsessed with, and then gets
abandoned by, a spirit known as La Belle Dame sans Merci, or "The Beautiful Lady
Without Mercy." Though seemingly aware she's an illusion, the knight lingers in his
memory of the Lady, and it's implied he will do so until he dies.

How does the Knight describes the lady in the poem?


The knight says that he met a beautiful, fairy-like “lady” in the “meads,” or fields. She
had long hair, was graceful, and had “wild” eyes. (We are not sure what “wild' eyes
would look like, but apparently, the knight thought it was attractive.)
The woman wasn’t interested. The man pleaded and begged. That makes men repulsive
to women. So it was in this poem. After an unbearably lengthy display of beta male
behavior from the man, the woman ended the conversation.

The man left with tears in his eyes. He prayed for his death to come quickly. It did. After
tearing out all his hair, he died in misery. This was a medieval man who did not
understand medieval women’s love poetry.

Depicting a pathetic omega male who died in lonely misery outraged the champions of
women.

4. La chanson de Roland

Pjesma o Rolandu (fr. La Chanson de Roland, na hrv. ponekad i Pjesan o Rolandu) je epska
poema iz žanra chanson de geste s kraja 11. stoljeća. Najpoznatija je iz serije starofrancuskih
junačkih pjesama o Karlu Velikom, nastalih u razdoblju između druge polovice 11. stoljeća i
1130. Autor i točno vrijeme nastanka nisu sigurno utvrđeni.

Sadrži oko 4000 stihova na starom francuskom jeziku. Pjeva o događanjima starim tri stoljeća,
tj. borbi viteza Rolanda (ili Hrudlana), markiza bretonskih močvara, protiv moćne vojske u bitci
kod Roncevauxa, Rolandovoj pogibiji i kasnijoj osveti Karla Velikog.[2] Postoji devet sačuvanih
rukopisa teksta ovog epa.

Povjesničari vjeruju da su se karolinški vitezovi u spomenutoj bitci borili protiv gerile naroda
Baska, a ne Avara. Na ovaj način je jedan lokalni rat predstavljen kao sveti rat, vjerojatno da bi
se potkrijepili razlozi za Križarske ratove. Klasični je primjer srednjovjekovne dvorske literature
koja slavi povijest, legende, viteštvo i feudalni ponos. Lik Rolanda ima sve odlike idealnog
srednjovjekovnog viteza: hrabar je, lojalan vazal, odan kralju i crkvi.[1]

La Chanson de Roland, English The Song of Roland, Old French epic poem that is probably the
earliest (c. 1100) chanson de geste and is considered the masterpiece of the genre. The poem's
probable author was a Norman poet, Turold, whose name is introduced in its last line.

5. Le vilain mire

Wives and husbands verbally and physically abusing each other has been a sad feature
of human life throughout recorded history. In medieval Europe, communities through a
shaming ritual called charivari publicly punished men for beating their wives. They also
through charivari publicly punished men for being beaten by their wives. Since
medieval times, domestic violence against men has come to be largely ignored. Men
who are victims of domestic violence are now punished by denial rather than by
charivari.

Le Vilain Mire, a thirteenth-century Old French fabliau, represents imaginatively


charivari for domestic violence. A rich peasant won with his wealth the hand of an
impoverished knight’s daughter. Fearing that he would be cuckolded while he was out
working in the fields, the peasant resolved to beat his wife in the morning so that she
would weep all day and not be attractive to men. When he returned home in the
evening, the peasant planned to make up with her and enjoy marital life. After getting
beaten twice, the wife ingeniously prompted the king’s messengers to beat her husband
repeatedly. The king’s messengers found the husband, beat him for the first time, and
then “they mounted him on a horse, his face to the tail, and led him to the king.”[1]
That’s the characteristic charivari position of a man being publicly shamed for beating
his wife, or getting beaten by his wife. Crediting the wife’s ingenuity in securing two
strong proxies, the husband was positioned for a double dose of punishment in this
fabliau

In this fabliau, a king’s daughter was gravely ill from a fishbone stuck in her throat. A
peasant, mistakenly regarded as a better doctor than Hippocrates, promised to cure the
girl in order to get royal officials to stop beating him.

The peasant arranged for an erotic setting: he was secluded with the girl in a room with
a blazing fire. Erotic cures feature in medieval poetry and ancient novels

The king’s daughter burst out laughing at the naked peasant’s itching. Her laughter
expelled the fishbone stuck in her throat and cured her grave illness. This un-erotic
erotic cure turns on bringing together the laughably incongruous.

The peasant doctor did not become a celebrated saint. But he did receive a large
income from the king, never needed to farm again, and went on to live happily with his
wife.

One of the best ways to learn about a culture is to figure out its sense of humour. In
medieval Europe, this means looking at fabliaux: short, funny tales that demonstrate
common stereotypes and jokes – usually sexual, violent, and containing a clear
scapegoat. They’re the type of story that usually see someone get his “come uppance”,
or succeed by wits alone. I came across a fabliau called “The Peasant Doctor” this week,
that shows the kind of clever turnaround medieval listeners loved, and that we still love
today (thankfully, in a less-violent form). This version of the story is found in Fabliaux:
Ribald Tales from the Old French.
The story begins with a rich peasant farmer who marries a poor knight’s daughter and
immediately regrets it: what if one of her knightly friends (who has nothing else to do
during the day, naturally) comes by and seduces her while he’s out ploughing? To
prevent this, he comes up with the idea that if he beats her in the morning, she’ll weep
all day, and when he comes home he can make it up to her, so they can enjoy the
evening pleasantly. He tries this for a couple of days, and sure enough, his wife weeps
all day so that no one wants to come near her – one day he has beaten her so hard, he
“almost crippled her.” But during the afternoon alone, his wife has time to think. “Has
my husband ever been beaten?” she says to herself. “Not he, he does not know what
blows are. If he did, not for all the world would he give me so many of them.”

While she is mulling this over, two messengers of the king ride up, asking for some
refreshment. She discovers they are looking for a doctor for the princess, who has a
fishbone stuck in her throat. The wife tells the messengers that her husband is a doctor,
but that he “is of such a humor that we won’t do anything for anybody unless he is first
beaten soundly.”

The messengers go off to find the husband, who protests that he is not a doctor. They
take it as a sign of his obstinacy and beat him, tossing him on their horse and taking him
to the king. The messengers tell the king that they’ve found a brilliant doctor, but that
he requires a beating before he’ll work. The king is amazed, but accepts this, so that
when the farmer protests that he can’t get the fishbone out of the princess’ throat, the
king exclaims, “What wonders do I hear! Beat him for me!”

The farmer, desperate, says he will cure the princess after all, which he does by making
her laugh so hard the fishbone flies out (apparently, scratching himself naked by the fire
is enough). Relieved, the farmer thinks he can now return to his normal life, but the king
is so pleased that he declares the farmer will stay at court as his doctor. The farmer
protests, is beaten again, and then relents.

One day, “more than eighty” sick people arrive at court, and the farmer is called upon to
cure them. Predictably, he protests, is beaten again, and then says he will cure them.
When the king has gone, the farmer says to the sick people that he will cure them by
burning the sickest person there, “and the others will benefit from this, for all who
swallow the powder of the man who has been burned will be cured immediately.”

He then asks the person who believes he is the most sick to come forward. Miraculously,
no one is that sick anymore, and they all leave. The king, impressed, allows the doctor to
go home again, with untold riches – enough that he never need plough again. Because
he is too wealthy to work during the day, he no longer beats his wife, and they all live
happily ever after.

This type of trickster-makes-good story isn’t unique to the Middle Ages, but medieval
listeners did love stories of someone being wildly successful because of his wit –
especially a peasant. Interestingly, in this story, the farmer’s wife is just as successful as
he is, keeping herself safe from her beatings and ending up richer than she’s ever been.
Often, fabliaux are about women who actually are unfaithful (sometimes they are
punished, sometimes they aren’t), but this woman is actually innocent and undeserving
of punishment (we’re talking by medieval standards, here), and she manages to turn her
beast of a husband into a prince through her own cunning. The audience, then, gets two
turnarounds to enjoy: the woman who outsmarts her jealous husband, and the peasant
who outsmarts the king. A doctor who’s just making things up also speaks to the
medieval sense of humour: who knows if most doctors are just making things up,
anyway?

Domestic violence is rarely a part of the modern sense of humour (with tremendously
good reason!), but slapstick, trickery, predictable repetition, and successfully faking
expertise – especially if the character is the farthest thing from the stereotype of the
expert – certainly are. “The Peasant Doctor”, then, shows us that our sense of humour
may have (thankfully) changed somewhat, but that there are some things that we still
find funny. It’s interesting to know that, even across hundreds of years, watching
somebody manage to trick his or her way into a better life can still make us smile.

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