[..] Idleness so called, which does not consist in doing nothing, but in doing a great deal not recognised in the dogmatic formularies of the ruling class, has as good a right to state its position as industry itself. It is admitted that the presence of people who refuse to enter in the great handicap race for sixpenny pieces, is at once an insult and a disenchantment for those who do. [..]
R. L. Stevenson
It was called for! Enjoy this beauty
[…]
In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,
It perched for vespers nine;
Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white,
Glimmered the white Moon-shine.'
'God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!—
Why look'st thou so?'—With my cross-bow
I shot the ALBATROSS.
In the celebrated ballad The rime of the ancient mariner, Coleridge explores the mystical voyage told by a prophet-like mariner, warning a wedding guest and thus humanity, about the risks of challenging nature.
But what lead the mariner to this terrible action? Was it pride, thirst of power or hubris?
I am not sure whether the text specifies it or not, what do you guys think?
[…]
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful, a faery's child;
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sideways would she lean, and sing
A faery’s song.
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She look'd at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.
She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said.—
I love thee true.
She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she gaz'd and sighed deep,
And there I shut her wild sad eyes
So kiss'd to sleep.
And there we slumber'd on the moss,
And there I dream'd, ah woe betide!—
The latest dream I ever dream'd
On the cold hill side. […]
This week I would like to take a wider perspective as I follow through my “songs for the weekend” series.
The Ballad is a middle age genre which required a bard and a public who would listen. The structure is pretty strict as it was meant to be learned by heart (rhyming scheme, stanzas and refrains tend to always respect the same number).
The content didn’t necessarily convey a moral value: the goal was entertaining and possibly confirming popular beliefs.
The romantics took inspiration from the ballad not only for its structure, which was modified anyway to fit a more lyrical and mystical style, but also for the fascination with ancient tradition and humble-like sound.
Today I would like to share with you “La Belle dame sans Merci” by John Keats (you have guessed it, he is one of my favourites).
The tone is definitively gloomier and more evocative than we are used to with the traditional ballad. However the femme fatale figure acts like a gradual unifier in the poem, giving it the sense of proximity with death and beauty (the true essence of sublime) that Keats has always been fascinated with.
Enjoy La Belle dame! I’m also sharing a medieval ballad, Lord Randal, so as to highlight the similarities and differences.
Which one do you prefer? Which other interpretations of the ballad do you know?
https://youtu.be/MMR55HoeSG4?is=CgmEF5PCjoDH62za
He turned away from her suddenly and set off across? the strand. His cheeks were aflame; his body was aglow;his limbs were trembling. On and on and on and on he strode, far out over the sands, singing wildly to the sea, crying to greet the advent of the life that had cried to him.
Her image had passed into his soul for ever and no word had broken the holy silence of his ecstasy. Her eyes had called him and his soul had leaped at the call. To live, to err, to fall, to triumph, to recreate life out of life! A wild angel had appeared to him, the angel of mortal youth and beauty, an envoy from the fair courts of life, to throw open before him in an instant of ecstasy the gates of all the ways of error and glory. On and on and on and on!
He halted suddenly and heard his heart in the silence.
What does this song have to do with literature?
Correct if I’m tripping, but the lyrics in this song have always reminded me of the sonnet “my mistress eyes are nothing like the sun” by W. Shakespeare.
They both talk about feminine figures who do not fit in the beauty standards of their times
The lyrical presence of the poet / bard is evident and repeated throughout the work
They are both catchy ahah
Enjoy!
‘A speechless sadness’ by Osip Mandelshtam
A speechless sadness
opened two huge eyes.
A vase of flowers woke:
splashing crystal surprise.
The whole room filled,
with languor - sweet potion!
Such a tiny kingdom
to swallow sleep’s ocean.
Wine’s slight redness,
May’s slight sunlight –
fingers, slender, and white,
breaking wafer-fragments.
I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,
Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine;
Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves;
And mid-May's eldest child,
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer
I’m obsessed with this series on genius with some of my favourite artists.
Noah Kahan has, imo, created a very subjective version of the ballad style song. Compared to “rät”, from last week, the symbols are more accessible even for those who are not from Vermont. Anyone can relate to the content conveying clear elements of separation, nostalgia and willingness to move on despite the pain.
From the literary pov, I love the association “season of the sticks” with a gloomy time. The more we are approaching spring, the more it makes me think of the expectations and cathartic charge this period has as rebirth and renewal. Autumn is associated with darkness and decay.
Could they be related instead of opposites though? Spring is a transitory step, snow melts and mud is left behind, dead leaves sediment and the inevitable death is a door to a new life.
What do you think?
Favourite line: dream each night of some version of you that I might not have but I did not lose.