temporary concession to Gaimar's idea-if it be his-at the beginning of the Brut, he returns to the old standard, and maintains it throughout the rest of that poem. In the Rou he shows himself an even stronger partisan of the traditional couplet, but lowers the ratio of three-line phrases through the adoption of longer periods. What he evidently wished to defend was the couplet in itself, not the general status of old-time versification. In this respect he was not so genuine a conservative as the author of Thèbes, whose proportion of broken couplets is low and of threeline sentences high, as they should be. We therefore consider this unknown poet a real exponent of the traditional manner, breaking the couplet only when necessary to give expression to a more extended thought. With him we would class the authors of the Sept Sages, Floire et Blanchefleur, the Douce Folie Tristan, and Marie de France's Espurgatoire-poems which probably cover the sixth decade of the century, contemporaries of Wace's later verse. Meanwhile the notion of the couplet which had been championed by Gaimar was gaining headway, especially in romantic literature. In Thomas' Tristan, the Enéas, and the first part of Benoît's Troie, it presents what we might call a natural development-a larger, but still moderate, proportion of broken couplets, a constantly high ratio of sentences of three lines. With these poems may be classed Marie de France's lais. This stage marks the limit beyond which the old style of narrative verse could not safely go. The poets who belong to it vary their rhythm in order to emphasize their thought. They do not break the couplet wantonly. But that an attempt was being made to do so, and that a conflict over the narrative couplet was in progress, seems clear from the vacillation manifested in the larger part of Troie by Benoît de Sainte-More. If the critical text which is being established by Constans does not seriously affect the worth of our data, we may see in Troie an author disturbed in his art by this literary strife, wishing to ally himself with the winning side, but uncertain as to the side. And so he breaks the couplet with increasing frequency and avoids the three-line period, until, either his judgment or his own artistic instinct prompting, he settles down to a fairly moderate employment of the broken couplet. But the concomitant of short sentences he never recovers.1 Benoît wavers. His contemporary, Gautier d'Arras, less ingenuous than Benoît, chooses his position and abides by it. Eclectic here as elsewhere, Gautier gives us the impression of a man who does not wish to offend anyone. His use of the broken couplet is considerably freer than its use with the common-sense school of Thomas and the Enéas, but in his first poem he maintains a high ratio of short sentences after the break in the couplet. And when he lowers that proportion in Ille et Galeron, without touching the percentage of broken couplets he had set for himself, we are quite sure he felt that the time was propitious for him to do so; for Benoît, and Wace even, had set the example. Who will not say that Gautier realized that the middle road to fortune was the safest for the honest traveler? Now, what was this occult force which occasioned good Benoît's perturbations and kept the prosody of the fearful Gautier at an unusual level of consistency? Quite probably, it was the authority of Chrétien de Troyes, whose Érec had just found favor with the patrons of literature in France and England. For an analysis of Chrétien's versification reveals the fact that it was in Érec that he changed his position as a versifier. There from a radical representative of the modified old school he became the founder of the new. He begins Érec with a proportion of broken couplets which but slightly exceeds the ratio adopted by the author of Énéas. But no sooner does he have his subject-matter well in hand than he increases this proportion, and quickly reaches the ratio which he preserved for the remainder of his writings. The same steadiness is noticeable in Chrétien's treatment of the three-line sentence which follows the break in the couplet. Should this supposition be valid—and it rests on quite as good a basis of validity as the larger part of our accepted theories regarding the literature of the twelfth century-then Érec would have come to 1 The first half of Constans' text indicates a normal use of the three-line sentence. above, p. 16, note 1. See 2 It is understood that Perceval is not included in this analysis, because of the unreliability of the Mons MS, the only one which has yet been printed. Benoît's notice while he was in the very midst of Troie, and would have preceded both poems of Gautier d'Arras. The presence of this sudden change in Érec would also furnish an argument for those who claim that Erec was Chrétien's first long poem.1 After Chrétien, and during his career, there are perhaps four ways of handling the couplet: the traditional way, which held its own for a time, particularly in didactic and historical poetry, and received occasional recruits from romantic literature; the developed form of the traditional way, as represented by Tristan and the Énéas; the moderate employment of the new rhythm established by Chrétien, which was adopted by Gautier d'Arras and the author of Amadas et Ydoine; and, finally, the blind imitation of Chrétien's excesses in prosody, which seems to be the standard for all kinds of verse in the first half of the thirteenth century. But during the great poet's literary career his followers were few in number, and it is not likely that his days were so prolonged as to enable him to witness the triumph of the rhythm he had so persistently advocated. YALE UNIVERSITY F. M. WARREN 1 My own impression, from studying the literature of this period, is that Chrétien began his series of romances with one notion of composition firmly in mind, and this notion was to limit the length of court poems. Thèbes, Enéas, and Tristan-which I think are earlier than Érec-not to mention a chronicle like the Brut, all violated his conception of proportion. He intended to give them all a model in Érec. The idea of wrecking the traditional structure of the couplet and its accompanying short sentence would seem to have come to him afterward and during the process of composition. To this desire for symmetry in length I would ascribe the addition of the Joie de la cour episode to Erec, the extended introduction on Alexander and Soredamour in Cligès, and the moderation of Godfrey de Laigni in ending la Charrette. Gautier d'Arras follows him in this reform-it is hardly possible that Chrétien could have followed Gautier-follows him to the extent of making his two poems practically equal. Amadas et Ydoine, the answer to Cligès, exceeds it somewhat, but by this time Chrétien himself had wearied of his reform and was about to return to the old measure in Perceval. STUDIES IN CERVANTES I. "PERSILES Y SIGISMUNDA" II. THE QUESTION OF HELIODORUS In my last article' I said that Cervantes had a more cogent reason for "daring to compete with Heliodorus" than the traditional one of merely aiming to follow some revered classical model. For he realized that the romance of Theagenes and Chariklea was, at the very time when the Persiles was being composed, hardly considered by the popular mind as the work of a noted ancient; in no sense did it take rank among the learned with those standard Greek and Latin writers who have always served in the study of classic literature. It was rather an intrinsic part of contemporary Spanish fiction, and so was classed with such romances as were current at the time. To confirm this, it will be best to begin with specific proofs, and then proceed to such generalities as may strengthen the conclusion reached. 3 In one of the most charming plays which have come from the pen of Lope de Vega, namely his amusing comedy La dama boba2written about the time that Cervantes was busy with his Persiles— the plot turns on the wholly different character of two sisters, Nise and Finea. The former is an excellent type of the bluestocking or bachillera of the times, though not by any means wholly without feminine charms; she is simply a devourer of all kinds of literature, with a marked predilection for romance and poetry and young poets also. Finea, on the other hand, is wholly illiterate, and Lope, with his characteristic skill in por 1 Modern Philology, Vol. IV (1906), p. 17. 2 An autograph MS of the play is preserved in the Biblioteca nacional at Madrid. It is signed and dated April 28, 1613. All my citations will follow the reading of the MS, the punctuation being my own. The text in the edition of the "Biblioteca de autores españoles" is very incorrect. (Vol. I of Comedias escogidas de Lope de Vega, pp. 297 ff.) 3 pues, Nise bella es la palma: finea un roble, sin alma y discurso de razon. Nise es muger tan discreta, -Act I, vss. 122-28. And the father says a little later: resuelbome en dos cosas que quisiera; -Vss. 238-41. |