The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry 9781526160829

Citation preview

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

MANCHESTER MEDIEVAL LITERATURE AND CULTURE Series editors: Anke Bernau, David Matthews and James Paz Series founded by: J. J. Anderson and Gail Ashton

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Advisory board: Ruth Evans, Patricia C. Ingham, Andrew James Johnston, Chris Jones, Catherine Karkov, Nicola McDonald, Haruko Momma, Susan Phillips, Sarah Salih, Larry Scanlon, Stephanie Trigg and Matthew Vernon Manchester Medieval Literature and Culture publishes monographs and essay collections comprising new research informed by current critical methodologies on the literary cultures of the Middle Ages. We are interested in all periods, from the early Middle Ages through to the late, and we include post-medieval engagements with and representations of the medieval period (or ‘medievalism’). ‘Literature’ is taken in a broad sense, to include the many different medieval genres: imaginative, historical, political, scientific, religious. While we welcome contributions on the diverse cultures of medieval Britain and are happy to receive submissions on Anglo-Norman, Anglo-Latin and Celtic writings, we are also open to work on the Middle Ages in Europe more widely, and beyond. Titles available in the series 31. Enacting the Bible in medieval and early modern drama  Eva von Contzen and Chanita Goodblatt (eds) 32. Riddles at work in the early medieval tradition: Words, ideas, interactions  Megan Cavell and Jennifer Neville (eds) 33. From Iceland to the Americas: Vinland and historical imagination  Tim William Machan and Jón Karl Helgason (eds) 34. Northern memories and the English Middle Ages  Tim William Machan 35. Harley manuscript geographies: Literary history and the medieval ­miscellany  Daniel Birkholz 36. Play time: Gender, anti-Semitism and temporality in medieval biblical drama  Daisy Black 37. Transfiguring medievalism: Poetry, attention and the mysteries of the body  Cary Howie 38. Objects of affection: The book and the household in late medieval England  Myra Seaman 39. The gift of narrative in medieval England  Nicholas Perkins 40. Sleep and its spaces in Middle English literature: Emotions, ethics, dreams  Megan G. Leitch 41. Encountering The Book of Margery Kempe  Laura Kalas and Laura Varnam (eds)

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry Caitlin Flynn

Manchester University Press

Copyright © Caitlin Flynn 2022

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

The right of Caitlin Flynn to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Published by Manchester University Press Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978 1 5261 6081 2 hardback First published 2022 The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Front cover—Arundel MS 317, f.25. Copyright © The British Library Board

Typeset by Cheshire Typesetting Ltd, Cuddington, Cheshire

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Contents

Acknowledgements Introduction: the narrative grotesque

page vi 1

Part I:  The Palyce of Honour, Gavin Douglas 1 ‘Overset with fantasyis’: grotesquing the dream vision 31 2 Identity crisis: temporal dissonance and narrative voice 63 3 Heavenly harmonies: classical and Christian divinity in Palyce102 Part II:  The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo, William Dunbar 4 Making demandes: frame, form, and narratorial persona133 5 Flyte of fancy: the first wife’s response161 6 Lovesick or sick of love? The second wife’s response186 7 Bad romance: the widow as venerean preacher 211 Conclusion237 Bibliography247 Index257

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Acknowledgements

First I would like to thank Rhiannon Purdie. Her vibrant enthusiasm for Older Scots is immediately contagious and through her I gained a passion for this incredible literature. She has guided me through this journey with wisdom, humour, and generosity. More widely, I have found a community of wonderfully collegial individuals in the corner of medieval literature inhabited by Older Scots specialists: among others, I would like to thank David Parkinson for graciously reading this entire book in an early draft and for contributing many thoughtful and useful insights; Nicola Royan, who has time and again shown me generosity and support in navigating academia; and Theo van Heijnsbergen, who provided me feedback at any early stage in this project. The detailed and constructive responses provided by the anonymous readers were also invaluable to the stages of revision this study underwent. I have been lucky, too, in the institutions at which I have had the privilege to study and work over the course of my career. My gratitude is extended to the University of St Andrews and to the School of English, where I found a community that supported me in all aspects of my studies; and also to the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Freie Universität Berlin, and Jutta Eming, for graciously supporting my work. To my steadfast friends I send loving thanks: to John J. Gallagher for unfailingly providing me with perspective, levity, and drinks; to Michael Nott for encouraging me at low moments and for wandering all the streets with me; to Amanda Merritt for allowing me the space to express my worries, fears, and triumphs, and for sharing so many special moments with me.



Acknowledgements vii

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

To my lovingly boisterous and supportive family – Cathy, Scott, Bree, Cayla, Sofia, Trevor, Jack – thank you for your constant enthusiasm and encouragement. Lastly, to my mother, Mary Caroline, who without fail encouraged me to follow my dreams whatever they were and wherever they took me. I am inexpressibly grateful for the million ways in which she has inspired and ­supported me.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Introduction: the narrative grotesque

If a painter chose to join a human head to the neck of a horse, and to spread feathers of many a hue over limbs picked up now here now there, so that what at the top is a lovely woman ends below in a black and ugly fish, could you, my friends, if favoured with a private view, refrain from laughing? Believe me, dear Pisos, quite like such pictures would be a book, whose idle fancies shall be shaped like a sick man’s dreams, so that neither head nor foot can be assigned a single shape. (Horace, De Arte Poetica)1

Horace’s treatise on poetic composition (10 BCE) derides the rupture and fusion of bodily boundaries as laughable, chaotic, and inarticulate. He argues that poetics written in the spirit of these ‘idle fancies […] shaped like a sick man’s dreams’ would be equally subject to such derision. While Horace’s disdainful perspective is dominant, his description accurately expresses the precepts that define the grotesque. At its most essential the grotesque is the fusion of horror and humour. The intersection of these affective reactions arises from the rupturing of boundaries, whether bodily or abstract. Horace’s simile to fever hallucinations impresses a key feature of the grotesque: it warps and eventually transforms recognisable objects, thoughts, or concepts through a dual process of rupturing boundaries and fusing opposed affective reactions. This subjective aspect of the grotesque is especially provocative in literary settings where abstract concepts such as lexis, prosody, genre, and diegesis might all contribute to this destructive and generative project. The narrative grotesque, therefore, creates a framework through which literary texts may be analysed as they interrogate, distort, and rupture conventions.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

2

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

This study proposes the narrative grotesque as a new collocation of the critical term ‘grotesque’. This new collocation offers to literary criticism a strategy for reading texts that centres discussion on moments that meld together, however briefly, a collection of discordant or opposed elements. This fusion does not only represent disrupted conventions or boundaries, however. It provokes a sensation of horror, repulsion, and humour to create chimeras of the type reviled by Horace. While these chimeric texts innovate on genre, form, tone, and affect, they do so in a manner which is more concerned with self-consciously probing literary expression and style than pushing forward any one particular genre or form. In this way, the narrative grotesque is a framework that brings into focus textual ruptures and fusions in order to explicate underlying philosophical and aesthetic concerns in literary narratives. This study considers two Older Scots poems that exemplify the narrative grotesque, namely Gavin Douglas’s The Palyce of Honour (c. 1501) and William Dunbar’s The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo (c. 1507). Narrowing focus to these two texts allows for a forensic examination of the multivalent forms and outcomes of the narrative grotesque. When it is applied as a framework for reading medieval texts the narrative grotesque will be shown to be an illuminating method for bringing order and insight to unruly texts that disorient and disturb by overspilling boundaries and constructing dizzying literary hybrids. The narrative grotesque pervades these texts at the levels of lexis, narrative voice, genre, and beyond, thus making them ideal exemplars of the framework’s applications. Throughout this study, other texts of Scottish and English origin will be brought to bear as intertexts and analogues in order to show the ways in which Douglas and Dunbar engaged with their literary predecessors and milieux. Through the multitude of ‘grotesqueries’ found in Douglas and Dunbar, this study will also demonstrate the ways in which the narrative grotesque may be applied to other medieval and early modern texts. The introduction will first give an overview of the literary atmosphere in late medieval Scotland with an orientation towards exploring the contexts and trends that may have given rise to the production of these two grotesque poems within several years of one another. Next, a brief history of the critical term ‘grotesque’

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 3

will situate the reader in the multiple evolutions which the grotesque has undergone as it was transferred from a term for architectural decoration to a literary catch-all for exaggerated and obscene figures. The narrative grotesque is distinguished from these various uses of the grotesque because it is not limited to visual effects. Rather, the narrative grotesque elucidates exaggerated forms of transgression and disruption at linguistic, formal, and structural levels of the literary text.

Douglas, Dunbar, and later medieval Scottish literature Scottish writers were in a unique position at the end of the fifteenth century: the geographically peripheral location of Scotland meant that, despite deep and lasting ties with continental Europe, they integrated new materials into their literary canon unevenly and sporadically. This led to the late persistence of medieval styles of poetic composition. However, that is not to say that Scots were intellectually backward: their engagement with humanism and early European print culture led to a curious mixing of medieval styles with fresh philosophical perspectives.2 Scotland’s distinctive political environment also contributed to a peculiarly Scottish literary culture where the ‘advice to princes’ mode was popular for generations, in part a result of the successive minority kingships throughout the fifteenth century, starting with James I of Scotland. Perhaps the most significant challenge faced by scholars of Scottish literature is the frustratingly narrow and uneven transmission of this literature to the present day. Many surviving texts can be traced to only a handful of authors (mostly of the fifteenth century or later), while the remaining anonymous works often retain barely a trace of their historical context, location of composition, or likely authorship; sometimes dating can be narrowed to only a fifty-year period. As Nicola Royan has observed, what we know of medieval Scottish literature is largely limited to the tastes of three sixteenth-century Edinburgh residents: George Bannatyne (1545–1607/8), Richard Maitland (1496–1586), and John Asloan (fl. 1513–30). The so-called Bannatyne Manuscript alone transmits sixty of William Dunbar’s poems, fifty of which are written in a

4

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

single hand.3 Regarding patterns of literary production, Royan remarks: The devolution of literary production outwith an only intermittently regal court provokes additional questions about audience and circulation, as well as about the relationship of the regions of Scotland to the centre. A metropolitan model of production and reception, still evident in discussions of early modern English literature, seems far less probable in a realm where there was not always a political centre, and where power was frequently devolved to regional magnates and burghs.4

This observation has implications for two essential aspects of the poetry composed by Gavin Douglas and William Dunbar. The first regards the location and environment of the Scottish court: Douglas and Dunbar are quintessentially of the court and demonstrably wrote for or to James IV of Scotland. William Hepburn, for instance, has convincingly demonstrated that Dunbar’s poem ‘Schir, ye haue mony seruitouris’ contains insights into the personnel active in James IV’s Renaissance court.5 Yet, the mobile nature of the court alongside the authors’ other duties, namely Douglas’s ecclesiastical appointments, meant that there were long periods of time in which these authors were not physically in attendance at the royal court. Furthermore, some of the most significant works produced in Scotland in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, including Douglas’s masterful translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, the Eneados (1513), boasted patrons from the nobility rather than the royal family. The second relevant aspect of courtliness raised by Royan’s remarks pertains to the distinction between interacting with the court on a personal level and engaging courtly modes of writing. During the period that Dunbar and Douglas were active, c. ­1490–1513, court poetry in Scotland and England was undergoing a stylistic evolution. This trend has been most notably identified by Antony Hasler in his study of allegory and authority in Scottish and English court poetry. He observes, ‘this period sees […] the explosion of a fragmenting and abrasive eclecticism, in which signification goes violently awry’, a result which he contends leads to composite literary forms that ‘threaten to collapse into incoherence

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 5

under the pressure of something unspoken’.6 Hasler’s comments come as a conclusion to his study, and in the following analysis his observations are extended, albeit indirectly.7 Hasler’s study is limited specifically to court poetry, but hybridisation, multiplication, and transfiguration are themes evident in other genres of Scottish poetry of the period. Perhaps most relevant for the current discussion is the anonymously composed Older Scots fabliau The Freiris of Berwik (c. 1480). The fabliau form is well known for its exaggerated, obscene, and humorous content. As I have argued elsewhere, The Freiris of Berwik innovates on the genre by mobilising ritual magic (necromancy) as the central narrative concern and, in so doing, ‘explore[s] prescient conflicts between modes of knowledge, types of literary expression, and the uncomfortable tensions between popular practices and official intellectual stances’.8 In that analysis, I set the Scottish fabliau in conversation with a Middle High German analogue, Hans Rosenplüt’s Der Fahrende Schüler. Reading the texts within a grotesque framework, thus decentring critical strategies more grounded in transmission and explicit cross-textual allusions, exposed a hitherto unremarked correspondence between the fabliaux: each text uses the increasingly archaic medieval comic form to explore the precarious status of ritual magic in intellectual and ‘popular’ spheres. The critical framework applied across this study should similarly open critical discourse to different modes of comparative analysis. Gavin Douglas and William Dunbar were, nonetheless, closely associated with James IV’s court and are considered to be two of Scotland’s pre-eminent makars. Douglas came from an aristocratic background and was a younger son of Archibald, the fifth earl of Angus. He obtained a degree at University of St Andrews and it is presumed that he subsequently spent time in Paris. As is the case for many writers of the period, Douglas was a member of the clergy and was made provost of St Giles in Edinburgh in 1503 before becoming the bishop of Dunkeld in 1516. The Douglas family was active in political life throughout the fifteenth century and Douglas himself became especially involved in the court and its political machinations after the disastrous Battle of Flodden in 1513. He died from plague in London in 1522 in the midst of various ­political intrigues.9

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

6

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

His impressively wide knowledge of literary and philosophical writing is evident in his two longest works, The Palyce of Honour (hereafter Palyce) and the Eneados. Royan observes that in Palyce Calliope’s train includes many eminent classical writers, but it also shows Douglas to be au courant with the Continental literary scene and European humanism by listing, for instance, Petrarch and Boccaccio among her cavalcade.10 In terms of Douglas’s humanist impulses Royan notes that, although his association with this movement is problematic, certain aspects of his translation of the Aeneid reflect at least a sympathy with humanist principles. Coinciding with humanist principles regarding education, Douglas presents his translation as a learning tool and he thinks critically about the versification of his translation.11 Douglas’s characterisation of his motivations and philosophy in translating the Aeneid reflect back to his work a decade earlier which explores the purpose of the poetic vocation, the sources of poetic inspiration, and the role that poetry plays in society. As will be explored in the following chapters, Douglas uses the dream vision to interrogate these questions by turning them into the basis of the dreamer-narrator’s psychomachia. Viewing the text through the perspective of the narrative grotesque makes possible a nuanced reading of Douglas’s intertwining of medieval styles with humanist concepts. The first half of this study takes as its subject Palyce. Douglas’s text is comprised of a complex lattice of hybridisations, which are created through dissonant combinations of perspectives and boundaries, whether spatial, temporal, or corporeal. Consequently, the narrative grotesque is applied to elucidate his innovative take on dream-vision poetry and the process of poetic making. Palyce follows two simultaneous trajectories: the first is a solipsistic agenda in which the dreamer seeks validation and direction as an individual and poet; the second follows a wider epistemological track that attempts to reconcile poetry’s function in society by establishing it as a conduit between the mundane and the divine. The narratordreamer’s intellectual and psychological turmoil reflects not only a painful process of self-discovery but also the precarious role of poetics as a divinely inspired mode of enlightenment and as an instrument of personal elevation.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 7

Palyce follows medieval dream-allegory conventions by setting the opening scene in a spring garden. As the narrator proceeds further into the garden, he hears an unknown voice sing in praise of May’s bounty. Rather than feeling inspired, the narrator remonstrates May, Nature, and Venus for what he perceives to be their neglect of his dedicated service. He sets himself into a frenetic state, witnesses a comet-like flash in the sky, and subsequently faints – an act which turns out to be his entrée into the dream. In the dream, temporal and spatial dimensions dilate and constrict unpredictably, while sensory perceptions similarly morph with erratic speed. The dreamer, alone, wanders the terrifyingly poisonous and decrepit dreamscape disconsolately. Eventually he encounters a parade of divine entities and through the intervention of two trailing figures he learns that the party is journeying to the Palace of Honour. He is enraged to see Venus lead a subsequent cavalcade and verbally harangues her, which ends in his indictment and trial for crimes against Venus. Luckily, he is rescued by Calliope, who intervenes as his barrister and then brings him into her retinue of poets and philosophers for the journey. After a brief stop in Venus’s garden, the narrator attempts, with the help of a nymph guide, to see the Palace of Honour up close. Although he reaches the entrance, a glance through the entry door stuns him and he tumbles some way down the mountainside. As he attempts to return to Venus’s garden he slips into a brook and the shock of the fall rouses him from unconsciousness. He once again finds himself in the garden of the frame, albeit a garden that looks much less lustrous than before. The series of contradictions, reflections, and multiplications that characterise everything from the most peripheral motif to the overarching structure of the text has led to varied interpretations of the journey’s allegorical significance. David Parkinson, for instance, discusses farce in the narrative: The Palis may be read as an exploration of the broader significance of courtly experience, with its infernal foundation and heavenly goal […] In between those fixed points, however, come the shifting hells and paradises of common individual situations; and here, in the passing of one extreme into another, farce may slip in.12

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

8

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

Parkinson’s salient point – that farce marries the ‘shifting hells and paradises’ in the narrative – is extended in the following analysis: many of these transitional scenes, in fact, achieve the narrative grotesque by fusing opposed affective experiences, normally using temporal dissonance to counterpoint the dreamer’s fear with the narrator’s ridicule. The frequent abrupt shifts from hellish to heavenly; the fluctuations in style and register; and the characters inhabiting the text all contribute to the production of the narrative grotesque. Elsewhere L. O. Aranye Fradenburg situates the text as a fitting product of the courtly culture cultivated during James IV’s reign. She asserts that ‘the dependence of the poetics of honor on exhibitionism, theatricalization, [and] phenomenalization’ reflects the mood of James’s court.13 Her argument highlights the dual sense of creation and destruction that pervades the vision by emphasising the looming threat of violence sensed by the dreamer.14 She concludes that ‘the contradictions between honor as reputation or reward (worldly honor) and honor as virtue (high honor) is thereby narrated as a displacement of one pole of meaning by the other’.15 The dreamer’s search for H(/h)onour (as framed by Fradenburg) reflects only one facet of the theme of transfiguration, which appears in multiple guises throughout the poem. The discrete episodes referenced in Parkinson and Fradenburg are indicative of a more pervasive sense of distortion at play in Douglas’s poem. The narrative grotesque centres moments of distortion, rupture, and fusion as points of entry into the text. Indeed, the predominating aspects of horror evoked at these key junctures are made grotesque through a patina of humour produced by the disjointed diegesis and the unlikely interactions between Douglas’s dreamer and the various inhabitants of the dream. Moreover, the flashes of awe experienced by the dreamer are always set within and against grotesque episodes. In effect, the problem of elevating the poet from the bestiality of humanity to interpreter and messenger of divine insight is reified by the narrative grotesque. William Dunbar’s biographical details are murkier. His dates of birth and death are unknown. The only dating evidence locating Dunbar in a certain time and place are found in the Treasurer’s Accounts between 1500 and 1513, where he is listed as a ­‘servitour’

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 9

of James IV. It seems likely that he attended the University of St  Andrews, but documentation is limited to the name William Dunbar occurring in the university’s records as ‘determining’ in 1477 and among the graduates in 1479. He disappears from the records completely until 1500. During this period it is sometimes presumed that Dunbar was on the Continent. After James IV’s death at the Battle of Flodden he once again vanishes from the records (although the Accounts are missing between August 1513 and June 1515) and never reappears. The last historical mention to Dunbar is on 14 May 1513. Dating evidence for his work establishes his period of activity roughly between 1490 and 1513.16 Sally Mapstone remarks on a comparative oddity in the colophons and title pages associated with his poetry in manuscript renderings  and  print: Dunbar’s name often appears with the qualifier ‘compilit’ and his name is frequently preceded by the title ‘Maister’, but he is never identified by another rank or ecclesiastical office.17 Dunbar’s extant corpus of poetry is impressively wide ranging in form, subject, and style. He wrote petitionary poetry, festive, comic, and religious poetry, he dealt with the themes of love, death, piety, court life, friendship, and competition, and he even wrote about migraine headaches. His verse forms are mind-bogglingly diverse: he wrote carols, refrain-poems, and flytings, and he wrote in both rhyme royal and tail rhyme. Priscilla Bawcutt says of him: ‘Dunbar is a poet of enormous variety. He speaks with almost too many voices.’18 As Bawcutt recognises, any generalisations about his poetry or autobiographical extrapolations are nearly impossible.19 Of Dunbar’s The Thrissill and the Rois (c. 1503), a dream vision written on the occasion of the marriage between James IV and Margaret Tudor, Hasler observes that it exposes the author’s concerns ‘with the transfiguring power of language, with the visibility of figures, and with the imagining of imperial temporality’.20 Indeed, Hasler’s comments encapsulate some persistent concerns in Dunbar’s poetry that culminate in The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo. As will be shown in this study, Dunbar once again self-consciously interrogates similar concepts and, through the grotesquing of literary forms and styles, creates a warren of narrative voice and perceptions of authority and veracity. This investigation aims to orient focus to these moments of corruption

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

10

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

and rupture. Accordingly, this should create fresh opportunities for critical discourse regarding the relationship between various poems in Dunbar’s corpus, including The Thrissill and the Rois and The Goldyn Targe. The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo (hereafter Tretis) is one of Dunbar’s most iconic poems and it has engendered much debate among critics. The Tretis is exceptional among Dunbar’s other poems for multiple reasons, foremost for its unique formal properties: it is hundreds of lines longer than any other poem in Dunbar’s corpus and the unrhymed alliterative long line in which it is written diverges significantly from the rigorous stanzaic structures favoured by Dunbar. Bawcutt makes the observation that while Dunbar was clearly well read and had a virtuosic knowledge of medieval verse forms, he was not what one would call an ‘intellectual’ poet. That is to say, overt references, quotes, translations, or paraphrases of other authors or texts occur seldomly.21 This is certainly the case in the Tretis, where allusions to other works are integrated with subtlety or by implication. This study reassesses the poem by considering the discordant elements that generate critical disagreements in order to explore wider trends in Dunbar’s writing: his poetry consistently confronts the audience with one version of reality only to reveal the artificial or illusory quality of their perceptions. When these conflicting impressions of fantasy and reality are repeatedly layered upon one another the entire construct of poetics is destabilised. The narrative grotesque thus provides a framework for describing this process in Dunbar’s work. Dunbar employs a mosaic of motifs and genres to construct the complex stylistic and narrative landscape in the Tretis. Owing to this labyrinthine structure, he is able to deconstruct a number of highly recognisable medieval conventions and forms. The poem takes as its subject a demande d’amour discussed by three women as they drink together in a secluded garden at night. One woman, identified by the narrator as a widow, poses a demande which asks whether the women are happy with their marriages or whether they would choose a different husband or lover if given the chance. Each of the three women delivers a response to this question. Their discourses challenge at every level conventions, ideals, and forms of courtly poetic expression. In turn, the narrator, concealed in

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 11

a hawthorn bush, reports their conversation to the audience. He augments his passive observation with interjected commentaries that frame and editorialise the content of the speeches and the demeanour of the women. These interruptions typically highlight the indecorous or lewd nature of the trio. However, following the widow’s impressive sermon-response, he reacts finally with such horror that it seems comically self-betraying. The narrator closes the narrative by initiating a final subversive distortion when he asks the audience a new demande: which woman would you choose if you had to choose one? On all levels the text interrogates the concepts of emotional authenticity and narratorial veracity by repeatedly manipulating the audience’s perception of the narrators. The grotesque aesthetic privileges ambivalence and, in so doing, discourages assessments which assign either positive or negative values to particular figures, themes, or expressions. As will become apparent, the text resists classification on every level; it is, rather, a kaleidoscopic composition that is most revealing at points of rupture and fusion. Dunbar’s deeply innovative approach to prosody, narrative technique, and genre pushes forward intellectual and creative boundaries that were becoming increasingly porous as the Middle Ages drew to a close.

A grotesque history The term ‘grotesque’ was coined in reference to a decorative style made popular after the excavation of the Domus Aurea of Rome around 1480. In its earliest form, grotesque was used to describe foliate figures that defied natural laws to show animate forms flowing together with floral shapes and creating figures that were doubled or reflected into distorted configurations.22 Luca Signorelli’s borders at Orvieto cathedral, painted between 1499 and 1504, demonstrate the translation of the classical ‘grotto’ decoration into Renaissance visual arts. His depiction of Empedocles turned away from the audience and gawking at the figures populating his frame, with an upraised hand, palm extended in a surprised or restraining gesture, compellingly conveys the disoriented and perhaps even repulsed reaction to such imagery. Yet, his posture

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

12

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

and expression are relaxed and Empedocles is seemingly engrossed by the cavorting figures. As Empedocles’s portrait insinuates, competing reactions of wonder, horror, playfulness, and laughter encompass the most essential responses to the grotesque whether in the visual arts or as it appears in literary settings.23 Centuries later, John Ruskin’s multi-volume study, The Stones of Venice (1851–53), argues for two grotesque phenotypes in architectural decoration. He labels these the ‘noble’ and ‘ignoble’ grotesque. Ruskin demonstrates the difference between the types with an illustration of two lions – one appears with upturned face; the other looks forward with outstretched, curled tongue and rolling eyes. He refers to the latter as an example of the ignoble grotesque and calls it the ultimate corruption of beauty; he even goes as far as refusing to publish all but this single pictorial example, fearing that it will pollute his study.24 In Volume II, the chapter on ‘The Nature of Gothic’ asserts that Gothic architecture is comprised of four elements, the fourth being ‘Grotesqueness’, which he attributes to the ‘Disturbed Imagination’ of the builder.25 It is striking to note that, like Horace, he connects the grotesque with a delusion or hallucination resulting from some detrimental physical or mental condition. In Volume III, in the chapter entitled ‘Grotesque Renaissance’, Ruskin critiques the ignoble grotesque as a depraved signal of the moral corruption of the culture. Ruskin asserts that ‘the thoughts of the nation [Venice] were exclusively occupied in the invention of such fantastic and costly pleasures as might best amuse their apathy, lull their remorse, or disguise their ruin’.26 He then describes Venetian architecture c. 1650–1700 as ‘amongst the worst and basest ever built by the hands of men, being especially distinguished by a spirit of brutal mockery and insolent jest […] exhausting itself in deformed and monstrous sculpture’.27 Despite his excoriation of the so-called ‘ignoble’ grotesque, Ruskin defines its characteristics in the process of rejecting them, and, furthermore, he identifies the value and power of the ‘noble’ grotesque. Frances Connelly summarises Ruskin’s twofold understanding of the noble grotesque: The first was that the grotesque confounds language and logical sequence as it fuses together disparate realities. The second element



Introduction 13

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

was that the grotesque opens up a liminal space, full of ambiguity and contradiction, that requires us to ‘overleap the gaps’ in order to make meaning of it. Of enormous importance is Ruskin’s insight that the grotesque places the viewer in an in-between, unresolved space, compelling each individual to take these disparate elements and make meaning out of them.28

Later, Connelly distils even further the value Ruskin assigned to the noble grotesque – ‘it is in the “noble grotesque” that Ruskin found an image with revelatory power, its strange and inchoate fusions creating a highly poetic means of expression and a vehicle for the most exalted of meanings’.29 Ruskin’s dual view of the grotesque pits the ignoble, which he called ‘the most hopeless state into which the human mind can fall’,30 against the noble, which he determined was ‘a profound expression of the most passionate symbolism’.31 Essentially, he separates images of bestial and ‘low’ themes from the profundity achieved by more graceful unions of contradictory symbols.32 Such explicit value assessments are set to the side in the current study, though Ruskin’s exploration of grotesque phenotypes allows for a broader understanding of the range of forms the grotesque might inhabit. Connelly’s work on the grotesque, confined to the visual arts, offers extensive insights into its critical utility as well as its value as an artistic aesthetic. Connelly summarises her conception of the grotesque and its place in art-historical criticism: understanding that the grotesque is a cultural action is fundamental to grasping how it constructs meaning in individual images, as well as how it is manifested through historical time. Historical narratives tend to move from unity to unity, emphasizing the artists and milieus at the center, where a style or movement reaches its purest realization and is most distinctly different from other styles. A grotesque history focuses on the ‘impure’ boundaries: where intermixing and negotiating contest the normative center and pull it into flux. Like an anamorphic perspective, a history of the grotesque cuts crossways through the traditional structures of art-historical narratives: periodicity, stylistic influence, and iconology. The grotesque cannot be characterized as a style, but it is an interrogation of style, a means to call its precepts and boundaries into question.33

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

14

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

Connelly’s assessment of the grotesque as an interrogation of style and a means for questioning conventional boundaries extends beyond art-historical criticism. In literary texts these concepts are equally developed: the narrative grotesque therefore offers a nuanced interpretation of texts that ‘cut crossways through traditional structures’ and pull normative centres into flux. As will be explored in the following chapters, Douglas and Dunbar, especially, interrogate medieval literary styles and call ‘precepts and boundaries into question’. In critical discourse, the grotesque has progressively gained popularity in the fields of art history, literature, and philosophy since the 1950s.34 The diverse fields of critical discussion have resulted in confused and often contradictory explanations for the term. Literary critics, particularly those with a focus on medieval texts, have often limited their analysis to identifying discrete visual moments of the grotesque;35 and, in order to avoid the thorny issue of definition, some authors issue disclaimers that they use the term only in its most general sense.36 Christian Thomsen addresses the nebulous body of research by distilling the most essential questions asked of the grotesque. According to Thomsen, critics have asked whether it is a style, a worldview, or an estranged world (entfremdete Welt); whether it is the simultaneously ridiculous and demonic; whether the intentions of an author, a literary work, or even reality itself can be grotesque. Finally, critics wonder if it is in fact a genre like satire or parody, or if it arises in varied manifestations and functions in any genre.37 Thomsen’s collation of critical queries reveals the difficulty in simply establishing the terms in which we can talk about the grotesque, much less the particularities that might define a text or image as grotesque. This study introduces the collocation ‘narrative grotesque’ in order to create a useful nomenclature to be applied to literary texts that exhibit distinct patterns of rupture and fusion not limited to visual images. These patterns are distinct for the unique emphasis on the melding of affective horror and humour alongside the extreme distortion of formal literary features. Neil Rhodes’s Elizabethan Grotesque proves useful as a point of reference to define further the distinctive affective responses evoked by the narrative grotesque. He describes the grotesque as a contradictory or incompatible emotional response to a single image:



Introduction 15

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

‘­frivolity and macabre, or, more generally, laughter and revulsion, are the twin polarities of the grotesque’.38 Rhodes clarifies these polarities by calling attention to the distinction between the beautiful and the repulsive, and the comic and the repulsive; the former pairing is illustrated by a scene from Thomas Lodge’s Robert of Normandy in which a nun’s brutal rape and torture is juxtaposed with a beautiful sunrise. Of this scene Rhodes observes: Incompatible responses are certainly being demanded, but of a different kind. The combination of horror and beauty, or the aestheticizing of pain, and the physically repellent, is a characteristic not of the grotesque, but of ‘decadent’ imagery. Comedy, not beauty, mingles with the repulsive or macabre elements of the grotesque.39

Rhodes’s distinction emphasises that the grotesque is not solely focused on the creation of affective intensity by means of disparity. Instead, it provokes revulsion/horror and humour as a result of the extreme grafting together of disparate entities; the two reactions are a by-product that coexist in tenuous balance. Hence, this result is not necessarily the ultimate goal of such literary chimeras, but it is a defining feature. As Connelly observes, the grotesque is an interrogation of style. The means by which the grotesque conducts this interrogation characteristically produce this horror–humour dichotomy. With regard specifically to the narrative grotesque, it fractures stylistic conventions to such an extent that the text opens a new space for interrogating modes of literary expression. In contrast, Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of the grotesque, which is perhaps the most influential conception of the term in literary applications, elevates it as a generative and restorative process. Bakhtin’s work was revolutionary in its day and has since experienced an impressive level of impact and longevity. Despite the occasional utility of a close reading or comment, Bakhtin’s overall argument presents more problems than answers. Rabelais and His World advances the proposition that the grotesque is characterised by carnival laughter, which is festive, universal, and ambivalent; it rejects any pejorative connotations associated with such laughter. Specifically, Bakhtin takes issue with a critical tendency to categorise laughter as having no deeper resonances and emanating from either negative satire or the droll and fanciful.40 This wholesale

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

16

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

inversion of ‘grotesque realism’ as a positive affirmation rather than a derisive or destructive indictment overcorrects and mischaracterises the grotesque as something invested in promoting a specific moral agenda. Two additional faults leave crucial gaps in his theory: first, his reading aligns the grotesque only with writing that is expressly set within a comic genre or form. Second, his theory is intensely phallocentric and grounded in grotesque embodiment. For instance, Bakhtin rejects the idea that any body part except an orifice or excrescence (what he clarifies as a ‘sprout’ or ‘bud’) can exhibit grotesque distortion or rupture.41 This parameter excludes any number of potentially grotesque works. Just one text of this type is the Older Scots festive poem The crying of ane play wherein the grotesque giantess dies after having a violent caesarean section.42 Aron Gurevich’s later study of medieval grotesque critiques Bakhtin’s theory of grotesque realism. His argument, rather, promotes a more nuanced reading of medieval society in relation to the grotesque: But the problem is not at all confined to the comic lowering of the exalted or the carnival inversion and blending of the serious with the humorous. […] Medieval grotesque was rooted in a specific kind of dualist view of the world in which heaven and earth stood face to face. The medieval mind brought these oppositions together, drew the unapproachable close, united the fragmented, and, occasionally, for a moment produced a very real synthesis.43

Gurevich, while refuting Bakhtin, still maintains the sense of the grotesque as an opposition between sacred and profane worldviews, as a spiritual duality. Nonetheless, his conception of the grotesque to some extent sets the ‘medieval mind’ in the same ‘unresolved space’ that Connelly describes.44 Douglas, in fact, does explore this gap between human and divine in Palyce. Crucially, the inflection of humanism is essential in his project, since, according to humanist views of poetics, the poet could become a conduit for divine illumination – a kind of prophet. This concept will be a focal point in the assessment of Douglas’s poem. The above critical discussions privilege visual aspects of the grotesque, and, certainly, visual effects and embodiment are elements

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 17

of the narrative grotesque. Palyce and the Tretis mobilise disturbing images within their narratives and present forms of embodiment that reify these inchoate forms; and the following analysis is eminently applicable to texts which rely more heavily on visual images. Robert Henryson’s The Wolf and the Wether demonstrates this variety of grotesque well. In the fable, a ram disguised in the skin of a dog chases a wolf that attempts to steal one of the sheep from the herd. During his pursuit, the wolf is so terrified that he has explosive diarrhoea. As the two run through a bramble the dog’s skin is partially torn from the ram thus revealing his identity. The wolf turns back and catches the ram, who tries to explain away the chase as a playful game. The wolf retorts that he was clearly terrified – as demonstrated by the trail of diarrhoea – and says to the ram, ‘Blissit be the busk that reft yow your array / Ellis, fleand, bursin had I bene this day’ (2572–3) (Blessed is the bush that tore away your costume or else, fleeing, I would have been ruptured this day);45 the wolf believes his terror would have caused his body to rupture through uncontrolled waste. Instead, the wolf, regaining his power, finishes his conversation with the ram and ‘Than be the crag bane smertlie he him tuke / Or ever he cessit, and it in schunder schuke’ (2586–7) (Then roughly took him by the neck bone and, without stopping, he violently shook it apart). The Moralitas that follows is unsettling, since Henryson describes the ‘sentence’ (meaning) of the parable as ‘fructuous and agreabill’ (2590) (fruitful and suitable). Saliently, Henryson’s fable inverts Matthew 7:15: ‘Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.’ Henryson transforms the biblical verse with an obscenely scatological episode paired with two images of brutal death (one imagined and one real), only to perkily gloss the parable as fruitful and suitable.46 Although a longer commentary is not possible in this context, it is evident that applying the strategy of the narrative grotesque to this text has significant potential: the violent and obscene visual imagery could serve as a locus for more comprehensive textual analysis. Across Henryson’s Fables further opportunities to apply this framework abound (e.g. to The Trial of the Fox and The Fox and the Wolf). The narrative grotesque therefore moves beyond previous critical applications, since it extends the concept of the grotesque from solely identifying visual examples

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

18

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

to incorporating interrogations of poetics and textual construction at a more fundamental level. Notably, Douglas and Dunbar each engage modes that are not unequivocally connected to comic writing: Douglas uses the medieval dream vision to frame his narrative, while Dunbar uses the demande d’amour. The two poems become kaleidoscopic and inchoate fantasies by means of the persistent and deeply rooted series of multiplications, hybridisations, transfigurations, and destructions constructed by Douglas and Dunbar. Hasler has pointed to this phenomenon in a more limited capacity in his analysis of Skelton’s dream vision The Bowge of Courte (1499). He notes that, via its techniques of embodiment, the poem ‘points to a traditional problem in the rhetorical construction of subjectivity: the difficulty of assessing the sincerity behind the rhetorician’s mask, the perennial anxiety as to whether adept speech necessarily betokens moral worth’.47 Douglas and Dunbar are each concerned with the problem of rhetorical sincerity as well as the connection between ‘adept speech’ and moral worth. Their individual strategies for probing these issues are outlined briefly below. Douglas interrogates the ‘rhetorical construction of subjectivity’ in his grotesque rupturing and fusing of conventional dream vision roles, a project which is most obvious in the characterisation of the narrator. The narrator subversively adopts the role of ‘dream guide’ for the first thousand lines of verse. Yet this identity completely fractures the typical purpose of the dream vision guide: the narrator guides only the audience and not his dream-self, consequently negating the entire purpose of dream vision guides. Instead, the dreamer wanders lost and confused until he blasphemes Venus nearly halfway through the poem, and only after the trial does Calliope assign him a guide. This links into Hasler’s proposal because the multiple Douglases embody different possible ­subjectivities – subjectivities which are presented simultaneously yet represent separate temporal moments. In this way, it is not so much sincerity as veracity and accuracy that are central to this aspect of Douglas’s work. Dunbar, meanwhile, addresses the concept of ‘adept speech’ as an indicator of moral worth. He does so by creating a series of antinomies between the speakers in his text and between poetic

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 19

forms; he encloses these constructions within a dream vision-like garden that acts as an echo chamber refracting and rebounding the illusory and chimeric nature of the main diegesis. Sincerity, masks, and moral worth all come under scrutiny as a result of this multilayered composition. Dunbar, rather than resolving these issues, exposes the artifice of conventional poetic categories by finding new and shocking ways to rupture and fuse modes of poetic expression. The frauds and ever-multiplying subjectivities expose and even celebrate the elasticity and rhetorical ephemerality of poetry. The narrative grotesque clarifies this chaos of form and voice and finally offers a new understanding of the Tretis. In the narrative grotesque, texts distort and eventually fracture apart conventional modes of narration and literary composition. Horror should be provoked as layers of (un)reality are woven together until the text can no longer be definitively categorised. The disjointed and chimeric nature of these compositions create humour through the surprising and unprecedented fusions of tone, register, form, and style. The self-conscious preoccupation with the status of an artistic work is a core concern expressed in the texts under consideration here. In their own unique ways, both Douglas and Dunbar strive to locate a space in which poetics might most effectively interrogate and express anxieties about authority, authenticity, veracity, and eloquence. The narrative grotesque allows for analysis to be constructively and systematically focused on moments of rupture and suture in order to make sense of the surprising hybridisations, inversions, subversions, and distortions achieved by both poets.

Organisation of the study The Palyce of Honour Chapter 1 introduces Palyce and sets it in its context as a dream vision poem. This discussion takes into account the diverse range of material available to Douglas by the time he took up the form in 1501. Chaucer’s The Parliament of Fowls and The House of Fame as well as Robert Henryson’s The Testament of Cresseid

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

20

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

are all brought into conversation with Palyce in order to illustrate Douglas’s unique treatment of the form from a backward-looking perspective. By locating the points at which Douglas ruptures and overspills typical narratological and structural boundaries with the narrative grotesque, it is possible to demonstrate the ways in which he responded variously to Italian humanist discourses pertaining to poetics and poetic identity. This philosophical grounding, as epitomised by Giovanni Boccaccio, Cristoforo Landino, Marsilio Ficino, and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, is shown to be deeply influential to the text. This foundation will be expanded in Chapter 2, where Douglas’s reinvigoration of the dreamer-narrator-poet trope is central. Despite the fact that the dreamer and narrator are apparently versions of Douglas, he portrays them as vividly independent entities that undertake simultaneous, yet parallel, psychological transformations. Initially, the dreamer is a bumbling and naive figure, but he steadily closes the psychological and temporal distance between himself and the narrator as the dream progresses. The narratorial voice, meanwhile, exhibits an omniscient perspective, which places him in a superior position to his dream persona, whence he comments on and derides the events of the dream as well as the behaviour of the dreamer. The competing iterations of Douglas’s dreamer-narrator engender much of the confusion and discord in the narrative as they implode the traditional roles of the narrator and dreamer by erasing typical narratological boundaries. Their voices weave in and out of one another, thereby creating a chaotic tapestry of poetic identity at once deeply attached to temporal, spatial, and intellectual boundaries and completely divested of these considerations. Lastly, Chapter 3 demonstrates how cosmological and astrological themes are integrated to create a distinctly humanist-complected conception of poetry’s role in society. As the dreamer contends with a vividly oppressive and chaotic dreamscape, heavily influenced by the celestial spheres, he also engages in tense interactions with variously divine and celestial figures. Most prominently, Venus’s overbearing presence in the dream invests the text with cosmological and allegorical significance unlike any other dream vision poem. Eventually Douglas shows Calliope, Venus, and Honour to form a



Introduction 21

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

hierarchy as guide, muse, and divine virtue. Alongside this, Honour is portrayed as occupying the central position in a second hierarchy which aligns earthly kingship, divine virtue and enlightenment, and God. These refractions and echoes meld together classical mythology and Christian ideals as complementary, if unequal, forces in the poet’s practice.

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo Analysis of the Tretis begins in Chapter 4. This chapter opens with an examination of the formal structure of the poem, with a focus on the demande d’amour and love debates. It looks to the conventions as they were established in French literature and demonstrates the presence of the form in Scotland with a brief exposition of the demande d’amour in Sir Gilbert Hay’s mid-fifteenth-century romance The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour. This Scottish context leads to a discussion of Dunbar’s engagement with Older Scots literary forms more widely, especially where this relates to his use of Scottish styles, structures, lexis, and tone. Next, the nature and development of the narrative’s frame garden is assessed in conjunction with the narrator’s role in framing and editorialising the speeches. It is concluded that the multiplication of perspectives and the ambiguous network of symbolism and allusion inherent to the frame creates a deeply destabilised scaffolding for the rest of the narrative. Chapter 5 examines the first wife’s response. This response interweaves generic expectations associated with the demande with an excoriating flyting of her husband. This poetic invective fractures apart any perception of a merely scintillating and risqué exposition of marriage. The wife begins by crafting a fantasy of sexual freedom and power, only to abruptly describe her husband’s demonic sexual demands that leave her physically and emotionally battered. Just as quickly, she reveals that she sexually manipulates her husband for material gain. This rollercoaster of tone and perspective first introduces several of Dunbar’s salient concerns: how do we understand and convey veracity? What forms of expression promote emotional authenticity? How is authority linked with perspective? The first wife’s narrative is shown to adopt language found in l­iterary

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

22

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

­ ytings as well as nebulously adopting Scottish motifs common to fl depictions of demons. The narrative grotesque in this instance is intensely reified through the use of this ‘horror’ motif in a structurally central position in her response. The motifs and topoi on either side of this narrative strand veer between a fantastical dream of sexual freedom and an embodiment of anti-feminist discourse. The combination of the three factors creates a humorously and horrifically discordant clash of style and content. Chapter 6 moves on to the second wife’s response, which develops themes introduced by the first wife. In this case, the second wife launches into an invective before she unexpectedly shifts into a love complaint that deconstructs courtly concepts of love and lovesickness. She twists this heartfelt expression and its physical symptoms into a manipulative gesture which she uses against her husband. The complaint comes under particular scrutiny as it undermines conventions of a mode that was already notorious for its rather loose structure and form. Scottish complaints such as those found in Richard Holland’s The Buke of the Howlat and The Quare of Jelusy (author unknown) are presented as intertexts that also push against the conventions of this mode. Lastly, in Chapter 7, the widow’s sermonising response is taken as the culmination of the progressively grotesqued demande d’amour. The formal aspects of the widow’s sermon are assessed in the opening of this examination with special attention given to the widow’s role as preacher. The ‘morality’ that she promotes in her sermon, however, inverts Christian standards of behaviour and conduct. And the role occupied by the widow is manifold: she is a respondent to the demande, she is a preacher, and the protagonist in her exemplum. Finally, she claims that her speech is a saint’s life. This interplay of narrative roles is argued to reveal the widow’s resemblance to Venus, especially as she is depicted in other Scottish works, such as The Goldyn Targe and The Testament of Cresseid. The widow’s speech mobilises features of the preceding responses in such a way that the audience’s perception of duplicity and sincerity, truth and falsehood are uncomfortably fused together. Through a forensic examination of this pair of early sixteenth-­century poems, this study establishes the wide-ranging utility of the narrative

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 23

grotesque as a strategy for reading medieval and early modern texts. What might be deemed limiting aspects of the texts, namely the extent to which they are unique representations of either author’s literary productions or a specific moment in Scottish literature, is in fact a strength for this study. The sheer density and variety of ‘grotesqueries’ supply a rich array of potential interpretive applications. Additionally, the range of intertexts, analogues, and philosophic perspectives that are integral to the poems highlight a diverse, multilingual, and mobile literary culture at the cusp of the early modern period. As will be explored in the Conclusion, the narrative grotesque might be applied more widely to Scottish writing where there is a particular blossoming of literary innovation during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Yet, it might also be used in conjunction with other theoretical reading strategies and in the context of other vernacular literatures. When the grotesque is mobilised as a theoretical model useful beyond the superficial identification of disturbing images, it opens up new conversations relating to aesthetics and style. In its literary application, the narrative grotesque dissects chaotic and fractured forms, thereby restoring meaning to the apparently meaningless; and it ultimately recontextualises bizarre, disorienting, and isolated textual features as fully realised aspects of poetic making.

Notes  1 Horace, Satires. Epistles. The Art of Poetry, trans. H. R. Fairclough Loeb Classical Library 194 (Cambridge, USA: Harvard University Press, 1926), pp. 450–1.  2 Cf. S. Verweij, The Literary Culture of Early Modern Scotland: Manuscript Production and Transmission, 1560–1625 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).  3 See S. Mapstone, ‘The Transmission of Older Scots Literature’, in N. Royan (ed.), The International Companion to Scottish Literature, 1400–1650 (Glasgow: Scottish Literature International, 2018), pp. 38–59 (p. 48).   4 N. Royan, ‘Introduction: Literatures of the Stewart Kingdom’, in N. Royan (ed.), The International Companion to Scottish Literature, 1400–1650 (Glasgow: Scottish Literature International, 2018), pp. 1–18 (p. 2).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

24

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

 5 W. Hepburn, ‘William Dunbar and the Courtmen: Poetry as a Source for the Court of James IV’, Innes Review 65.2 (2014), 95–112.  6 A. J. Hasler, Court Poetry in Late Medieval England and Scotland: Allegories of Authority (eBook: Cambridge University Press, 2011), p. 169.  7 Cf. K. Terrell, Scripting the Nation: Court Poetry and the Authority of History in Late Medieval Scotland (Ohio: Ohio State University Press, 2021).  8 C. Flynn, ‘Fabliau Afterlives: Magic, the Grotesque, and the FifteenthCentury Fabliau’, JEGP 120.1 (2021), 18–40 (p. 40).  9 See N. Royan, ‘The Scottish Identity of Gavin Douglas’, in K. Terrell and M. P. Bruce (eds), The Anglo-Scottish Border and the Shaping of ­ 95–209, Identity, 1300–1600 (eBook: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), pp. 1 and ‘Gavin Douglas’s Humanist Identity’, Medievalia et humanistica, Special Issue: Writing Identity in Medieval and Early Modern Scotland, 41 (2016), 119–36, on his Scottish and humanist identities, respectively. See also P. Bawcutt, Gavin Douglas, A Critical Study (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1976), and D. J. Parkinson ‘Introduction’ to The Palyce of Honour (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, rev. edn, 2018), esp. pp. 1–12. 10 Royan, ‘The Scottish Identity of Gavin Douglas’, p. 198. 11 See N. Royan, ‘Gavin Douglas’s Eneados’, in R. Copeland (ed.), Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature. Volume 1: 800–1558 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), pp. 561–82. 12 D. J. Parkinson, ‘The Farce of Modesty in Gavin Douglas’s The Palis of Honoure’, Philological Quarterly 70.1 (1991), 13–25 (p. 22). The poem’s title is spelled variously in each modern edition of the text: Gavin Douglas, The Palis of Honoure, ed. David Parkinson (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 1992) and The Palice of Honour in The Shorter Poems of Gavin Douglas, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Edinburgh: Scottish Text Society, 2nd edn, 2003). Parkinson’s revised edition, The Palyce of Honour, serves as the reference text for the study and this spelling is followed. 13 L. O. [Aranye] Fradenburg, City, Marriage, Tournament: Arts of Rule in Late Medieval Scotland (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1991), p. 185. 14 Fradenburg, City, Marriage, Tournament, p. 188. 15 Fradenburg, City, Marriage, Tournament, p. 190. 16 See P. Bawcutt, ‘Introduction’, Dunbar the Makar (online: Oxford University Press, Oxford Scholarship Online, 1992; 2011) for Dunbar’s biography. 17 Mapstone, ‘The Transmission of Older Scots Literature’, p. 49.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 25

18 Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar, p. 1. 19 See A. C. Spearing, The Medieval Poet as Voyeur: Looking and Listening in Medieval Love-Narratives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993); Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar, pp. 4–5, cogently deals with this issue. 20 Hasler, Allegories of Authority, p. 32. 21 Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar, p. 25. 22 W. Kayser, Das Groteske: Seine Gestaltung in Malerei und Dichtung (Hamburg: Gerhard Stalling Verlag, 1957), p. 20, argues that the terms la grottesca, grottesco, and le grottesche originated in Rome and classes them as Italian coinages of the late-fifteenth century. See also G. G. Harpham, On the Grotesque: Strategies of Contradiction in Art and Literature (Colorado: The Davies Group, 2006), esp. pp. 27–32. In Harpham’s opinion the Latin and Greek roots are still fitting to the modern usage in their sense of ‘the underground, of burial, and of secrecy’ (p. 32). According to Barasch, in the introduction to Wright’s study of caricature and grotesque, the earliest extant reference to the word is found in Vasari’s description of Michelangelo’s architectural style and the Medici tombs. T. Wright, A History of Caricature and Grotesque in Literature and Art (New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1968), p. xxv. 23 See F. Connelly, The Grotesque in Western Art and Culture: The Image at Play (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), pp. 39–41, for an insightful analysis of Signorelli’s borders. 24 J. Ruskin, The Stones of Venice (online: National Library Association, Project Gutenberg, 1851–53), Volume 3, p. 125. 25 Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Volume 2, p. 155. 26 Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Volume 3, p. 112 (square brackets added). 27 Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Volume 3, p. 112. 28 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 12. 29 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 150. 30 Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Volume 3, p. 121. 31 Ruskin’s comment refers to the Lombardic griffins at the west portal of the Verona Duomo although it is widely illustrative of his argument, The Stones of Venice, Volume 5, p. 147. 32 See further Connelly, Image at Play, on Ruskin’s noble grotesque, pp. 150–3. 33 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 12. 34 In philosophical contexts, M. Foucault, Abnormal, Lectures at the Collège de France, 1974–5, trans. G. Burchell (New York: Picador,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

26

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

2004) and S. Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams, trans. J. Strachey (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976) and The Uncanny, trans. D.  McLintock (New York: Penguin, 2003) popularised the term. In an art-historical context, F. Connelly, Modern Art and the Grotesque (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) and Image at Play arguably offer the most eloquent and comprehensive discussions of the grotesque in any discipline. 35 There are several critical studies on the grotesque in medieval literature; however, most are abbreviated expositions of individual visual examples: W. Farnham, The Shakespearean Grotesque: Its Genesis and Transformations (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), situates medieval grotesque as a precursor to Shakespeare’s grotesque. C. W. Thomsen, Das Groteske und die englische Literatur (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1977), devotes a small subsection of his study to D.  W.  Robertson, A Preface to Chaucer: Studies in Medieval Perspectives (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1962), esp. pp. 150–7, in which grotesque imagery in Chaucer is briefly taken under consideration. In J. D. Edwards and R. Graulund, Grotesque (Abingdon: Routledge, 2013), esp. pp. 36–50, medieval literature is  used to illustrate the monstrous aspect of the grotesque, a field which has its own school of criticism. Robertson’s, and Edwards and  Graulund’s studies only skim the surface of the potential forms and functions of the grotesque in medieval literature. 36 D. Williams, Deformed Discourse: The Function of the Monster in Mediaeval Thought and Literature (Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1996), pp. 16–17. He uses the terms ‘grotesque’, ‘monster’, and ‘fantastic’ interchangeably. 37 Thomsen, Das Groteske, p. 9. 38 N. Rhodes, Elizabethan Grotesque (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1980), p. 10. 39 Rhodes, Elizabethan Grotesque, p. 10. 40 M. Bakhtin, Rabelais and His World, trans. H. Iswolsky (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1984), pp. 5–12. 41 Bakhtin, Rabelais and His World, pp. 317–18. 42 See C. Flynn, ‘Two Cailleacha in Older Scots Comic Poetry’, North American Journal of Celtic Studies 4.2 (2020), 198–214 (p. 204). 43 A. Gurevich, Medieval Popular Culture: Problems of Belief and Perception (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 183. 44 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 12. 45 All line references to Henryson’s work from Robert Henryson, Robert Henryson. The Complete Poems, ed. David J. Parkinson (online:

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Introduction 27

Middle English Texts Series, 2010). Translations my own unless otherwise stated. 46 The narrative grotesque has potential to respond to critics that are less sure of the humorous aspects of ‘realistic brutality’ as remarked in L. Tracy, Torture and Brutality in Medieval Literature: Negotiations of National Identity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), esp. pp. 191–2. 47 Hasler, Allegories of Authority, p. 55.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Part I

The Palyce of Honour, Gavin Douglas

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

1

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

‘Overset with fantasyis’: grotesquing the dream vision

Here the cup becomes as liquid as its contents, and as one improbable form follows another, it seems as though it is only the artist’s inspired improvisation that prevents the whole thing from a sudden collapse into formlessness. The actual creation of this ewer was, of course, anything but improvisational. Van Vianen painstakingly hammered out these forms from a single disk of silver, and it is a testament to the artist’s virtuosity that we read the finished object as a whimsical caprice.1

Adam van Vianen’s Lidded Ewer (1614) morphs from sea monster to maiden, maiden to water, water to shell, and finally a simian figure supports the fluid fantasy (Figure 1.1). Connelly observes that the audacious enhancements to the jug overspill its functionality, and exposes van Vianen’s ‘final trump to the presumptions of those who insist on using this simply as a functional cup: the pleasure of the unsuspecting drinker, savoring the last delicious drop, evaporates with the discovery of two salamanders at the bottom of the cup!’2 Connelly’s remarks highlight the striking relationship between creator, creation, and audience in the grotesque object. The grotesque fluidity and improvisation of the object is possible only by means of the extreme ingenuity and control of its creator. And, even when the insistent viewer crushes the unruly form into conventional categorisation, it resists belligerently. Gavin Douglas’s The Palyce of Honour (c. 1501) achieves a similarly chaotic, boundary-fracturing narrative grotesque through Douglas’s manipulation and innovation of the medieval dream vision genre.3 This chapter undertakes a forensic analysis of Douglas’s treatment of the conventions long established in the medieval dream

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

32

The Palyce of Honour

Figure 1.1  Lidded ewer for the Amsterdam Goldsmiths Guild (1614). Adam van Vianen. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, BK-1976-75. Public domain.

vision genre. The discussion takes into account the status of dream vision poetry in medieval thought and writing with a particular focus on the setting and mood first instigated in Palyce’s frame and pursued in the dream. Crucially, Douglas’s genre-breaking narrative frequently betrays distinctly humanist overtones. These tones exemplify the significant transformations in philosophy and aesthetics that were taking place in Scottish writing in the later fifteenth century. The narrative grotesque accommodates these clashing ideologies by offering a framework with which it is possible to identify the medieval boundaries that are distorted and overspilled by ground-breaking humanist modes of thinking.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 33

The disruptive nature of Douglas’s narrative is, moreover, dependent on sensory experience: rather than awakening to a locus amoenus, Douglas’s dreamer encounters a confusing and apocalyptic landscape which is itself disrupted by the divine courts that process through the wilderness. The tripartite narrative arc explores questions relating to poetic identity, the role of poetry in the world, and the relationship between the worldly and the divine. Reflections and multiplications are inherent to the narrative and the repetition of threes is repeated on a large scale, as evident in the poem’s overarching organisational structure, and also in the minutiae, as demonstrated by the three three-stanza poems created by the dreamer at important transformative moments in the dream. The resulting echoes add ever-increasing levels of complexity to an already dense and enigmatic work. Douglas’s exploration of his dreamer-­ narrator’s mental processes and perceptions forms a grotesque experiment in dialectic. As a result, Douglas achieves a sense of grotesque fluidity reminiscent of van Vianen’s Lidded Ewer whereby forms and ­expectations seem to transform before the eyes of the audience.

Medieval dream visions Dream visions offered varied and flexible settings for authors to explore questions of epistemology within a deeply personal and introspective frame. The phenomenon of the dream, and by extension the literary dream vision, however, posed problems for writers, who were forced to grapple with the extent to which they could be trusted as sources of insight or knowledge. On one hand, dreams might be attributed to poor digestion, while on the other hand they might be prophetic visions of divine origin. Beyond their wide transmission across the medieval West, Macrobius’s early fifth-century Commentary on the Dream of Scipio and Calcidius’s late fourthcentury Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus are useful barometers of medieval attitudes towards dream visions, since they provide what Steven Kruger terms a ‘middle way’ between the two extremes: ‘Rather than asserting that all dream experience was either divine or mundane, such authors took a more inclusive approach, accepting the possibility that, under different sets of circumstances, both

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

34

The Palyce of Honour

divine (externally inspired) and mundane (internally stimulated) dreams can occur.’4 The inherent ambiguity and flexibility of the dream vision poem, as suggested by the dream’s ambivalent treatment by Macrobius and Calcidius, is magnified in Douglas’s interpretation of the form. Despite the almost rote nature of literary dream visions by the opening of the sixteenth century, Douglas affects an innovative take on the form by incorporating humanist perspectives into the popular medieval mode. Despite their waning popularity across the rest of Europe, dream visions were a popular mode in Scotland in the fifteenth century. Two pre-eminent Scottish makars, William Dunbar and Robert Henryson, engage the genre, while several other works further prove the ubiquity of the form.5 Dunbar and Henryson contrive dream visions that push and pull at generic conventions, but Douglas’s composition is unique: it creates a dream vision that functions as all five categories of vision as proposed by Calcidius in his commentary on Timaeus. Calcidius summarises the five types: a dream, which we said arises out of vestigial disturbances within the soul; a vision, the kind that is ushered in by a divine power; an admonition, when we are guided and admonished by the counsel of angelic goodness; a manifestation, e.g., when a celestial power makes itself openly visible to us during waking hours, ordering or forbidding something in awe-inspiring form and speech; a revelation, whenever the secrets of a coming event are revealed to those who are ignorant of what the future holds in store.6

Palyce embodies each of these possibilities. The narrator’s soul is clearly disturbed, as demonstrated through the apocalyptic landscape in which he wakes; the visionary aspect, conversely, is slowly revealed as the dreamer transforms into the narrator and learns to interpret the events of the dream; a celestial power makes itself known in voice and sign with the disembodied voice and meteor of the frame, which so terrify the dreamer that he faints into the vision; the revelation might be linked to Venus’s command to the dreamer  to translate a ‘buke’ for her.7 Equally, Honour’s brief appearance in the poem reveals to the dreamer the potential apotheosis of virtue and poetic achievement. This rather cursory listing serves only as a starting point for the following analysis. Each

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 35

a­ vailable ­interpretation reflects various possibilities presented by the vision and, when combined, they form an anamorphic composition that deconstructs the rote conventions and motifs that had persisted throughout the medieval period into something uncannily recognisable yet alien. The terms Douglas uses to describe his vision have previously been addressed by Amsler where he notes that the opposed language used by the dreamer and narrator reveal their temporal distance. He argues, ‘the narrator’s invocation of God’s grace to help in describing the vision forces the reader to come to terms with the ­distinction between the dreamer’s perception of a “fanton” or “dreidfull terrour” (117) and the narrator’s present view of the dream as a true vision’.8 Although this distinction supports Amsler’s assessment of the temporal dissonance between dreamer and narrator more widely developed in the poem (an interpretation that is by no means nullified by the current analysis), it does seem to limit the dynamic nature of the vision to a linear progression rather than the layered chaos of possibilities that Douglas offers his audience. Chaucer’s The House of Fame is an important intertext to Palyce. The Proem to Book I addresses the unstable and unreliable nature of dreams by listing their multivalent causes and sources. The narrator demurs that he could not presume ‘to knowe of hir signifiaunce […] Or why this more then that cause is’ (17, 20) and twice exclaims, ‘God turne us every drem to goode!’ (1; 58).9 Chaucer’s overview of the types of dreams – avision, revelacion, drem, sweven, fantome, oracle – immediately and overtly signals to his audience that his work participates in this unruly category of experience. In this way it differs greatly from Douglas’s interpretation of the literary dream vision, which organically mingles a litany of terms relating to the description of dream visions throughout the narrative. The apparently ad hoc nature of Douglas’s nomenclature contributes significantly to the character of the dream vision, since it does implicitly what Chaucer does in a rather heavy-handed way: it impedes the audience’s impulse towards categorisation as a means of interpretation. This raises a key concern underpinning medieval critical thought on the subject of dreams, namely their status as reliable sources of knowledge. The wildly contradictory material pertaining to the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

36

The Palyce of Honour

interpretation of dreams, real or literary figment, might be reduced simply to the search for veracity. Douglas mobilises this epistemological concern as a pretence for defending the poetic process, thus intertwining a medieval issue with a humanist. At the close of the second part of the poem the dreamer is integrated into Calliope’s retinue after she comes to his defence against Venus’s indictment of the dreamer for blasphemy. Bearing witness to the divine harmony and perfection of Calliope’s company, the narrator interjects a defence of his recollection of events as well as the veracity of the dream. This dual defence exemplifies the (con)fusion of medieval and humanist modes of thinking characteristic of Douglas’s writing. Defending his project, the narrator attacks potential critics: Eik gyf I wald this avyssyon endyte, Janglaris suld it bakbyt and stand nane aw, Cry ‘Out on dremes quhilkis ar not worth a myte.’ Sen thys til me all verité be kend, I reput bettir thus till mak ane end Than ocht til say that suld herars engreve. On othir syd thocht thay me vilepend, I considdir prudent folk will commend The vereté and sic janglyng rapreve. (1267–75) [Also, if I would indite this vision, idle-talkers would deride it and without fear cry, ‘away with dreams which are not worth a penny’. Since this is known to me to be all truth I consider it better to end here than to say anything that should upset listeners. On the opposing side though they despise me, I consider prudent folk will commend the truth and censure such fault-finding.]

Although the narrator attempts to pre-empt criticism, his simple declaration that his dream is true is problematic insofar as the narrator and the dreamer prove to be deeply unreliable voices, not least because the narrator repeatedly admits that he was out of his senses throughout much of the dream. Recollection and ‘lived’ experience are equally complicated by the interwoven narrative voices, which distort conventional narratorial boundaries. Consequently, the status of the dream as a reliable source of knowledge in general terms as well as the narrator’s recounting of it are inherently unreliable. In response, the narrator redirects responsibility for

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 37

i­nterpretation to the audience. This layering of perspective and interpretative practice creates space for varying and even contradicting views of the dream, thereby locating Douglas’s dream vision in the centre of debates about the veracity and utility of dream visions, both literary and literal. This narratorial aside to the audience, then, plays on medieval notions of the unreliability of dreams as revelations, signs, or portents, divinely inspired or otherwise. Yet, these remarks lead to a respectful acknowledgment of those ‘prudent folk’ who might contribute ‘correction, support, and releve’ (1276) (correction, assistance, and aid) to his discourse. Douglas repurposes his comments in Palyce in the third prologue to his translation of the Aeneid, the Eneados (1513). In this prologue he pre-empts detractors: I dreid men clepe thame fablis now on days; Tharfor wald God I had thar erys to pull Mysknawis the creid, and threpis otheris forvayis. Incayß thai bark, I compt it nevir a myte; Quha kan not hald thar peice ar fre to flyte; Chide quhil thar hedis ryfe and hals worth hayß – Weyn thai to murdryß me with thar dispyte? Or is it Virgill quham thame list bakbyte? (16–23) [I fear men call them fables these days; therefore, by God, [if I only] had their ears to pull, ignorant of the Creed, and obstinately going astray. In case they bark, I don’t care a penny; whoever cannot hold their peace are free to flyte; Chide until their heads burst and their throats become hoarse – do they suppose to murder me with their scorn? Or is it Virgil whom they wish to slander?]

This passage refines the more nebulous defence provided by the narrator in Palyce, quoted above. Douglas’s prickly comments claim implicit authority owing to his proximity to Virgil in his role as translator; Douglas demonstrates this authority with his use of what Bawcutt calls a ‘demanding’ nine-line stanza, aabaabbab5.10 As such, Douglas is both ‘qwyke and scharpe’ (1286) (lively and witty) in his defence, a quality he strives for in Palyce. Royan’s examination of the first prologue of Eneados in her discussion of Douglas’s (complicated) identity as a humanist confirms Douglas’s presentation of poetry as a vehicle for moral

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

38

The Palyce of Honour

i­nstruction. In the first prologue he condemns Caxton’s representation of Dido as both an intellectual and moral failure (189–200). She characterises this passage: ‘the recurrent concern with truth and sentence and the use of patristic authority [via Augustine] might as easily be ascribed to Douglas’s ecclesiastical identity as well as to his humanist credentials’.11 The mixing of identities, perspectives, and philosophies evident in Douglas’s translation has its origins in Palyce. The narrator’s interjection at the end of part two of Palyce demonstrates the evolving self-assurance and identity of the narrator as he grapples with the process of composition. In this respect Palyce introduces themes that are refined in Douglas’s later work and exposes a nascent concern with poetics that coincides with humanist thinking on the subject. Douglas’s defences gain complexity when viewed in the context of humanist defences of poetry, which were popularly employed throughout the movement. Boccaccio’s final two books of his Genealogy of the Pagan Gods (c. 1360–74, hereafter Genealogy) comprise perhaps one of the most well-known, and earliest, outspoken defences of poets and poetry from a humanist perspective. Douglas was certainly familiar with Genealogy – he references it by name multiple times in Eneados.12 In Book 14 of Genealogy, after addressing the king, Boccaccio indicts ‘the ignorant’ who might read his book: Around my book, as usual at the sight of a new work, – will gather a crowd of the incompetent. The learned will also attend, and, after a careful inspection, doubtless some of them who are revered for their righteousness, and possess both fairness of mind and scholarship, will, by your example, praise whatever is commendable and, in all reverence, criticise whatever is not.13

Boccaccio contextualises poetry within a community of intellectuals intent on developing and refining this mode of expression, and he derides and rejects those that might hastily judge poetry as superfluous or beneath scholastic styles of expression. When set against Boccaccio’s defence of poetry, it becomes evident that, while Douglas engages typical medieval modesty topoi and links into the conflicting views of dreams as instructive devices, he also alludes to wider issues of poetic utility by referring to the community of intellectuals

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 39

that might provide correction, support, and releve in the process of creation and interpretation, which he entrusts above all to God’s guidance (1277–8).14 This latter concern is one of the core tenets of humanist poetic philosophy, which, as Royan demonstrates, reappears in Douglas’s later framing of his translation of the Aeneid. Douglas’s unique construction of the dream world and its frame reflects the philosophical concerns underlying his work. The locus amoenus of the frame appears encrusted with jewels and so heavily perfumed with vapours that it seems a halcyon and synthetic memory. Certainly, this conventionally Edenic garden setting was meant to represent a recognisably ideal and blissful space, yet Douglas’s extremely ornate language amplifies this effect to the breaking point. In the opening stanzas Douglas opts for what Rod Lyall refers to as a surrealistic and elaborate use of colour and rhetoric.15 In the second stanza, flowers are a blanket of jewels strewn by Flora: ‘So craftely dame Flora had over fret / Hir hevinly bed, powderit with mony a set / Of ruby, topas, perle, and emerant’ (10–12) (so skilfully Dame Flora had adorned her heavenly bed, sprinkled with many a plant of ruby, topaz, pearl, and emerald); while in the third stanza he shifts to referring to the ground as ‘Naturis tapestreis’ (20) (Nature’s tapestries). This kind of decorative language also appears in Tretis. In describing the flora surrounding the three ladies, Dunbar’s narrator says that the garden is ‘Arrayit ryallie about with mony riche wardour / That Nature full nobillie annamalit with flouris’ (30–1) (royally arrayed with plentiful rich greenery that Nature very nobly enamelled with flowers).16 The implications of Dunbar’s choice of imagery are explored in more detail in Chapter 4; however, it is important to introduce this likeness here: in both texts this descriptive language serves to invest the landscape with a sense of ­inauthenticity, dazzlingly lovely though it may be. Previous critics have commented at length on the unusual choice of descriptive language in both Douglas and Dunbar. Lyall finds that Douglas’s language closely mimics that used in heraldry and the decorative arts, and concludes: Douglas is, then, not only giving his description a hard, lustrous texture; he also emphasises its artificiality by associating its detail

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

40

The Palyce of Honour

with visual decoration and the stylisation of a heraldic shield. In the following stanza he pursues this conventionalisation further: the landscape now becomes a tapestry, so that again the relationship between nature and art is subverted. The natural world which the poet’s art describes is itself portrayed as a work of artifice. The boundary between art and life, always ambiguous in the dream world of allegorical traditions, is now obscured in the very language of the poem.17

This plastic beauty evidently disturbs the narrator on a subconscious level, since it causes him to lash out impotently at the heavens. In this way, the locus amoenus – a poetic setting meant to convey beauty, inspiration, revelation, and romance – is undermined and consequently called into question. Predating Palyce by at least a decade, Robert Henryson’s The Testament of Cresseid (c. 1475–90, hereafter The Testament) is a useful reference point when considering the dream vision as it developed in Scotland. Henryson’s writing exhibits an early suggestion of humanist thought, though it is firmly anchored in medieval sensibilities. Two of Henryson’s editors have remarked on this aspect of his writing: Douglas Gray identifies Henryson as working within a sort of ‘medieval humanism’, on which Parkinson elaborates by describing Henryson’s energy as ‘adventurously original’.18 Other critics have credibly argued for a more pronounced influence of Italian humanism on Henryson’s work, although many questions regarding his access to various specific humanist works remain unresolved.19 In The Testament the narrator does not fall asleep in contemplation of love or his recent bedtime reading; rather, as Kathryn Lynch has observed, Henryson sets up all of the typical markers of the dream vision frame, but undercuts expectations when the narrator’s reading leaves him alert and wakeful.20 Henryson first carefully establishes the meteorological and astrological setting of the narrative: the audience finds the narrator in the midst of a quintessentially dismal Scottish spring, which Henryson describes as a ‘doolie sessoun’ (1) (dismal season) with ‘schouris of haill’ (6) (showers of hail) and an icy north wind. He further imparts a penitential and downcast mood by specifying that Aries is in the ‘middis of the Lent’ (5) (in the middle of Lent).21 Beyond the weather and season,



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 41

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Henryson provides an astrological profile, which he implies influences the narrator’s reading and contemplation of Cresseid’s story: I stude quhen Titan had his bemis bricht Withdrawin doun and sylit under cure And fair Venus the bewtie of the nicht Uprais and set unto the west full richt Hir goldin face in oppositioun Of god Phebus direct discending doun. (9–14) [I stood when Titan had his bright beams withdrawn down and retracted under cover and fair Venus, the beauty of the night, rose up and positioned her golden face straight to the West in opposition to god Phoebus directly descending down.]

Mars rules the astrological sign of Aries and when set against Venus, rising as the evening star, and Phoebus, descending, an interesting conjunction of influences is formed. Mars is normally associated with Saturn and, as such, was seen to have a negative influence. Aries is the ruling sign, thus insinuating a potentially negative and destructive influence, and the dreary weather amplifies this effect: the narrator associates the weather, astrology, the subject matter of his reading, and his personal comfort (or lack thereof) as converging overwhelmingly as he ‘began to wryte / This tragedie’ (3–4). Venus is generally a positive influence and seen as beneficent to intellectual occupations, especially when considered one of the so-called ‘three graces’ with Jupiter and the Sun (Phoebus). Auspiciously, Venus appears as the evening star rising in opposition to the setting sun. These astrological conditions are shown to have an immediately revitalising effect on the narrator when he says that Venus’s piercing rays ‘my faidit hart of lufe scho wald mak grene’ (24) (my withered heart she desired to make green with love). This state of mind, deeply affected by astrological influence, is therefore crucial to the narrator’s reconsideration of Cresseid’s fate and Chaucer’s interpretation of her story. As Parkinson’s notes to The Testament attest, medieval encyclopaedists such as Bartholomaeus Anglicus (fl. 1220–40) provide scientific explanations for meteorological events and seasonal climates; Henryson’s description reflects this sort of knowledge. Notably, however, the zodiac’s influence on the scholar closely

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

42

The Palyce of Honour

correlates with some humanist views on the topic. Marsilio Ficino (1433–99) discusses the concept of the ‘three graces’ at length in his Three Books on Life (De Triplici Vita, 1489).22 His characterisation of their bearing on scholarly pursuits fits comfortably with the effects described by Henryson: the trio’s influence is seen to be positive and productive. Ficino identifies the Moon and Mercury as supportive to the ‘three graces’, and this certainly seems relevant as Henryson’s narrator absorbs the gloaming from his private chapel before spending the night writing The Testament. Although we do not have evidence that either Henryson or Douglas possessed a copy of Ficino’s Three Books on Life, Hector Boece owned a copy at the time he took up his position as Principal of the King’s College in Aberdeen after its founding in the 1490s. The copy is a French edition, terminus ad quem 1496, printed by Georg Wolf and Johann Philippi de Cruzenach. Jane Stevenson and Peter Davidson speculate that Boece acquired the text sometime between 1494 and 1497 while at the University of Paris. The copy is heavily annotated in Boece’s own hand.23 This brief tangent is important to gaining a fuller understanding of Scottish literary culture, since in many cases the evidence for literary or philosophical influence is rather more circumstantial than concrete. Henryson’s unusual treatment of the dream vision frame in The Testament has a subtle, yet provocative, tinge of humanism. This humanist influence is seen with more clarity only several years later in Douglas’s Palyce. Both Douglas and Henryson distinguish themselves from earlier (English) dream vision poets, especially Chaucer. In The Parliament of Fowls the dreamer falls asleep weary from the day’s travails (92–5) and his only mention of cosmology is his reference to Venus who ‘madest me this sweven for to mete’ (115). In The House of Fame the narrator makes no overt reference to cosmological influence on his vision. Henryson’s cosmological commentary, rather, is set in tension with the inset dream vision when Cresseid falls ‘doun in ane extasie’ (141) (down in an ecstasy) and ‘the sevin planetis discending fra thair spheiris’ (147) (the seven planets descending from their spheres) initiate the divine summit including Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Phoebus, Venus (with Cupid), Mercury, and Cynthia. This convergence of cosmology and divinity is striking, considering the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 43

narrator’s reported astrological influences. The planets and their related deities influence the narrator’s perception of Cresseid’s story as he wonders about the verity of Chaucer’s words. Henryson ingeniously expands this planetary influence when cosmology comes to life within Cresseid’s narrative universe as the planetary spheres are embodied by their corresponding classical deities. This embodiment takes on a terrifying note as the gods debate Cresseid’s fate. Douglas, meanwhile, in contrast to either Chaucer or Henryson, transforms the conventional locus amoenus into a catalyst for the narrator’s self-destructive and incensed confrontation of his allegorical muses and celestial guides. Palyce’s dreamer first expresses his disgruntlement after hearing a disembodied voice singing to May as he wanders the frame garden. The voice proclaims the supremacy of May as the ‘maternall moneth, lady and maistres, / Tyl every thing adoun respirature’ (65–6) (maternal month, lady and sovereign, to every thing on earth reviver). Parkinson notes that sometimes this voice is suggested to be avian in origin, which would reflect  the trope of speaking birds in the conventional locus amoenus.24 Whether or not the voice is avian, it exerts considerable influence insofar as it provokes the dreamer’s distress and subsequent lamentation to Nature, May, and Venus. As far as it may be considered a response to the dreamer’s words, ‘ane impressioun’ (105) (a flash) streaks across the sky and ‘with that gleme so dasyt wes my mycht / Quhill thair remanit nothir voce nor sycht, / Breth, motione, nor hetis naturale’ (109–11) (with that gleam my bodily strength was so benumbed until there remained neither voice nor sight, breath, motion, nor natural heats). Later, in the midst of another swoon within the dreamscape, the dreamer looks once again to the sky and sees ‘a schynand lycht out of the northest sky’ (359) (a shining light out of the north-east sky). This repeated orientation towards astrological events is an important motif throughout the narrative.

Palyce’s grotesque dreamscape The cosmos of the vision is frequently set in jarring counterpoint to the hellish landscape in which the dreamer wakes, essentially

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

44

The Palyce of Honour

­ irroring the narrator’s disturbed psyche at the point of his colm lapse. The sensory overload experienced by the dreamer thus reifies his intersecting experiences of horror and awe; in turn, the grotesque arises from the moments of farcical levity that punctuate the dreamer’s dire and disturbed state of mind. Moreover, these ­intersecting affective experiences are frequently accompanied by narrative ruptures and interruptions. This narrative instability thus accentuates and emphasises the grotesque as an aesthetic that, at its most fundamental, interrupts and redefines boundaries, whether bodily, psychological, or narratological. The following section considers the intersection of the seemingly unabated horror of the hellish landscape with the awe-inspiring beauty of the heavens, both visual and auditory, that continuously interrupts the dreamer’s experience of existential terror. At its most essential the grotesque not only destroys boundaries but also stitches together, however momentarily, diametrically opposed experiences. In this way the dreamer is repeatedly sent into nearly catatonic states as his psyche attempts to achieve these fusions and reconcile his conflicted state of mind. These moments of catatonia are more often than not the very moments of comedy most vividly and memorably conveyed in the narrative. Thus the dreamer’s chaotically vacillating dream vision is crystallised in moments of the grotesque. Bringing this aesthetic quality to the fore thereby allows for a more precise understanding of the arguments underpinning the poem – namely, the framing of poetry and poets as a mediators of divinity and as instruments of moral and intellectual instruction. The dreamer’s return to consciousness, or at least his conscious recognition of the dreamscape, does not introduce a mythical land of lambent light and mystical greenery. Rather, he enters a cacophonous and dark landscape with poisonous air and venomous serpents. This setting immediately establishes the foundation for the impending grotesque chaos and frees Douglas from many of the strictures and pitfalls of conventional dream vision. One compelling aspect of his return to consciousness is the awakening of his senses, which mirrors the stupefying process undergone in the frame – first his voice and sight disappear, followed by his breth, motione, and hetis naturale, and finally he has the sensation that his blood coagulates in his veins. Upon waking in a ‘deserte terrybill’ (136) (terrible



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 45

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

desert) beside an ‘ugly flude horrybill’ (137) (repellent, dreadful river) he re-establishes his senses. Hearing is the first to return:25 Thys laythly flude, rumland as thondyr, routyt, In quham the fysche, yelland as elvys, schoutyt. Thair yelpis wylde my hering all fordevyt. Tha grym monsturis my spretis abhorryt and doutyt. Not throu the soyl bot muskan treis sproutyt Combust, barrant, unblomyt, and unlevyt; (145–50) [This loathsome river rumbling as thunder, roared, in which the fish, yelling as elves, shouted. Their wild yelps deafened my hearing. Those grim monsters my spirit shrank from and dreaded. Nothing sprouted through the soil but rotten trees burnt up, barren, unblossomed, and leafless.]

This soundscape starkly contrasts the music of the frame garden where birds filled the branches and: ‘Melodiously makand thair kyndly gleis, / Quhois schill notis fordinned al the skyis. / Of reparcust ayr the eccon cryis / Amang the branchis of the blomed treis’ (23–6) (melodiously they made their music, whose penetrating notes reverberated in the skies. From impacted air the echo resounds among the branches of the blooming trees). Sound is a signal motif throughout the narrative. These two passages draw most attention for the replacement of the avian inhabitants so typical of the dream vision genre with yelling fish, which were sometimes cast as harbingers of the apocalypse in medieval doomsday narratives.26 Douglas cleverly portrays the shifted soundscape with diction playing off the consonance between fordinned (24) and fordevyt (147). Neither word is common. In fact, only fordin appears in the Dictionary of the Scots Language (DSL) (‘to fill with din; to cause to resound’) and the only examples are from Palyce and Eneados.27 The prefix ‘for-’ is recorded in the Middle English Compendium as an indicator for an ‘(a) intensive or completive action or process, or (b) action that miscarries, turns out for the worse, results in failure, or produces adverse or opposite results’.28 Although the birdsong is set within a seemingly positive context, fordin implies a sense of chaos or intensity of sound. And the dreamer certainly experiences an adverse reaction to the idyllic frame garden and its soundscape in his eventual swooning fit. The subtle shift in descriptive language

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

46

The Palyce of Honour

between the birds and fish amplifies the effect of fordin and fordeve. The yelling of the fish, then, is not entirely an inversion of the birdsong, although they do take on a more sinister cast as they shout like elves and are characterised as grym monsturis. Conor Leahy astutely describes the swampy auditory quality of the fishy hellscape: ‘Douglas weirdly opts for a and b rhymes that are barely distinguishable from one another […] The insistent thickening of these sounds, which makes the scene so different from its analogues, compels the tongue to click incessantly on the palate, especially in words like “routit”, “sproutit”, “rattillit”, “doutit”, “reifit”, and “clatterit”.’29 The transformation of the soundscape to a deafening cacophony intensifies the auditory aspect of the poem and reflects the deterioration of the dreamer’s circumstances. Douglas’s creation of new or unusual words to convey this mood embodies the auditory confusion experienced by the dreamer. Furthermore, there is a clear contrast between the bower in full bloom and the barren trees of the vision. This contrast is apparently more than visual, since the natural features of the landscapes play an interesting role in the making of the soundscapes: in the garden the leafy trees seem to provide a surface from which the birdsong resounds and echoes. In the dreamscape the notes instead strike out with no softening effect that might be achieved by a lush garden/ forest. The dreamer’s vision is not simply a movement from a paradisal to hellish environment but, rather, a movement through a distorted looking glass into an alternate reality. With his returning sense of touch the dreamer perceives the cold whistling wind and subsequently regains bodily control, although only in the most rudimentary sense. This process of re-embodiment is important, since the dreamer’s physical proximity to and relation with his surroundings consistently reflect his evolution. The dreamscape nearly overwhelms him: ‘The quhislyng wynd blew mony byttir blast. / Runtis ratlit, and uneth myght I stand. / Out throu the wode I crap on fut and hand’ (158–60) (the whistling wind blew many fierce gust[s]. Tree stumps creaked, and I could hardly stand. Out of the wood I crept on foot and hand). The dreamer is not unaware of the connection between the vision’s hellish landscape and his existential woes. In his diatribe against ‘Cruel Fortoun’ (166) he ends with the observation: ‘Quhyddyr is bycum

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 47

sa sone this duyly hant / And veyr translat in wyntyr furyus? / Thus I bewale my faitis repugnant, / Inconstant warld and quheil contrarius’ (189–92) (From whence is this dismal haunt come so fast and spring changed into raging winter? Thus I bewailed my repugnant prospects, inconstant world and contrary wheel). Despite the derisive tone the narrator affects in his later interjections against his dream persona, the dreamer’s perception of his environment eloquently fuses the philosophical, affective, and physical at this early point in the vision. The world is literally inconstant and contrarius. Inconstant, since the garden almost dissolves around him only to reform in fractured distortion; contrarius, since the wind physically blows or comes against him so strongly that he cannot stand. He must instead scrabble and crawl across the boggy terrain. The concept of Fortune’s wheel is thus reified in chilling detail. Fate and transformation, the foundational thematic threads of the vision, too, are incorporated into this reifying assessment of the dreamer’s state. In the following passage the dreamer encounters the courts of Minerva and Diana. His momentary distraction shrinks his focus from the expansive wilderness to a pinpoint of light, sound, and, most importantly, stability. Minerva’s court emerges ‘with gude effere quhare at the wod resoundyt. / In stedfast ordour, to vysy onaffrayit, / Thay rydyng furth, with stabylnes ygroundyt’ (208–10) (with fine ceremony at which the wood resounded. In steadfast rank, unafraid to look around, they ride forth, seated with assurance). Diana’s hunt, meanwhile, is populated by ladies ‘with lusty giltyn tressys / In habit wild maist lyke till fostaressys’ (328–9) (with bright golden tresses, in attire most like female foresters). Both courts seem oblivious to the landscape and for a brief moment so too does the dreamer. One particularly heart-stopping moment for the dreamer comes when he wishes for ‘sum signys or sum tokkyn / Of Lady Venus and of hir companee’ (314–15) (some signs or some token of Lady Venus and her company). Immediately, ‘A hart transformyt ran fast by the tree, / With houndis rent, on quham Dian wes wrokkyn’ (316–17) (a transformed hart ran fast by the tree, tore at by hounds, on whom Diana was avenged). The dreamer claims to interpret this sign right away:

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

48

The Palyce of Honour

Mare perfytly, forthy, I knew the syng; Wes Action quhilk Diane nakyt watyt Bathyng in a well, and eik hir madynnys yyng. The goddes wes commovyt at this thing And hym in forme hes of a hart translatit. I saw, allace, his houndis at him slatit. Bakwert he blent to gyf thaym knawlegyng Tha raif thair lord, mysknew hym at thaym batit. (320–7) [Accurately, therefore, I understood the sign; [it] was Actaeon who watched Diana naked bathing in a spring and also her young maidens. The goddess was enraged at this and transformed him into the form of a hart. I saw, alas, his hounds incited against him. He glanced backward to give them understanding that they tore at their lord, [they] mistook him that baited them.]

The sign is even more telling than the dreamer makes out – he too crouches in the undergrowth (or in a stump, at any rate), waiting to glimpse a goddess. When he does see, and then berate, Venus some 300 lines later, events devolve until the dreamer is in danger of a similarly bloody end. During their confrontation he recalls his earlier sighting of Actaeon and constantly checks that his body retains its integrity (736–44). Moreover, Actaeon’s tribulations reflect the dreamer’s voicelessness and obscurity at this stage of the vision. Ovid’s Metamorphoses is a clear source for Douglas’s classical references, and a brief turn back to Boccaccio provides further texture for Douglas’s treatment of allegory here: James Kriesel’s analysis of Boccaccio’s Ameto (which uses Ovidian source material) applies equally to Douglas’s narrative choices. According to Kriesel, Ovid’s recapitulations of the myths of the Pierides and Arachne show female narrators [that] challenge through their song or weaving the poetic and narrative capabilities of the divine, and are subsequently punished for their hubris by being changed into animals. Similar to the Pierides and Arachne, Boccaccio’s nymphs also sing, in particular of adultery, but far from condemning them to becoming animals, their erotic narratives have the power to reveal virtue and turn Ameto from a ‘beast into a man.’ If Ovid is a model, it would seem that Boccaccio may be considering the efficacy of human, or a human mode of, storytelling.30

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 49

Kriesel goes on to note Boccaccio’s overt nod to Ovid through Ameto’s self-conscious probing of his head to check for Actaeonlike horns when he encounters the nymphs and dogs.31 Palyce’s dreamer follows a nearly identical trajectory, especially in his surprising ‘transformation’ from beast to man subsequent to his vicious outburst, which is discussed in more detail in the following chapter. In this context, it is productive to note the way in which the philosophical questions underpinning the poem, namely poetics and poets as mediators of divine knowledge, however imperfect, are reified in the landscape of the dream. The instrumentalisation of the vision’s landscape to convey meaning, especially through this classical allegorical orientation, lends credence to the humanist strands that continually reappear throughout the vision and which innovate on medieval notions of the dream vision as a literary form. The interlude provided by the courts of Minerva and Diana, and particularly the appearance of Actaeon, is quickly displaced and seemingly forgotten by the dreamer. With their passing through the stark wilderness and with the dreamer’s subsequent return to complete solitude he refocuses on the terrifying landscape. Where the dreamer’s first description of the hellish environs of the dream focused on the natural features ‘in quhom na thing wes Nature confortand’ (156) (which in no way was Nature soothing), this (re-) location suddenly populates the dream with all variety of disturbing and venomous creatures: In that desert dispers, in sondyr skattryt, Wer bewis bare quham rane and wynde on battryt. The water stank, the feild was odious Quhar dragonys, lessertis, askis, edders swattryt With mouthis gapand, forkyt tayles tattryt, With mony a stang and spoutis vennomous Corruppyng ayr be rewme contagious. Maist gros and vyle enposonyt cloudis clatteryt, Rekand lyke hellys smoke sulfuryus. My dasyt hed, fordullit dissyly, I rasyt up, half in a letergy, As dois a catyve ydronken in slep And so opperyt tyl my fantasy A schynand lycht out of the northest sky.

50

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Proportion soundis dulcest hard I pepe The quhilk with cure till heir I did tak kepe. In musyk, nowmer full of harmony, Distant on far, wes caryit be the depe. (346–63) [In that disperse desert, scattered asunder, were bare branches which rain and wind battered upon. The water stank, the field was hateful where dragons, lizards, asps, and adders wallowed with gaping mouths, forked, tattered tails, with many a fang and venomous squirts polluting the air by toxic vapour. Very massive and vile poisonous clouds rumbled, reeking like hell’s sulphurous smoke. My dazed head, stupefied dizzily, I raised up, half in a lethargy, as does a wretch drunk with sleep and so appeared to my imagination a shining light out of the north-east sky. I heard the most harmonic rhythmic sounds pipe, to which I took care to listen attentively. In melody, proportions full of harmony, from afar, were carried by the deep [water].]

Bizarrely, the odoriferous and poisonous water of the Cocytuslike river conducts the harmonious music that appears in tandem with or as a result of the inexplicable shining light. The crashing combination of the two experiences – the seething earthly cesspool and the harmonious symphony above – robs the narrator of any rational thought or movement. The experience is set off by the rhyme scheme, which resumes the heavy, clicking a rhyme on ‘-yt’, observed by Leahy around lines 145–53, and opposed by the open vowel of the a rhyme on ‘-y’ in the following stanza. The dreamer’s perception at once captures the expansive sense of a writhing wilderness of venomous creatures and fine detail in such images as the creatures’ forkyt tayles tattryt. The narrative grotesque resurfaces with the narrator’s tangential interjection about the conductive qualities of water and the hearing capabilities of fish. This non sequitur interrupts the dreamer’s largely unsuccessful attempt to reconcile the horrific and angelic forces battering him. He snaps himself out of his narratorial distraction with a pseudo-stern comment to himself: ‘Anewch of this; I not quhat it may mene. / I wyll returne till declare all bedene / My dreidfull dreme with grysly fantasyis’ (382–4) (Enough of this; I do not know what I mean. I will return to declare completely my frightening dream with grisly fantasies). The narrative dissonance achieved by this comment

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 51

is striking: the humorous absurdity of the narrator’s aside disrupts the dreamer’s confused dismay and consequently defuses it. And, it has the effect of reasserting the vision as a literary construction mediated by the narrator. The audience’s immersion in the gruesomely monstrous environment is wholly ruptured and the narrator’s description of his dreidfull dreme with grysly fantasyis asserts an artificial melodrama to the narrative that had, only lines previously, achieved an immersive horror-film quality. Reconciliation between the terrible landscape and the angelic harmony telegraphs the more abstract conflict between mortal and divine that traces through the narrative. The narrator’s continued recontextualisation of the dreamer’s experience almost strangely diverts and redirects the audience’s attention. He continues by overlapping his previous statement: ‘Lang ere I said – and now this tyme is twyis – / A sound I hard, of angellys as it had bene, / With armony fordynnand all the skyis’ (388–90) (Long before I said – and it is now twice – I heard a sound, as if it had come from angels, making all the skies resound with harmony). The narrator here recalls the resounding nature of birdsong in the frame with fordynnand; however, within the ravening wilderness of the dreamscape, the sound threatens to stupefy the dreamer. A series of rhetorical exclamations lauding the supreme perfection of the harmony follow: ‘Quhat sang? Quhat joy? Quhat armony? Quhat lycht? / Quhat myrthfull solace, plesance all at ryght? / Quhat fresch bewté? Quhat excelland estate?’ (403–5, continuing through line 410) (What song? What joy? What harmony? What light? / What merry happiness, in due proportion? / What fresh beauty? What fine mode of existence?) The dreamer’s melancholy, in fact, seems to sharpen his perception of joy and perfection. And he ends his exclamation: The hevinly soundis of thair armony Has dymmyt so my drery fantasy, Baith wit and reason, half is lost of all. Yit as I knaw, als lychtly say I sall: That angellyk and godly company Tyll se me thocht a thyng celestiall. (412–17) [The heavenly sounds of their harmony so dimmed my melancholy understanding, both perception and reason, half is lost. Yet, as

52

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

readily shall I say: to see that angelic and godly company seemed to me a celestial thing.]

A fascinating self-reflexivity throws the entire dream off kilter, but with striking subtlety. The narrator claims that confusion and over-stimulation have deeply affected his perception of events. The sounds themselves have diminished his understanding of events and thus impeded his ability to perceive, convey, or interpret their meaning. This brings the essential philosophic problem of dream visions to the fore: the narrator only imperfectly remembers the dream, despite claims to the contrary, and he modestly admits that even with ‘profund wit angellical’ (411) (profound, angelic intelligence) he would be unable to convey the contents of his vision accurately. This problem of ‘knowing’ has profound implications, since the claim that the narrator describes the dream precisely as it happened is destabilised. From another perspective, the dreamer’s experience of the hevinly soundis is crucial to the poem’s persistent reference to cosmological harmony. In the dream world, the dreamer’s confrontation of his opposing aural and visual experiences effectively cripples him, and even the lucid narrator struggles to reconcile the simultaneous experiences of horror, melancholy, and sublimity. Harmonic sound appears frequently in the narrative, and with the entrance of Venus’s retinue the narrator gives a comprehensive and learned overview of musical theory and instruments (490–516). Interpolated lists arrive regularly in the narrative and often serve as points of transition and as venues for the narrator to demonstrate his considerable knowledge of all varieties of concepts, places, and things. The musical catalogue, prefacing the dreamer’s all-­ important confrontation with Venus, holds specific implications for the humanist aspects of Palyce. He ends by saying, At thair resort baith hevyn and erd resoundit. Na mare I understude thir noumeris fyne, Be God, than dois a gekgo or a swyne, Save that me think swete soundis gude to heir. Na mair heiron my labour will I tyne. (516–20) [At their concord both heaven and earth resounded. No more of these fine musical proportions I understood, by God, than does a cuckoo or



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 53

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

a swine, except that I think sweet sounds are pleasurable to hear. No more hereon will I waste my labour.]

Just as he does with his cajoling remark after his digression on aquatic acoustics and fish, the narrator uses humour to defuse the paralysis of horror and awe affecting the dreamer. The fluctuations between diegetic levels, furthermore, impress the unreliability of the narrator insofar as his claims of stupidity are absurdly fake considering the skilful comprehension with which he describes musical theory. In this way, the grotesque effectively highlights this moment in the narrative as an essential turning point in the text. Plato’s Timaeus offers an illuminating contextual reference point for the narrator’s careful description of the soundscape, by turns a screeching waste and angelic paradise, as well as the dreamer’s disturbed reaction to all sounds. In Timaeus musical harmony is used as an avenue for discussing the human soul. During the discussion of vision, hearing, and sound he clarifies their relation: Concerning sound also and hearing, once more we make the same declaration, that they were bestowed by the Gods with the same object and for the same reasons; for it was for these same purposes that speech was ordained, and it makes the greatest contribution thereto; music too, in so far as it uses audible sound, was bestowed for the sake of harmony. And harmony […] was given by the Muses to him who makes intelligent use of the Muses, not as an aid to irrational pleasure, as is now supposed, but as an auxiliary to the inner revolution of the Soul, when it has lost its harmony, to assist in restoring it to order and concord with itself.32

The discordant soundscape that greets the narrator gains new meaning when viewed from the opposite direction: the initial soundscape reifies through disharmonic ‘music’ the faltering of the narrator’s soul that causes his dream to manifest. With the entrance of Venus the dreamer re-encounters harmony, now mediated through her court. Shortly thereafter, in his most dire need, Calliope’s court is preceded by their ‘soundis swete of plesand melodie’ (807). Calliope’s court embodies an especially interesting translation of harmony by means of the expressly poetic nature of their music. Venus and Calliope, although cast in opposing roles at trial, both play important parts in the establishment of the ­dreamer’s internal

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

54

The Palyce of Honour

harmony and thus offer him the stability and guidance he needs to fulfil his destiny. Douglas’s use of harmony and sound reflects humanist interpretation of the Timaeus rather than medieval interpretation, as offered, for example, by Calcidius. Calcidius interprets the passage as reflecting the degradation of the soul through its persistent contact with the body. He asserts that divine music, not the music enjoyed by the ‘mob’, pulls the soul back towards harmony, which in its noblest form is justice.33 He ends his commentary on the subject with the remark, ‘without any doubt, music provides the adornment of reason to the soul by calling it back to its primordial nature and finally rendering it as the craftsman god originally made it’.34 Reydams-Schils, however, emphasises that, ‘in Calcidius’ treatise on the human soul theories that would establish a connection between the soul and numbers or musical harmony are strikingly missing. He limits his reflection on this theme to the claims that the soul is modulated (modulata) and that it has a kinship with numbers.’35 In contrast, Marsilio Ficino’s commentary on the same passage is more representative of the role harmony plays in Palyce. First he observes that ‘the soul is knit together indissolubly, it is made up of so much multiplicity that it has a natural tendency to turn towards those things which are wholly composite’.36 Harmony is thus used as a metaphor, since the ideal binding together of composite elements is harmonious. Ficino then emphasises the appearance of Plato’s comment on harmony in the section of the Timaeus pertaining to the senses: ‘Now harmony moves the body through the airy nature which has been set in motion; through the purified air it strikes the airy spirit which knits soul and body together; through its influence it affects the sense at the same time as the soul […] through its tempering power it sweetly soothes.’37 Certainly the dreamer’s inexplicable relief at Calliope’s entrance results from a combination of factors, but chief among them is the soothing effect of their melodic song and poetry, which he claims ‘playit and sang / so plesand vers quhill all the rochys rang’ (799–800) (played and sang such pleasant verse until the cliffs rang [as a bell]). Calliope’s ‘court rethoricall’ (835) (court of rhetoric) strengthens the nascent transformation of the soundscape – the harmonic music of Venus’s

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 55

court is transmitted by the roiling river and now the cliffs resound with the eloquent song of Calliope’s procession. The dreamer repeatedly affirms his transforming state of mind: ‘All hail my dreid I tho foryet in hy / And all my wo, bot yit I wyst not quhy’ (781–2) (all wholly I forgot my dread at once and all my woe, but yet I did not know why) and later, ‘my curage grew – for quhat cause I not wate’ (829) (my vitality grew – from what cause I knew not). The palliative effect of harmonious music, clearly rendered by Douglas, is linked by Ficino to his interpretation of the relation between the human soul and the world-soul. The kinship of the two explains the ability for humans ‘to discern the universal harmony and appreciate the absolute proportions, both in air by means of music and in the body by means of nature, unless it had there caused within itself and unless there were within it a harmony rising above the harmony produced therefrom in all else’.38 The soul can perceive harmony only by virtue of it containing some small seed of the same universal harmony of the world-soul. Without getting too far into the weeds of Platonic theory and its medieval and humanist commentators, Douglas at least hints at an inclination to use musical harmonies as a poetic motif that reifies the dreamer’s struggle to bring his perception of self and purpose into common cause or, for lack of a better word, harmony. The walls of the Palace of Honour have curious engravings, which the dreamer stops and studies for some time and which causes his Nymph to chide him, ‘hes thou not ellis ado / Bot all thy wyt and fantasy to set / On sic dotyng?’ (1866–8) (have you not else to do but lavish your intelligence and imagination on such foolishness?) This passage has roots in The House of Fame where the dreamer is overwhelmed by his trip to the cosmos: ‘With that this egle gan to crye, / ‘Lat be,’ quod he, ‘thy fantasye! / Wilt thou lere of sterres aught?’ (991–3) Chaucer’s dreamer declines to be taught astronomy and the eagle chides him and gives his reasoning for teaching the dreamer about the stars: For when thou redest poetrie, How goddes gonne stellifye Bridd, fissh, best, or him or here, […]

56

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

How alle these arn set in hevene; For though thou have hem ofte on honde, Yet nostow not wher that they stonde.” (1001–3, 1008–10)

This rather basic reason to learn astronomy is nevertheless rebutted again by the dreamer, who claims that the stars are too bright to behold anyways (1015–16). The explanatory notes to these lines clarify that ‘Africanus compares the music of the spheres (too great for human ears) with the sun (too bright for the human eyes) […]. Similar remarks on the dazzling brilliance of the heavens appear in Bernardus Silvestris […], Alanus de Insulis […], and Bartholomaeus Anglicus, tr. Trevisa.’39 The concept of brightness and light in Palyce is addressed at some length in Chapter 3; however, it is worth briefly noting the philosophical grounding of these lines in Chaucer in order to understand more fully the subtle alterations Douglas makes to the tone and subject matter of the scene and their implications for Douglas’s poetic philosophy. Chaucer’s dreamer is portrayed as perplexed and a little dull for refusing the eagle’s offer of astronomical knowledge, even if he attributes this reticence to the knowledge being beyond his mortal ken. On the other hand, upon approaching the gate to the palace, the Nymph instructs Douglas’s dreamer ‘this ordenance to vysyte’ (1828) (to survey this edifice). Unlike Chaucer’s dreamer, this dreamer is awestruck and appreciative: I bad na mare of plesance nor delyte, Of lusty sycht, of joy and blys perfyte, Nor mare weilfare til have abone the mold Than for til se that yet of byrnyst gold, Quhare on thair was maist curiusly ingrave All naturall thyng men may in erd consave. (1831–6) [I wanted nothing more of pleasure nor delight, of pretty sights, of joy and perfect bliss, no more well-being to have in this life than to see that gate of burnished gold, whereon there was most intricately engraved all phenomena men might consider in the world.]

Douglas’s dreamer needs no persuasion to study the gates, which are decked out in scientific, cosmological, and classical scenes. The engravings are a clear allusion to the passage in which Chaucer’s dreamer observes the cosmos at the end of Book II in The House of



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 57

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Fame. Yet, in the context of Palyce, the engravings also mark the crucial fusion of classical deities, musical harmony, and astronomy in the narrative. Their description is worth quoting at length. Among the other pictorial decorations the dreamer observes: The ayr, the fyre – all the four elymentis – The Speris Sevyn and primum mobile, The sygnis twelf perfytly every gre, The zodiak, hale as bukis represents, The Poil Antertik that ever himselfe absentis, The Poil Artik, and eik the Ursis twane, The Sevyn Sterris, Pheton, and the Charle wane. Thare wes ingraf quhow that Ganamedis Wes reft till hevyn, as men in Ovyd redis, And on till Jupiter made his cheif butlare. […] Of the planetis all the conjunctionys, Thare episciclis and oppositionis Wer porturyt thair, and quhow thair coursis swagis; Thare naturale and dayly motionis, Eclipse, aspectis, and degressyonys. Thare saw I mony gudly personagis Quhilkis semyt all lusty quyk ymagis. (1839–48; 55–61) [The air, the fire – all four elements – the seven spheres and primum mobile, the twelve [astrological] signs, perfect in every degree, the zodiac, whole as books represent, the Antarctic pole that keeps himself out of sight, the Arctic pole, and each of the bears [Ursa major and Ursa minor], the Pleiades, Phaethon, and Ursa Major.40 There was engraved how Ganymede was abducted to heaven, as men read in Ovid, and made chief butler to Jupiter. […] All of the conjunctions of the planets, their epicycles and oppositions were portrayed there and how their courses subside; Their positions and daily motions, eclipse[s], aspects, and deviations. There I saw many distinguished persons which seemed fine lifelike depictions.]

Lines 1846–8 refer back to Chaucer’s dreamer’s trip to the heavens where he fears that he will be stellyfyed – turned into a star – like Enoch, Elijah, Romulus, and Ganymede. Death by transformation is a recurring motif in Palyce. Rather than directly translating this

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

58

The Palyce of Honour

specific instance of transformative, mortal terror from Chaucer, Douglas instead deconstructs it and shows his dreamer, however terrified, to have a persistent sense of curiosity and thirst for knowledge. The gate fluidly depicts scientific concepts and classical lore as  an interwoven series of images. Up to this point, the narrator recalls the dreamer’s perception of the chaotic landscape in fractured fits and starts, and throughout the vision the dreamer tries to bring the composite image into harmony, in all its forms (visual, auditory, etc.). The gates to the palace reify this project by physically engraving a cosmologically harmonious scene that integrates all avenues of knowledge into the golden gate. The narrator closes his brief summary of the gates by observing, ‘the werkmanschip excedyng mony fold / The precyus mater, thocht it wes fynest gold’ (1862–3) (the workmanship exceeding many times the precious material, though it was finest gold). The roles of the dreamer and guide sit in opposition to those in The House of Fame. Instead of a guide despairing to ever teach him anything, the Nymph moves along Douglas’s dreamer with the observation, ‘List thou se farlyes, behald thaym yondir, lo, / Yit study not ovir mekil, a dreid thow vary / For I persave thee halflyngis in a fary’ (1870–2) ([If it] please you to see marvels, behold them yonder, lo, yet do not study overmuch, out of fear you will rave, for I perceive you to be halfway dazed). The Nymph, having experience with the dreamer’s propensity for swooning fits, warns him that the gate may drive him into a dazed, catatonic state. Yet, the dreamer desires understanding and knowledge despite the difficulty he has perceiving the images, much less studying them in detail. This represents a continuous animus towards delineating, justifying, and elevating the poetic craft in Palyce. The dreamer is dogged in his pursuit of his destiny, even in the face of his own cowardice, fear, or perceived lack of ability. It is the dreamer that constantly motivates the forward motion in the dream and this is demonstrated by the fact that his guide joins him only some thousand lines into the poem. Furthermore, the dreamscape disturbingly reifies the internal struggle of the dreamer against competing influences and his own self-doubt and lack of understanding. In other medieval dream visions, such as The House of Fame or The Parliament of Fowls, the dreamer’s

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 59

activities prior to sleeping transport him into a mystical world that seems more a fantastical otherworld than an embodiment of the poet’s existential angst. The palace in this way represents not only the supremacy of virtue or divine honour over worldly glory, but also a cosmological and psychological transformation. The disjointed and fractured disharmonies that characterise the valley floor, which the dreamer initially occupies, are foiled by the palace, which is physically ensconced by heavenly harmonies in the guise of its wondrous golden gate. In this way, the palace represents a pinnacle of achievement in terms of obtaining harmony in the soul, the by-product of which is the blossoming of the poet’s ability to comprehend his role in the world. Thus he can begin to act as a conduit for divinely inspired moral, philosophical, and historical knowledge.

Notes  1 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 26.  2 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 10.  3 Line references from Gavin Douglas, The Palyce of Honour, ed. David Parkinson (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, rev edn, 2018). All Older Scots translations my own unless otherwise noted.  4 S. F. Kruger, Dreaming in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 19.  5 Cf. King James I of Scotland, The Kingis Quair and ‘Quha douttis dremis is bot phantasye?’ (attributed to ‘Lichtoun’).  6 Calcidius, On Plato’s Timaeus, ed. and trans. John Magee (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 2016), p. 527.  7 Twelve years later, Douglas claims to fulfil this command with the completion of his translation of the Aeneid, Eneados (1513). In the direction following his translation, he states: ‘Quharin also now am I fully quyt, / As twichand Venus, of myn ald promyt / Quhilk I hir maid weil twelf ȝheris tofor, / As wytnessith my Palyce of Honour’ (119–122) (Wherein now I am fully reconciled, as concerning Venus, of my old promise, which I made to her twelve years before, as my Palyce of Honour witnesses). All line references for Eneados from Gavin Douglas, The Eneados, Gavin Douglas’s Translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, Volume 2, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt with Ian Cunningham (Edinburgh: The Scottish Texts Society, forthcoming 2021).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

60

The Palyce of Honour

 8 M. E. Amsler, ‘The Quest for the Present Tense: The Poet and the Dreamer in Douglas’ The Palice of Honour’, Studies in Scottish Literature 17.1 (1982), 186–208 (p. 190). Amsler quotes from the Edinburgh (1579) version of the text in Bawcutt (ed.), The Palice of Honour.  9 All line references for Chaucer’s works from Geoffrey Chaucer, The Riverside Chaucer, gen. ed. Larry D. Benson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). 10 P. Bawcutt (ed.), The Eneados, Gavin Douglas’s Translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, Volume 1: Introduction and Commentary, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt with Ian Cunningham (Edinburgh: The Scottish Text Society, 2020), notes to the third prologue, p. 85. 11 Royan, ‘Gavin Douglas’s Humanist Identity’, p. 8. 12 In the first prologue he uses Genealogy to explain Aeneas’s problematic (from a Christian standpoint) descent into the underworld. He writes: Was it nocht eik als possibill Eneas / As Hercules or Theseus tyll hell to paß, / Quhilk is na gabbyng suythly nor na lie, / As Ihone Bocas in the Genealogie / Of Goddys declarys, and lyke as ȝhe may reid / In the Recolles of Troy quha lest tak hed (Douglas, Eneados, 201–6) (Was it not also as possible [for] Eneas as Hercules or Theseus to pass to hell, which is not an untruth nor a lie, as [Giovanni Boccaccio] in the Genealogy of Gods declares, and just as you may read in [Il Filostrato], [those] who wish [to] take heed). One illustrative study of Boccaccio’s style of mixing medieval and humanist traditions is S. Lorenzini’s ‘Con le Muse in Parnaso: Classical and Medieval Mythography on the Pierides and a Possible Source for Giovanni Boccaccio’, Medievalia et humanistica 39 (2014), 63–86. 13 Giovanni Boccaccio, Boccaccio on Poetry, trans. and ed. Charles Osgood (New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1956), pp. 17–18. 14 Cf. Landino’s commentary that although something seems related ‘in a quite lowly and humble way or are thought to be playing at pure fables to delight the ears of the idle, then most especially do they bring forth lofty things and those which were hidden in the very well-spring of divinity’ (B. McNair, Cristoforo Landino. His Works and Thought (eBook: Brill, 2018), p. 134). 15 R. J. Lyall, ‘The Stylistic Relationship between Dunbar and Douglas’, in S. Mapstone (ed.), William Dunbar, ‘The Nobill Poyet’ (East Linton: Tuckwell Press, 2001), pp. 69–84. 16 All line references for Dunbar’s works from William Dunbar, The Poems of William Dunbar, Volume 1, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1998).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



‘Overset with fantasyis’ 61

17 Lyall, ‘The Stylistic Relationship’, p. 74. 18 Selected Poems of Henryson and Dunbar, ed. Douglas Gray (London: Penguin, 1998), p. 365. Parkinson (ed.), Robert Henryson, p. 3. 19 R. D. S. Jack, The Italian Influence on Scottish Literature (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1972), esp. pp. 1–28. J. MacQueen, ‘Neoplatonism and Orphism in Fifteenth-Century Scotland: The Evidence for Henryson’s “New Orpheus”’, Scottish Studies 20 (1976), 69–89. S. McKenna, ‘Robert Henryson, Pico della Mirandola, and Late FifteenthCentury Heroic Humanism’, in G. Caie, R. J. Lyall, S. Mapstone, and K. Simpson (eds), The European Sun: Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Medieval and Renaissance Scottish Language and Literature (East Linton: Tuckwell Press, 2001), pp. 232–41. 20 K. Lynch, ‘Henryson’s “Doolie Dreame” and the Late Medieval Dream Vision Tradition’, JEGP 109.2 (2010), 177–97 (pp. 178–9). 21 See Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, notes to line 5; line 4; and lines 11–14. 22 Marsilio Ficino, Three Books on Life, trans. and ed. Carol V. Kaske and John R. Clark (Binghampton: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1989). This idea is variously addressed in Kaske and Clark’s ‘Introduction’, pp. 33–5, and by Ficino, Books 1.1, 3.1, 3.2, 3.4, 3.5, etc. 23 J. Stevenson and P. Davidson, ‘Ficino in Aberdeen: The Continuing Problem of the Scottish Renaissance’, Journal of the Northern Renaissance 1 (2009). Incunabula Short Title Catalogue number: if00159000. 24 Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to line 63. 25 Cf. Bawcutt, Gavin Douglas, p. 53 and Hasler, Allegories of Authority, p. 101. 26 A. K. Nitecki, ‘Gavin Douglas’s Yelling Fish: The Palice of Honour, Lines 146–8’, Notes and Queries 28.2 (1981), 118–19. 27 DSL, ‘fordin, fordyn, v.’ 28 Middle English Dictionary, ‘for- pref. (1).’ 29 C. Leahy, ‘Dreamscape into Landscape in Gavin Douglas’, Essays in Criticism 66.2 (2016), 149–67 (p. 155). Leahy conducts an insightful analysis of the passage against the wider dream vision tradition, cf. esp. pp. 155–7. 30 J. C. Kriesel, ‘Favole, Parabole, Istorie: The Genealogy of Boccaccio’s Theory of Allegory’, PhD Dissertation, University of Notre Dame (2008), p. 137. 31 See Kriesel, ‘Favole, Parabole, Istorie’, pp. 138–9. 32 Plato, Timaeus, in Timaeus. Critias. Cleitophon. Menexenus. Epistles, trans. R. G. Bury. Loeb Classical Library 234 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1929), p. 109.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

62

The Palyce of Honour

33 Calcidius, On Plato’s Timaeus, p. 543. 34 Calcidius, On Plato’s Timaeus, p. 545. 35 G. Reydams-Schils, Calcidius on Plato’s Timaeus: Greek Philosophy, Latin Reception and Christian Contexts (ePrint: Cambridge University Press, 2020), p. 81 (italics original). 36 M. Ficino, All Things Natural: Ficino on Plato’s Timaeus, trans. A. Farndell (London: Shepheard-Walwyn (Publishers) Ltd, 2010), p. 51. 37 Ficino, All Things Natural, p. 52. 38 Ficino, All Things Natural, p. 53. 39 Benson (ed.), The Riverside Chaucer, explanatory notes to The House of Fame lines 1015–17. 40 See Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to lines 1844–5, where he explains the confusion between the two ‘bears’ and the ‘Charle wane’.

2

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Identity crisis: temporal dissonance and narrative voice

Identity in Palyce is neither static nor singular. Instead, the narrative perspective undergoes constant shifts as the perceptions of the narrator and dreamer intertwine in a dense warren of affective antinomy. The narrative grotesque compellingly appears at moments of convergence and transformation: the dreamer’s experience of horror in the dream is punctuated by absurdity, farce, and comical ridicule. Crucially, these ‘grotesque’ fissures create space for the dreamer and narrator to apprehend the transformative messages of the dream, namely that the poet has a divine task not only in elevating himself as an individual but also in fulfilling his intermediary role as custodian and conveyer of history and (divinely inspired) knowledge. The effect of this complex rendering of identity and narrative voice is partly played out through the prevailing themes of fate and transfiguration. The dreamer’s existential angst over his fatall weird (fated destiny) is the principal cause of the vision and thus acts as the source of his deep anxiety and depression. Transfiguration amplifies this issue as it reifies the intense emotional turmoil experienced by the dreamer. Douglas ultimately conceives of his identity as a poet as a divine vocation and his journey through the dream vision maps the growth and development which he undergoes in order to comprehend and fulfil his duty. By faithfully serving and elevating God’s ordained representative on Earth, in this case James IV of Scotland, the poet may reach the pinnacle of achievement. Mainstream humanist thought maintained that poets belonged to a special class of individuals that benefited from divine inspiration. As such, poets might be considered to be prophets in terms

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

64

The Palyce of Honour

of the role they played in voicing divinely inspired moral or philosophical instruction. Cristoforo Landino asserts this view in his Disputationes Camaldulenses where he says that poets are ‘incited by divine madness [furore]’ and produce such marvellous works under this influence that they ‘are divine prophets [vates] and sacred priests of the Muses’.1 Marsilio Ficino, meanwhile, draws a comparison between poetry and prophecy by invoking variously ‘ancient poets (vates), the Sibyls, the biblical prophets, the testimony of Platonic philosophers, and the experience of dreams’.2 In more general terms, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola emphasised man’s ability to choose his moral nature and to shape his fate. In his work, Oration on the Dignity of Man, he declares: ‘Let our souls be pervaded by a certain holy and Junonian ambition so that we, not satisfied with what is mediocre, may aspire to what is loftiest, and may apply ourselves with all our strength in that pursuit, for we shall succeed if we are so minded.’3 This more general commentary on man’s self-determinism complements the specific commentaries on the role of the poet in Landino and Ficino. Strikingly, Douglas’s  fraught exploration of poetic identity and destiny at many points reflects these humanist conceptions of autonomy, identity, and poetics. In her seminal study of Gavin Douglas, Bawcutt asserts that Douglas was demonstrably familiar with the work of the Italian humanists Petrarch, Boccaccio, and Landino. She observes, however, that he does not make reference to either Ficino or Pico, and rejects any ‘obvious trace of their thought in Douglas’s poetry’.4 The present study diverges from Bawcutt by setting Palyce in conversation with these latter authors. While it is not possible to locate concrete evidence for Douglas’s direct knowledge of either Ficino or Pico’s writings, there is certainly compelling evidence that Douglas engaged with humanist theories of poetics exemplified in their works. Humanist conceptions of divine inspiration and the idea that the poet must separate from his body in order to channel the divine furor of poetic creation intersects jarringly with Douglas’s engagement of the dream vision and its attendant tropes and motifs. As typical in the dream vision, the dreamer asks questions of the inhabitants of the dream and his appointed guide as he moves

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 65

through the dreamscape. Through this process of inquiry, he discovers answers to the issues troubling his waking psyche: what is it to be a poet? Whence does poetic inspiration emanate? What role does the poet play in society? Douglas’s dreamer steadily integrates his self-obsessed point of view with a more universal understanding of poetry and, through this process, he determines his role to play within this worldview, namely to act as an emissary of divine knowledge and history. The implications of Douglas’s employment of the dream vision via his depiction of the frame garden and the dreamscape were the focus of the previous chapter. In particular, his distinct use of figurative language and surrealistic imagery were established as definitive features of his unique interpretation of the medieval genre. His mobilisation of humanist concepts of poetic composition, meanwhile, were shown to be persistently evident in the framing and environment of the dream vision. The framework of the narrative grotesque primarily highlighted the conjunction of medieval and humanist sensibilities as aspects reified by the tumultuous (dis)harmonic sensory events of the dream. The present chapter shifts focus to the narrator/dreamer’s psychological experience of the dream and the multiple subjectivities prompted by the individual perceptions voiced by each temporal persona. This argument tracks the dreamer’s emotional vacillations at important junctures in his personal development as well as the narrator’s mediation and explication of these moments, which expose Douglas’s engagement with the concepts of autonomy and identity.

Instabilities and refractions: collapsing into the dream In addition to the lustrous and jewel-like character of the garden, the narrator describes it as rich in healing and revitalising elements. Yet, the first line of the poem already destabilises this apparently restorative atmosphere: Aurora’s face (the dawn) is described as ‘pale’ and ‘lamentable’ (1) (pale; sorrowful). Parkinson notes that this description invests the narrative with sorrow at the outset: ‘in Ovidian terms, a pale, sorrowful Aurora portends overthrow, uncertainty, disappointment, and loss’.5 The narrator, however, goes

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

66

The Palyce of Honour

on to describe the environment as ‘right fresche’ (14) (very fresh), ‘halsom’ (46) (healthful), and ‘nutrityve’ (48) (nutritious); and while wandering the garden he describes his state of mind as ‘replennessed and full of all delice’ (29) (imbued with delight); and he says, ‘so rejoysyt and confort wes my sprete’ (59) (my spirit was so gladdened and comforted).6 In the midst of this rejuvenating environment a disembodied voice begins to sing in praise of May. Rather than inspiring his poetic inclinations, as might be expected from the preceding description of the vivifying and healthy atmosphere, the voice terrifies the dreamer and prompts his insecurities to surface. The first line of the song lauds May: ‘O May, thow myrrour of soles’ (64). Parkinson glosses the line as utmost example (acme) of happiness.7 If May is considered a mirror in the sense of an example to be followed, as a perfect representation of happiness, harmony, and health, the dreamer’s terrified reaction is the first indication that his inward reality is in conflict with his surroundings and, by extension, that his sense of self is in turmoil. The word myrrour in this context is foremost aligned with the idea of something exemplary, but it is no mistake that the first sense, a reflective glass, is also evoked. Mirrors played versatile roles in medieval dream visions and could be signals of both narcissism and knowledge, deception and reality. Reflections, imitations, echoes, and harmonies are rife in the poem; whereas May is linked symbolically with mirrors as an ideal embodiment of joy, Venus later presents to the dreamer a mirror in which he sees the entirety of human history, a cinematic experience dismissed by the Nymph as only a reflection of Venus’s face. Humanity is thereby aligned with the mercurial goddess as a perhaps trivial reflection of her instability, inconstancy, and deception. On mirrors Kruger observes, Medieval mirrors, however, serve not only to reflect the self, but also to reveal information about the world beyond the self. Similarly, the self-conscious dream poem is not independent of the external reality or truth that it attempts to represent. In its self-reflexive movements, dream vision raises not only self-contained formal questions, but also questions about how literature grasps and represents real and true entities existing outside a strictly poetic realm. The dream poem’s self-reflexivity, in other words, often leads into questions of epistemology.8

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 67

In fact, Palyce’s primary impetus is a negotiation of a solipsistic development of poetic identity with a wider exploration of the role of poetry in society and as a mediator between humanity and divinity. The cycles of history contained in Venus’s mirror highlight a sort of literary (and emotional) history of humanity; meanwhile the gates of Honour’s palace harmonise all realms of knowledge and experience. Poetry is thus framed as a method for creating harmony between different modes of knowledge and expression. Whether through May’s proclaimed status as the acme of happiness – a state that the dreamer recoils from rather than mirrors – or in Venus’s grand golden mirror, the idea of reverberation and reflection is central to the matter of the dream. The song introduces the motif of transfiguration to the narrative as well. Transfiguration is expounded repeatedly in physical terms as the dreamer constantly worries about the integrity of his body and as the physical landscape shifts quite literally under his feet. Part of the dreamer’s obsession with his physical body is conveyed through the recurrent analogy between humans and animals. The second stanza of the song introduces this motif. The singer addresses May: ‘Thy godly lore, cunnyng incomparabyl, / Dantis the savage bestis maist unstabyl / And expellis all that nature i­nfestis’ (73–5) (Your divine knowledge, incomparable learning, tames the unpredictable savage beasts and expels all that assails nature). This line is prophetic – the dreamer initially occupies the dream in exceedingly beastly form as he wallows in a ghastly mire, hides in a stump, and mistakes the din of Minerva’s approaching court as a wild stampede, although he later corrects himself by describing them as ‘ane lusty rout of bestis rationall’ (201) (an attractive herd of rational beasts). The mingling of beast and human recalls a remark made by Pico: he cautions against worldly, sensory pursuits, warning that they make men ‘brutes and mindless beasts of burden’.9 It is a view mirrored in Boccaccio especially in his treatment of the Actaeon myth in Ameto, as previously discussed. Douglas’s dreamer is deeply preoccupied with the possibility of being transfigured from a man to a beast, despite the fact that it seems the reverse occurs over the course of the poem. The context in which the ominous voice introduces the motifs of transformation and corporeal confusion installs May as the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

68

The Palyce of Honour

arbiter of worthiness and thereby casts her as both a protective and destructive force. In his distressed state of mind the poet internalises the concepts of the song and melds them into the distressing landscape of his dream. Rather than feeling comforted by May’s reported maternal qualities, the dreamer’s fears of inadequacy and unworthiness surface with utmost melodrama. When the song finishes the dreamer raises his face to the sky and is ‘sore effrayit, half in a frenisye’ (90) (acutely alarmed, half in a frenzy). Fear and frenzy lead him to call out desperately: ‘O Nature quene and O ye lusty May,’ Quod I tho, ‘Quhow lang sall I thus forvay Quhilk yow and Venus in this garth deservis? Reconsell me out of this gret affray That I maye synge yow laudis day be day. Ye that al mundane creaturis preservis, Confort your man that in this fanton stervis With sprete arrasyt and every wit away, (91–8) [‘O Nature queen and O you delightful May’, said I then, ‘How long shall I thus go astray, who serves you and Venus in this garden? Restore me from this great fear [so] that I may praise you every day. You that preserves all earthly created beings, comfort your man who in this delusion perishes with spirit downcast and all mental faculties gone away.’]

The mysterious singer addresses only May, yet the dreamer projects his angsty protestations to Nature, May, and Venus as triplicate arbiters of inspiration, guidance, and accomplishment. Where his path through the garden initially seemed to be a restorative ramble, now the dreamer asserts that he has been led astray in his service to Nature, May, and Venus. He begs them to reconsell [him] out of this gret affray. The primary meaning of reconsell has the sense of restoring or bringing back, but in this context it has the refined sense of bringing back into right or friendly relations. The two senses flow together as the affective state of the dreamer is cleaved from the restorative atmosphere of the garden, but also as he desperately seeks to serve these allegories in his capacity as a poet. The dreamer’s conflicted loyalties to Nature, May, and Venus set up a parallel with the dreamer’s encounters with Nature and

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 69

Venus in The Parliament of Fowls. In Chaucer’s poem the narrator initially claims to be a servant of Love (referring to the masculine entity), although not a very successful one. When he awakens in the dream he must first contend with the gates, which are inscribed with a conflicting message – they lead to a ‘blysful place / Of hertes hele and dedly woundes cure’ (127–8) as well as a place where one might expect ‘mortal strokes of the spere’ (135).10 Chaucer’s dreamer explores Venus’s temple but notices only artistic renderings of fallen lovers and describes her temple as painted with all who have loved and ‘in what plyt they dyde’ (296). Seeking an escape, the dreamer walks towards the original green fields of the garden in order to find ‘solace’ (297). He finds Nature enthroned and surrounded by birds. Conversely, the dreamer in Palyce seems to move fluidly and unexpectedly between the two opposing environments inscribed on Chaucer’s gates: in his lucid state the dreamer wanders a blysful place and seems content, but the disconcerting song to May, the socalled acme of happiness (soles), drives him into the desolate landscape of violence and terror alluded to as the alternative face of love in The Parliament – that land where ‘nevere tre shal fruyt ne leves bere. / This strem yow ledeth to the sorweful were / There as the fish in prysoun is al drye’ (137–9). The extreme physicality of Palyce’s narrative amplifies the effect only weakly achieved in The Parliament and transforms the dreamer-narrator figure from a hidden bystander, who arguably learns little to nothing from his experience, to a character that undergoes intense physical, emotional, and intellectual transformations. Douglas’s unusual treatment of the dreamer figure is further evidenced when set against the dreamer in The House of Fame. In that text, the eagle guide is the main force driving the dreamer’s discovery of the dream world. While the narrator’s pleas for inspiration act as a catalyst, the dreamer does not achieve the same active energy or emotional range as Douglas’s dreamer, nor does the triangular relationship between dreamer, narrator, and guide achieve the same dynamic complexity. For example, in Book II the eagle immediately appears to spirit the dreamer away and gives no explanation until he commands the dreamer to rouse from his dazed stupor. Chaucer’s dreamer fears his death via transfiguration and asks, ‘Shal I noon other weyes dye? / Wher Joves wol me ­stellyfye, / Or

70

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

what thing may this sygnifye?’ (585–7). The eagle senses the dreamer’s fear, reassures him that he is safe (596–604), and then explains that he dwells with Jupiter. He describes his mission: Certeyn, he [Jupiter] hath of the routhe That thou so longe trewely Hast served so ententyfly Hys blynde nevew Cupido, And faire Venus also, Withoute guerdon ever yit. (614–19)

This remark quickly clarifies the hierarchy of the dream and simply conveys the impetus for the vision. In contrast, Douglas’s dreamer combatively holds his Muses to account and then spends the first thousand lines of the poem traversing the terrain alone or contentiously challenging divine figures, all the while attempting to decipher the origin and meaning of the dream. His existential exclamation in the frame asks a question that is not even fully formed by Chaucer’s dreamer. Instead, the events of the dream happen to Chaucer’s dreamer, as demonstrated here when the eagle picks him up and then, unprompted, explains his role as emissary and guide. Melodramatic, bumbling, and absurd though he is, Douglas’s dreamer is the epicentre of action, whether he storms about in a fit of pique or cowers with fear. As will be shown in more detail below, in the midst of these frenetic and distraught reactions, the voices of the two Douglases (narrator and dreamer) repeatedly converge. These moments provoke a sort of re-embodiment and clarity that allows the dreamer to progress in his journey, thereby gaining enlightenment. The dreamer’s eventual relationship to the various allegories and deities is striking, since these figures primarily provide him information and support in his choices and movements; they rarely compel him to action (unless ‘arresting’ him or snapping him out a stupor). In his lucid state the narrator describes the bodily reaction he has to the song. He loses his wits, his spirit is downcast, and his body becomes the physical location of conflict as he quakes with fear in ‘baith puncys, vane, and nervis’ (99) (both arteries, veins, and nerves). Neither May nor Venus answers his lament. Instead the narrator witnesses an apparently divine sign in the sky; he slips



Identity crisis 71

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

more deeply into an ecstatic frenzy and in his dazed confusion he fears that he has lost his mind. His body finally gives way completely and he faints: My fatal werd, my febyl wit I wary, My dasyt heid quham lake of brane gart vary And not sustene so amyabyll a soun! With ery curage, febyl strenthis sary, Bownand me hame – and list no langer tary – Out of the ayr come ane impressioun Throw quhois lycht, in extasy or swoun, Amyd the virgultis, all in tyl a fary As femynine so feblyt fell I doun. (100–8) [My fated destiny, my feeble mind I curse, my dazed head which lack of brain made wander [could] not endure so amiable a sound! With  fearful spirit, feeble pitiful faculties, betaking myself home – and [I] wanted to tarry no longer – out of the air came a flash through whose light, in ecstasy or swoon, amid the shrubbery, utterly in a stupor, as enfeebled as a feminine being, I fell down.]

Incongruously, the dreamer’s exaggeratedly distraught reaction results from what the narrator identifies as an amyabyll soun. In this dizzy state of confusion the dreamer attempts to run away from the garden, but a flash in the sky causes him to swoon. This desperate attempt simultaneously to beg for enlightenment and, literally, to run away from the potentially divine sign embodies the intrinsic conflict between the worldly and divine in the poem and places the dreamer at the intersection of this conflict. Moreover, the concept of curage introduced here becomes another central motif in the dreamer’s journey. The mysterious singer declares several lines earlier that ‘in thee [May] is rute and augment of curage’ (82) (in you is the origin and increase of vitality). Casting May as the source of vitality or spirit as well as the means by which it is augmented is set in contrast to the repeated characterisation of the dreamer’s feebleness (of spirit) as a feminine attribute. Parkinson notes that the repetition of febyl in the above stanza signals a pervasively ‘complex [and] problematic’ view of femininity in the poem.11 His observation is sharpened when the concept of curage is brought to bear on this relationship: the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

72

The Palyce of Honour

dreamer’s curage disappears subsequent to the song praising May and, in a strange turnaround, it seems his newly enfeebled state can be remedied only by May herself since she is the rute and augment of curage. The dichotomy between a feeble versus vigorous spirit is therefore complicated when the dreamer correlates both feebleness and curage to femininity or a feminine entity. When the dreamer challenges May and Venus in the frame he begs them to save him from perishing in the delusion of the garden (97), thus destabilising the waking environment as a deadly fantasy or hallucination. In fact, this false waking world provocatively echoes Pico: ‘if you see someone who is enslaved by his own senses, blinded by the empty hallucinations brought on by fantasy (as if by Calypso herself) and entranced by their bedevilling spells, it is a brute animal you see, not a man’.12 Calypso, the enchantress who detains Ulysses, is a neat parallel to Nature, May, and Venus in Palyce. The dreamer pleads with these figures, but his pleas are heavily tinged by accusation and blame. The bestial depiction of the dreamer when he awakens in the dream immediately signals his (destructive) worldly orientation. The collapsing boundary between the deceptive illusion of the garden and the terrible upheaval of the dream thus presents an alternate view of the dreamer’s reality, rather than a wholly separate world. This surreal dream world, which in one moment carefully depicts the narrator’s physical and mental state, but in the next exposes the expansive landscape (by turns nightmarish and heavenly), reflects the fits and starts by which the dreamer is led, and leads himself, towards his destiny. The dreamer’s entrance into the vision coincides with this emotional nadir: his mental and physical anguish is represented by his bestial behaviour as he creeps ‘on fut and hand’ (160) (on foot and hand) through the hellish dreamscape. The narrator describes his transformed environment: ‘Quhairfore my selvyn was richt sore agast. / This wyldernes abhomynable and wast, / In quhom na thing wes Nature confortand’ (154–6) (Wherefore I myself was sorely afraid. This abominable desert and waste, in which no thing was Nature soothing). In an inversion of the dreamer’s plea for consolation, the landscape becomes a wyldernes abhomynable. Reflecting this environmental change, the dreamer no longer ambles through  the garden, instead he crawls like an animal. Just as the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 73

song warned, Nature exepelis all that nature infestis (75), particularly, savage bestis maist unstabyl (74). It is as if a glamour has been dropped and the competing realities asserted by the Chaucerian gate in The Parliament have been shown to be one and the same. In an echo of the song that initiated the dreamer’s waking frenzy, he lashes out at Cruel Fortoun (166) in a desperate yet elegant complaint that iterates the destructive threat posed not only by Fortune but by May and Venus. Through the refrain ‘Inconstant warld and quheil contrarius’, the dreamer returns focus to the core motifs of his vision: annihilation, transfiguration, and fate. He cries, ‘Allas allas, sall I thus sone be dede / In this desert and wait non uther rede / Bot be devoryt wyth sum best ravanus?’ (168–70) (Alas, alas, shall I thus soon be dead in this desert and expect no other recourse, but [to] be devoured by some ravenous beast?) The vivid pathos of the complaint, which recapitulates the common medieval motif of Fortune’s ephemerality and mutability, is disconcerting, owing to its source: the dreamer who scrabbles like a beast in the mud. Moreover, the image of his utterly base and bestial insignificance in the horrid dreamscape sits in stark opposition to the eloquence of his cry, which is delivered to the lashing emptiness as he stands ‘all solitare in that desert arrasyt’ (164) (all solitary, snatched away into that desert). As in the garden, there is no verbal response, no figure to act as audience; instead he hears an approaching cavalcade – a herd of beasts, he fears, come to trample him.

Encountering the divine: temporality and aesthetic antinomy Acting as a beast himself, and a pitiful one at that, the dreamer ensconces himself in a stump. The procession, shortly revealed to be that of Minerva, ‘Quene of Sapience’ (241) (Queen of Wisdom), is marked by the orderly, uniform, and dignified nature of its participants. The dreamer notices particularly their disciplined ranks and self-possession (209–10). This is the first hint of any kind of stability in the poem, and the figures that represent this selfpossessed mien turn out to be illustrious figures of biblical, classical, and historical provenance. His impression of the court is confirmed when he flags down two seedy characters who turn out

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

74

The Palyce of Honour

to be infamous traitors: Ahithophel and Sinon. Sinon first identifies the ‘prudent Sibillais’ (243) (wise Sybils) as members of Minerva’s inner circle: he names Cassandra, Deborah, Judith, Jael, Circe, and the ‘Fatale Systeris twynand our weirdes out’ (Weird Sisters spinning out our destinies), along with other unnamed prophetesses (244–6). Cassandra, Deborah, Judith, and Jael are all female figures known for their sagacity and bravery. Each woman outwitted or overcame their male oppressors or spoke truth to power (it is striking that Cassandra should be named first by Sinon). Their credentials may make their inclusion logical, albeit unusual, but the emphasis on Minerva’s retinue being first and foremost made up of sibyls is significant: in humanist poetics the Neoplatonic notion of poetic vates and the link between poetry and prophecy is consistently upheld and described by humanist thinkers such as Boccaccio, Landino, and Ficino. Circe and the three Fates sharpen this aspect by means of their explicitly prophetic and magical/supernatural associations; and, not coincidentally, Circe famously transfigured men into animals. In her study of affect in Palyce Bernau explores the significance of the consecutive divine processions. She observes, ‘lists and affect are placed in different forms of relation to one another, offering a textured exploration of the dreamer’s fluctuating affect when confronted with each of the paths towards Honor represented by the three companies he sees passing by in the wilderness’.13 At this moment, the dreamer resides in a liminal space (and not only that represented by his stump along the road) – he has not been formally outcast in the manner of either Ahithophel or Sinon, despite the fact that he resembles the savage bestis maist unstabyl that May expels from her garden. However, he is clearly unprepared to join the ranks of Minerva’s court, which makes its way proudly to the Palace of Honour. With confusion, uncertainty, and fear he asks Ahithophel and Sinon: ‘Tell me this wondyr, / How that ye wrechyt cativis thus at undyr / Ar sociat with this court soverane?’ (268–70) (Tell me [about] this wonder, how that you wretched, miserable people thus in subjection are associated with this royal court?) Ahithophel tells the dreamer: ‘Knawis thou not? Haill, erd quake, and thundyr / Ar oft in May, with mony schour of rane’ (272–3) (Know you not? Hail, earthquake, and thunder are often in May with many showers

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 75

of rain). Ahithophel’s apt metaphor brings into focus the moral ambivalence of wisdom. As mutable as spring, wisdom is neither inherently good nor bad, rather it is dependent on the person who possesses wisdom.14 The dreamer can either continue to wallow in wretchedness and look to a fate similar to Ahithophel and Sinon’s, or he can work to elevate himself to Minerva’s ordered ranks. Distracted and scared by the swiftly approaching processions of Diana and Venus, Ahithophel and Sinon ride away. This leaves the narrator to ponder their words from the safety of his stump: And I agayne, maist lyk ane elrych grume, Crap in the muskane akyn stok mysharrit. Thus wretchitly I maid my resydence Imagynand feil syse for sum defence In contrar savage bestis maist cruell, For na remeid bot deid be violence Sum tyme asswagis febill indegence. Thus in a part I reconfort my sell Bot that so lityll wes, I dar nocht tell. The stychlyng of a mows out of presence Had bene to me mare ugsum than the hell. (299–309) [And I again, most like an elvish man, crept in the ruined, decayed oak stump. Thus wretchedly I made my residence, imagining many times some defence against antagonistic, savage beasts most cruel, for no remedy but death by violence some times overcomes weak insufficiency. Thus in some part I comforted myself, but it was so little, I could not say. The squeaking of a mouse out of sight would have been more terrifying to me than Hell.]

The narrator injects a measure of levity into the topsy-turvy nightmare by describing himself as grappling in the mud like an elrych grume. His expression of terror is further offset by his assertion that even a mouse’s squeak would be more loathsome than Hell. Despite this absurdity, the dreamer actively contemplates what might be necessary to overcome his febill indegence while sequestered in his stump. He even finds some small amount of comfort in his musings. Notably, he reconforts himself – neither May nor Venus plays an active role in this first realisation. The narrative grotesque accentuates the significance of the scene, since the dissonance between

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

76

The Palyce of Honour

abject terror and the absurd context of the dreamer’s philosophical musings forms a vivid juncture in the diegesis; the scene crystallises the opposing forces battering the dreamer in a fragile moment of clarity where horror and humour intersect. This scene sits at the nexus of several important narrative threads, addressed below. Foremost, the mouse’s squeak immediately recalls The House of Fame (785) where the guide explains the theory of sound movement to the dreamer. Douglas responds twofold to this scene from The House of Fame: he pointedly caricatures the role of the dream vision guide and he undercuts his feigned ignorance to reveal his erudition by way of a nuanced understanding of sound and music. The characteristic affective rupture created by the narrative grotesque in the preceding scene accentuates this network of meaning, thereby fusing together Douglas’s parallel interrogations of epistemology and poetic identity. In the opening apostrophe the narrator mocks himself for his former ignorance (127–35), which Amsler highlights as a typically self-reflexive and temporally dissonant feature of the diegesis. His assessment, however accurate, does not emphasise the impact of the humour produced by such discordance between the two voices.15 This grotesque aspect is crucial, since it uniquely highlights Douglas’s melding of medieval and humanist sensibilities. This tendency is demonstrably revealed when the narrator irreverently repurposes the lofty declarations of Chaucer’s guide in The House of Fame, the tone of which are already facetious. Chaucer’s guide tells the dreamer: ‘Now hennesforth y wol the teche How every speche, or noyse, or soun, Thurgh hys multiplicacioun, Thogh hyt were piped of a mous, Mot nede come to Fames House. I preve hyt thus – take hede now – Be experience; (782–88)

The guide goes on to explain how sound moves through air, by likening it to the way rings radiate outwards from a stone dropped in water. Completely misrepresenting this lesson, Douglas’s n ­ arrator says,



Identity crisis 77

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Violent dyn the ayr brekkis and deris, Syne gret motion of ayr the watyr steris. The wattyr steryt, fischis for ferdnes fleis; Bot, out of dout, no fysch in wattyr heris, For, as we se, rycht few of thaym has eris – (373–7) [Violent din breaks and disturbs the air then [the] great motion of air stirs the water. The agitated water, fish escape for fear, but, beyond doubt, no fish hear in water, for, as we see, very few of them have ears.]

This is a crucial passage for the explication of the narrative grotesque taking place in the poem. The narrator unexpectedly ­ ruptures dream vision convention in his absurd misrepresentation of the theory of sound as espoused in the Chaucerian text. Douglas subversively manipulates medieval dream vision tropes by mingling the narrative voices and roles: like a one-man show, the narrator plays the roles of commentator and guide. His guiding commentary does not benefit the dreamer and is instead presented as a discursive sidebar. He subverts the very idea of the sage guide by claiming his ignorance, prolixity, and insufficiency as a source of knowledge. This subversion nominally inheres in the trope of false modesty, but in this context it caricatures the role played by dream guides. Additionally, in the midst of this convoluted digression the narrator subtly likens the dreamer to a fearful fish, since he similarly scurries away from every sound; this fish analogy returns later in the poem. The narrative grotesque elucidates Douglas’s commentary on the instructional nature of the dream vision genre by highlighting his transformation of a well-known passage into an absurdly comical interpolation on the question of fish hearing. This conflation of guide, narrator, and dreamer reveals the deep solipsism of the poem as it relates to issues of identity. The narrator acts as his own source of wisdom by editorialising and waxing lyrical throughout the frame and the first part of the dream while disregarding the fact that the dreamer does not benefit from any of this information. In spite of this self-absorption, however, the narrative still drives forward the investigation of epistemology and poetic expression. Douglas’s experimentation with the dream vision

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

78

The Palyce of Honour

in this manner allows him to test the boundaries of poetic practice by reimagining the role of authority, perspective, and narratorial voice. This early diegetic destabilisation creates space for the poet to become a powerful emissary of divine insight. This evolution is initiated by the dreamer, who takes a first tentative step without the benefit of a formal dream guide and against the narrator’s condescending commentary. Douglas’s innovation is further evident when compared with Chaucer’s portrayal of musical elements. In his discussion of music in Chaucerian texts, Hollander asserts that, despite Chaucer’s attention to naturalistic detail and his working knowledge of academic musical speculation, he does not integrate music as a dynamic critical instrument in his narrative worlds.16 Douglas, conversely, demonstrates a comprehensive and ‘carefully constructed exposition of the nature of music’, especially in his digression on music at lines 481–516. Hollander observes that Douglas evaluates and praises music ‘in terms of the two principal epitomes of Renaissance musica speculativa, the celestial music revealed to Cicero’s Scipio in his dream, and the fabled effectiveness of the music of Greece as symbolized in the figure of Orpheus’.17 The constant references to musical harmony, song, and Neoplatonic cosmology that characterise Douglas’s dream vision sit in compelling counterpoint to the conflicting temporal realities of the dreamer and narrator. Musical theory is thus mobilised in Palyce as an instrument for fusing medieval and humanist modes of thinking. The fractured identities of Douglas’s dreamer and narrator reflect the aesthetic effects achieved in Petrarchan poetics, further signalling the potential for humanist influence on Palyce. By ‘combining the retrospective form of the medieval dream vision with later medieval humanism’s notions of poetry and the stature of the poet’, Amsler observes, ‘Douglas constructs a moral narrative wherein the dreamer discovers, through the growth of his poetic powers, that poetry itself is a legitimate pathway to the Palice of Honour’.18 This correlation might be pushed even further by considering the intersection of medieval cosmology with the temporality of Douglas’s voices. In reference to Petrarch’s description of his Rime as a product of his youth, William Paden concludes,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 79 [Petrarch] realizes that his present voice has grown out of his past voice […] Through the temporal continuum the speaker reshapes his past from his inescapable present viewpoint, while the antitheses of past experience stretch his spirit taut. Medieval cosmology furnished the poet with no such dynamic temporal detachment from his subject. Aesthetic apprehension required, therefore, some extra-literary means to gain that sense of distance through which creation can include antinomy, and this distance was gained through music. […] With Petrarch poetry cast off music, language became self-sufficient as the vehicle of verse, and memory assumed the function of aesthetic distance which had been earlier accorded to music.19

Douglas’s attention to harmony and cosmology reflects a nuanced and humanist-complected presentation of music not commonly found in other medieval poems, especially dream visions. The extreme to which he pushes this temporal and affective antinomy is deeply grotesque. More generally, Douglas’s engagement with sound and musical theory links into his wider epistemological concerns, which are exemplified by catalogues and scientific digressions that appear throughout the poem. These interpolations are often positioned to provoke tension between the narrative voices by setting the dreamer’s existential fear against the narrator’s condescending or oblivious commentary. A grotesque exaggeration of the Petrarchan sense of temporal antinomy explicates the weird effect of these overspilling narrative voices. Affectively dissonant interpolations of catalogues and lists thus reveal starkly the fractious perspectives of dreamer and narrator. By implication this highlights the distinction between experience and recollection as well as the mutability of knowledge and perception. It is the voice of the narrator, struggling to translate the dream – to transfigure it from a kaleidoscope of sensation and emotion into a comprehensible image – that reveals the ongoing and unfinished process of creation. This anachronistic impulse towards order via the interjection of catalogues thus exposes the philosophical and epistemological questions underlying the poem. In this way Palyce exceeds other medieval dream visions in its extremely self-reflexive and self-conscious reconstruction of oneiric experience.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

80

The Palyce of Honour

These displays of encyclopaedic knowledge are further explicated by Boccaccio’s defence of poetry in the Genealogy. The defence describes qualities necessary to the poet beyond his divinely inspired furor. Boccaccio asserts that it is not enough for the poet to experience the divine madness of creation. The poet must also possess and cultivate academic gifts in order to invent and express his poetry effectively. Boccaccio’s tripartite process of poetic creation is comprised of (1) fervour, a God-given gift; (2) exquisite invention, which is the production of thoughts and ideas; and (3) elocution or expressive technique. All three are necessary to poetic creation, but the final element, especially, defines the successful expression of divine inspiration and poetic invention.20 Boccaccio asserts: ‘it is necessary to know at least the principles of the other Liberal Arts, both moral and natural, to possess a strong and abundant vocabulary, to behold the monuments and relics of the Ancients, to have in one’s memory the histories of the nations, and to be familiar with the geography of various lands, of seas, rivers and mountains’.21 These humanist qualities neatly complement and complicate further the dense layers of allusion in the poem. Importantly, they provide insight into Douglas’s grappling with identity as it pertains to the narrator’s quest to portray his vision with accuracy, intelligence, and beauty. After Douglas pulls himself out of his pedagogic digression about the movement of sound and fishy hearing, he attempts to delineate the affective aspect of the dream and its relation to the dreamer. Rather than returning to a physical description of his surroundings, the dreamer describes the negative effects of the joyous angelic harmony, which precedes Venus’s retinue, on his delicate state of mind: So dulce, so swete, and so melodius That every wycht thair with mycht be joyous Bot I and cativis dullit in dispare; For quhen a man is wreth or furius, Malancolyk for wo or tedius, Than is al plesance till hym maist contrare; And semblably than, so did wyth me fare. This melody intonyt hevinly thus For profund wo constrenyt me mak care; (391–99)



Identity crisis 81

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[so harmonious, so sweet, and so melodious that everyone there might be delighted, [except] I and wretches dulled by despair; for when a man is angry or mad, melancholic for woe or weary, then all pleasure is contrary to him; and apparently then, so happened with me. This heavenly-intoned melody, thus from profound woe, compelled me to express grief.]

Unlike the narrator’s digression only lines before, this tangent is not censored by the narrator. Allowing this description of melancholy to remain free of comic or irreverent commentary is crucial to the untangling of the dreamer’s fraught consciousness. Peter Toohey shows that, despite the multivalent classical medical conceptions of melancholia, fear and despondency are common features associated with the disease.22 Between the manic and depressive states of melancholia, Aristotle’s Problemata identify two converse effects of over- or under-heating the black bile: when it is overheated, those afflicted ‘are elated and brilliant or erotic or easily moved to anger and desire’, and when too cold, those afflicted suffer ‘irrational despondency’.23 Toohey correlates these two types of melancholic response with the Sophoclean Ajax: ‘After the act of frenzy Ajax’ predominantly atrabilious temperament begins quickly to cool. The result of this sudden extinguishing is a profound despondency.’24 Ficino’s Three Books on Life, on the other hand, provides a contemporary humanist lens through which to consider Palyce’s portrayal of the dreamer’s melancholic mood. Ficino asserts that the studious tend towards melancholy, owing to the constant use of their spirit, which he understands to be a corporeal vapour essential to sense-perception, imagination, and motor coordination. This aspect is intriguing, considering the dreamer’s persistent reference to his curage, which is frequently used in the sense of ‘spirit’, and his preoccupation with his body. Walker summarises Ficino’s theory: those with an academic disposition are liable to ignite and produce a temporary state of mania or exaltation, followed by extreme depression and lethargy, caused by the black smoke left after the fire. […] These extremes of madness and stupidity, or of contemplative genius, are of course connected with the ambivalent influence of the planet Saturn, to which melancholics are subject; hence, as we shall see, the importance for scholars of

82

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

attracting the influence of the benign planets: the Sun, Jupiter, Venus and Mercury.25

This explanation for the temperament of scholars quite accurately describes the manic symptoms and behaviour of the dreamer as he contends with the various pressures and revelations of his vision. The narrator’s side discussion of melancholy retroactively attempts to foreground and explain the dreamer’s response to Venus’s procession. Strikingly, the soundscape of the dream is identified as the catalyst for the dreamer’s angry outburst, thereby vividly asserting the generative and destructive potentialities of (dis)harmony.

Lyrical inset: lay or complaint? Venus’s procession is marked by its harmony, a motif which integrates the narrator’s discussions of sound and musical theory with the theme of organisation already observed in Minerva’s cavalcade. The dreamer elegantly translates the angelic harmony of sound that follows the court to the symmetry of the procession and its participants: ‘Thay condescend sa weil in ane accord / That by na juynt thair soundis bene discord’ (526–7) (They agree so well in a harmony that at no junction were their sounds discordant). However awe-inspiring and magnificent Venus’s retinue, the dreamer reacts just as the narrator foreshadows. In response to seeing the cavalcade the narrator says, ‘thair myrth commovit my curage’ (605) (their joy roused my spirits); but the curage torn from the dreamer in the frame returns with a vengeance in his provocative lay, which is ‘in dolour al distrenyeit’ (637) (utterly constrained by misery). From the outset his exclamation is problematic: Douglas’s description of his words as a lay scarcely falls within any broad definition of the form in its Middle English incarnation. Finlayson’s study of the Middle English lay concludes that: ‘it is a short narrative poem, characterized by a concentration on simplicity of action, and divisible into two essentially different types: the principal type of lay is essentially a short romance which usually involves some supernatural element; the other an ordeal tale which g­enerally

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 83

involves improbable coincidences’.26 This definition reflects the varied nature of the form in Middle English; however, despite ample room for interpretation, it does not seem terribly amenable to the dreamer’s self-proclaimed lay in Palyce. Setting the Middle English precedent aside, we might instead consider the interpolation of the lay in Guillaume de Machaut’s Remede de Fortune (terminus ad quem 1342). Machaut’s text, like Douglas’s, interrupts fluid narration with lyrical interpolations in the forms of the lai, chanson roial, baladelle, chanson baladée, and rondelet, among others. Calin asserts that these inset poems are meant to complicate and thus enrich textual interpretation – on one level, the progression of forms ‘corresponds to a comparable linear pattern and order of the narrative, bringing the Lover from ignorance, ineptness, despair, solitude, and failure in love to knowledge, sophistication, hope, a sense of community, and amorous success’, but, on another level, ‘to the extent that lyrical inserts as pre-texts, as mises en abyme, reflect the problematics of the narrative intertext, the narrative situation also may prove to be more ambiguous, difficult, and complex than it first appears’.27 In reference specifically to the lay, Calin says, ‘more than other lyrical inserts, the lai corresponds to our contemporary notion of mise en abyme’, and that in its twelve-part structure it represents ‘a total verbal and musical pattern, the lai at its best, harmonious  and perfect, mirrors in microcosm the harmony of the spheres in its macrocosmic perfection’.28 Douglas shortens his lay to three stanzas, which works to the advantage of the mirroring aspect of the poem since it is the first of three three-stanza lyrics composed by the dreamer in his dream. These lyrical inserts are bookended by the three-stanza song that originally drives the dreamer to distraction and the three-stanza dedication with which Douglas ends the work. The first lay follows a circular structure that collates the dreamer’s experience of the dream; its subject matter and imagery refract across the rest of the poem. The angry nature of the dreamer’s outburst closely aligns the composition with the complaint form, which traditionally addressed a personal grievance, and also to poetic invective, since the dreamer’s heated outburst seems more likely a sort of poetic yelling than harmonic singing. As such, Douglas’s identification

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

84

The Palyce of Honour

of his outburst as a ‘lay’ is in large part symbolic: inset lyrics, lay or otherwise, serve as important narrative markers in medieval writing. Similar to Machaut’s interpolations, the lyrics in Palyce follow an upward trajectory in terms of poetic development, they exhibit harmony and symmetry in length and subject matter, and they function as mises en abyme of the prevailing concerns of the narrative. More locally, two other unusual Scottish complaints provide productive analogies to the complaint delivered by Palyce’s dreamer. Richard Holland’s The Buke of the Howlat (c. 1448–52, hereafter Howlat) relates how a howlat (owl) seeks a remedy for his hideous appearance by appealing to the court of birds and Nature. He is granted a feather from each bird and promptly becomes insufferably vain and arrogant. Nature returns at the behest of the other birds and commands them to take back their feathers, forcibly. The howlat, beaten and returned to his original state, laments his fate. There are two parallel aspects that highlight the peculiar character of both complaints. Firstly, in each case the complaints arise not from the troubled love life of the complainant but, rather, from their dissatisfaction with themselves and as a method for blaming another entity for their lack. The howlat complains: ‘Quhom sall I blame in þis breth a bysyn þat I be? / Is nane bot Dame Natur – I bid nocht to nyte – / Till a[c]us of þis caise, in case þat I de’ (69–71) (Whom shall I blame in this fit of anger [for] the monster that I am? Is none [other than] Dame Nature – I ask [you] not to deny [it] – to accuse of this condition, in the circumstance that I die).29 Although addressing and blaming classical deities is by no means uncommon in the complaint, it is unusual to complain about an intrinsic (perceived) shortcoming of personality or appearance that does not relate to the state of being in love or loved. Secondly, the complainants in Howlat and Palyce face courts of their peers to decide the validity of their complaints. In this way, the lamenting outbursts mimic love debates more so than pure literary complaints of the type observed in the work of either Chaucer or Guillaume de Machaut. Where the howlat first complains to himself and then goes to an avian court on his own accord, the dreamer is moved to fury at the sight of Venus’s court and is forcibly brought to trial subsequent to

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 85

his outburst. His vehemence finds resonance in the response of the second wife from the Tretis, addressed at length in the sixth chapter of this study. These two complaints share a purgative, pseudo-­medical function insofar as the complainants have a physical reaction to their feelings that is remedied only through speech. The second wife opens her response by saying, ‘I sall the venome devoid with a vent large, / And me assuage of the swalme that suellit wes gret’ (166–7) (I shall eject the venom with a large discharge and assuage myself of the greatly engorged swelling). The narrator recalls that his curage was commovit to burst into song – ‘commove’ has the sense of exciting strong emotion, usually anger or annoyance. The concept of curage as deployed in Palyce and its physical power to affect the dreamer’s behaviour reflects humanist conceptions of the spirit, particularly as articulated by Ficino. He argues that the instrument with which scholars ‘measure and grasp the world’ is the spirit, which is ‘a vapor of blood’ that, ‘after being generated by the heat of the heart out of the more subtle blood, it flies to the brain; and there the soul uses it continually for the exercise of the interior as well as the exterior senses. This is why the blood subserves the spirit; the spirit, the senses; and finally, the senses, reason.’30 Thus, the spirit is essential to the health and productivity of the scholar. The second wife, similar to the howlat and the dreamer, has a peculiar love-related malady: she is lovelorn in the sense of being perennially loveless; of being deeply lonely. The dreamer also maintains a complicated relationship with (L/)love: he strives to be a servant of Venus, but receives no inspiration or guidance from his muse. As stated above, his complaint laments his fate and his shortcomings as a poet and finds a suitable culprit for his miserable state. In this respect, although he is not a lover per se, he does seek to be a servant of Venus, thus placing him in an unusual position as a complainant. In his foregrounding of the complaint Douglas’s narrator seems to call upon humanist conceptions of the spirit to explain his existential crisis; the dreamer’s words offer a spontaneous exposition of his melancholic state that amplifies this discourse: ‘Constrenyt hart, bylappit in distres, Groundit in wo and full of hevynes, Complene thy paynfull caris infinyte,

86

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Bewale this warldis frele unstedfastnes, Havand regrait, sen gone is thy glaidnes, And all thy solace returnyt in dispyte. O cative thrall, involupit in syte, Confesse thy fatale, wofull wretchitnes; Divide in twane and furth diffound all tyte Aggrevance gret in miserabill endyte. (607–16) [Constrained heart, enfolded in distress, rooted in woe and full of dejection, make complaint of thy infinite suffering, lament this world’s frail inconstancy, feeling regret since thy joy is gone and all thy happiness changed to outrage. O wretched subject, enveloped in sorrow, confess thy destined woeful wretchedness; divide in two and pour out straightaway great grievance in miserable poetry.]

The complaint vividly embodies the dreamer’s melancholia. His command to his heart to break open and void its sorrow and pain is especially provocative, considering the constant allusions to division, transfiguration, and destruction pervading the narrative. The dreamer here invokes a visceral image of torment in order to impress the urgency of his pain. Both here and in the Tretis, the speakers liken their melancholic rage to poisonous black bile that must be purged from the heart in order for the speaker to regain emotional and spiritual equilibrium. This type of intense embodiment grotesquely manipulates extant perceptions of medical melancholia against conventional forms of courtly poetics such as the complaint. The medieval conception of melancholia and the dreamer’s attempt to realign his humours via the poetic expulsion of his woe finds another parallel in Ovid’s desolate expression of isolation and pain in Tristia, written in response to his exile by Augustus. Ovid portrays his process of composition in similarly cathartic terms, especially as he claims to write during a perilous and stormy sea crossing: ‘my writing of verses amid the wild roar of the sea brought wonder, I think, to the Aegean Cyclades. I myself now marvel that amid such turmoil of my soul and of the sea my powers did not fail. But whether “trance” or “madness” be the name of this pursuit, ’twas by such pains that all my pain was lightened.’31 Douglas’s dreamer, conversely, experiences turmoil in purely psychological terms. The cacophonous and hazardous landscape of the dream

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 87

provides similarly dangerous conditions to Ovid’s sea voyage, and the dreamer’s outcry is motivated by his pain at the same time as it assuages his distress. When set in conversation with some remarks made by Landino in his commentary on Dante’s Inferno, the complaint appears to foreshadow the dreamer’s journey through the dream and the poetic development that it allegorises. In order to move from ignorance to divine enlightenment the poet must identify and purge himself of vice and sensual pursuits: ‘Our beatitude is located at the top of the mountain, that is, in contemplation of divine things, yet the human mind is not able to make itself suitable to the ascent if first it does not purge every vice. This purging begins with knowing vice, then one can purge them.’32 The rhetoric engaged by Douglas’s dreamer seems to signal that he will embark on this process in the following journey. The next stanza answers the first and thereby fulfils the purgative function Ovid ascribes to the process of writing. In response to his entreaty to his heart to ‘Confesse thy fatale, wofull wretchitnes’ (614), the second stanza runs: ‘My crewell fait, subjectit to penance, Predestinat sa void of all plesance, Has every greif amyd myn hart ingrave. The slyd, inconstant destany or chance Unequaly doith hyng thair ballance My demeritis and gret dolour I have. This purgatory redowblys all the lave. Ilk wycht has sum weilfare at obeysance, Save me, bysnyng, that may na grace ressave. Dede, thee addresse and do me to my grave. (617–26) [My cruel fate, [to be] subjected to penance, destined [to be] so empty of pleasure, has every grief engraved on my heart. The slippery inconstant destiny or chance unequally hang in their scales my misdeeds and I have great sorrow. This purgatory doubles all the rest. Everyone has some well-being after submission save me, monster, that may receive no grace. Death, prepare thyself and take me to my grave.]

Perhaps most immediately conspicuous is the transition from the second person singular, thy, which is used in relation to the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

88

The Palyce of Honour

c­ ommands he gives his heart in the first stanza, to the first person my. Shifting the perspective in this manner creates a sort of call and response within the complaint, which reflects in microcosm the instability of perspective and narrative throughout the poem. In this way the formal structure of the lay similarly reflects the narrative complexity achieved with the series of inset lyrics in Machaut. The dreamer mobilises religiously inflected terms with penance, predestinat, demeritis, purgatory, grace. His reference to his demeritis is especially provocative: he wonders whether the inconstant ephemerality of fortune or only chance is responsible for the unfair punishment of his demeritis.33 As the dreamer reframes and reorders his worldview this confusion will clarify into an understanding of God’s guiding role in the poetic vocation as well as the poet’s responsibility in developing his craft. In the final stanza Douglas evokes a pathos reminiscent of Cresseid’s complaint in Henryson, and more immediately recalls Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde with a repetitio on ‘Wo worth’ and an emphasis on destiny and despair. By turns, the dreamer laments his ‘mysforton anoyus’ (627) (grievous misfortune), his ‘fervent diseis dolorous’ (630) (severe, grievous disease), and his ‘cursyt destané’ (636) (cursed destiny). The cacophonous soundscape – a reflection of his duelling psychological states – is silenced by the dreamer’s decisive and divisive outburst. The dreamer, formerly passive in his suffering, slices through the shrieking and singing landscape to create a space where his voice is heard. On a psychological level his outburst silences his tumultuous vacillations between horror and delight. He galvanises his confusion by sublimating it into an attack against Venus. The emotional extremes that occur in the first few hundred lines take on a surreal complexion – illusions of space and place have been built up and destroyed; the dreamer has been at once terrified and enraptured; the narrator attempts to invest his narrative with meaning and order, despite the unhinged state of his dream self. Layers of signification and the convoluted internal dialectic cannot ultimately be reconciled and the narrative grotesque allows us to conceptualise these fractious antitheses. The narrator’s aside to the audience, ‘This lay I sayng and not a lettir fenyeit’ (638) (this lay I sang and did not make up a syllable), is the first instance of the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 89

­ arrator’s apparent harmony with his dream self, or at least the first n time he has approved of his dream self’s actions. It is striking that this angry outburst – his first active interaction with the dream’s illustrious occupants – initiates his transformation and connects the various identities at play in the poem. In this moment curage is not bestowed on the dreamer by means of Nature’s pity or May’s blessing; rather he is so incensed by the perceived injustice of his state in contrast to the spectacle of Venus’s shining court that his melancholy is galvanised into a rage that is no longer impotently shouted into the abyss, as was the case for his previous outbursts. The dreamer has indeed begun to transform: following his observation of Minerva’s court and his conversation with Ahithophel and Sinon, he started to acknowledge the need to confront his fate, no matter the potentially violent consequences. His impotent, paralysed behaviour and state of mind is catalysed by the joy he sees in Venus’s other servants. Physically, this transformation is reflected when Venus’s servants find his hiding place and compel him to crawl into the open before violently mobbing him. No matter that he is coerced into motion by outside forces, he never returns to abject bestiality, nor does he receive similarly physical punishment again.34

Trial and transformation In line with the dreamer’s impending transformation, the dreamscape seems to mutate again. Fettered, the dreamer is brought before Venus, Mars, and Cupid, now enthroned in golden chairs. The first thing he observes is the changing environment: Me thocht the feild – ovirspred with carpetis fare, Quhilk wes tofore brint, barrant, vile, and bare – Wox maist plesand, bot all, the suyth to say, Micht not amese my grewous pane full sare. (660–63) [The field seemed to me – overspread with beautiful carpets that which before was burnt, barren, vile, and bare – to become most pleasant, but all [of it], truth be told, might not assuage my grievous pain most sore.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

90

The Palyce of Honour

His observation of the rapidly civilising dreamscape is more disconcerting to the dreamer than comforting. This reaction is, as with most of the dreamer’s reactions, surprising, considering his repulsion at the chaotic and wild environment through which he has been moving. This disparity between expectation and reality, establishing the dynamism of the grotesque permeating the poem, highlights the significance of this moment in the dreamer’s development. For the first time he is brought into contact with one of the objects of his despair, longing, and torment. The dreamer is not received into May’s maternal bosom. Rather, he is charged with blaspheming Venus and meets his charges cuffed and on his knees. Conflicting perspectives come to the fore in this moment: the dreamer has cast himself as the victim, but now he is revealed to be the aggressor, at least from Venus’s perspective. This reversal undercuts the authoritative commentary presented from the dreamer-narrator’s perspective thus far, and in so doing destabilises the perceptions and characterisations of the dream and its occupants. This disjunction is solidified when the dreamer is prompted to respond to the charges against him and he abruptly shifts from quaking in fear and pleading for mercy to standing up to Venus. Initially he says that ‘me thocht my fortune fey. / Wyth quakand voce and hart cald as a key / On kneys I knelyt and mercy culd implore’ (673–5) (I thought myself fated to die. With quaking voice and heart cold as a key, on knees I knelt and begged mercy). When it becomes clear that no mercy is forthcoming, he reacts with a spontaneous plea of not guilty: ‘Sore abasyt, belive I thus out braid,  / “Set of thir pointis of cryme now on me laid / I may me quyte giltles in verité,”’ (685–7) (terribly dismayed, at once I blurted out, ‘Though you have laid these crimes on me, I will exonerate myself in truth, […]’). Fate, if not mutable, is subject to interpretation: the narrator recalls that he believed his fate was sealed and he was doomed to death. In the depths of desperation the dreamer is able, however, to martial his faculties enough to mount a defence against Venus’s charges. Whether or not the dreamer accurately understands his fate, it becomes clear that there is personal responsibility in facing one’s destiny. This (subconscious) realisation elegantly responds to Ahithophel’s comments about the ambivalent nature of wisdom.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 91

The dreamer has by no means evolved into a self-assured poet, despite this slight forward movement – the narrator recounts the debate between the dreamer and Venus with self-deprecating relish: he describes how she called him a ‘subtyle smy’ (705) (tricky rascal), a ‘curst creature’ (707) (cursed creature), and how she equated his intelligence with that of a snail (716–17). Although he declares himself not guilty and questions the legality of the court, Venus convicts the dreamer of harassment and of forswearing her service. During the trial the dreamer becomes terrified that Venus will transfigure him. This perceived threat is foregrounded by Actaeon’s appearance in the wilderness just prior to Diana’s procession, discussed previously. As with Actaeon’s powerless and desperate situation, the dreamer perceives his circumstances to result from mercurial fate and the whims of the goddesses. This conjunction of factors is expressed clearly in Ovid’s Tristia: Why did I see anything? Why did I make my eyes guilty? Why was I so thoughtless as to harbour the knowledge of a fault? Unwitting was Actaeon when he beheld Diana unclothed; none the less he became the prey of his own hounds. Clearly, among the gods, even ill-fortune must be atoned for, nor is mischance an excuse when a deity is wronged.35

Where Ovid correlates his exile with Actaeon’s trespass against Diana, Actaeon’s appearance in Palyce serves as an allegory that foreshadows the dreamer’s verbal assault on Venus – the dreamer is driven by wrath, not reason, to attack Venus. This correlation is reasserted during the trial: Yit of my deth I set not half a fle – For gret effere, me thocht na pane to de – But sore I dred me for sum othyr jape That Venus suld throw hir subtillyté In till sum bysnyng best transfigurit me, As in a bere, a bair, ane oule, ane ape. I traistit so for till have bene myschaip That oft I wald my hand behald to se Gyf it alteryt, and oft my vissage grape. (736–44) [Yet of my death I didn’t give half a fly – for great fear I thought it no pain to die – but I dreaded sorely some other trick that Venus should

92

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

through her cunning transfigure me into some monstrous beast, as into a bear, a boar, an owl, an ape. I so expected to be deformed that often I would behold my hand to see if it was altered and often touched my face.]

The narrator lists various victims of transfiguration, referring to the stories of Actaeon, Io, Lot’s wife, Lycaon, and Nebuchadnezzar, and declares that, ‘Myschans of ane suld be ane otheris lore’ (762) (one’s mishap should be another’s lesson), perhaps too little too late. The narrator reifies the narrative grotesque by demonstrating an active fear for the physical boundaries and integrity of his body. Although the dreamer’s affective state is consistently mirrored by the dreamscape, the signs of change that the dreamer seeks so fervently are nonetheless terrifying; the perceived threat to his physical integrity causes him to check his body feverishly. In spite of his fear of the goddesses and their proclivity for transforming their enemies, he admits that he is inexplicably comforted by the entrance of Calliope and her procession. For the first time the dreamer is warmed and revived. As he observes the ‘fyrme court’ (889) (stable court) approaching he says that ‘recomfort weil my hew tofore wes faid. / Amyd my brest the joyus heit redoundyt’ (890–1) (my colour that was previously pale was invigorated. In my chest the welcome warmth surged back). And twice the narrator observes that at their approach his curage grew (829; 971). Sinon and Ahithophel spur the dreamer’s initial introspection and allow him to develop the kernel of comfort that leads to his confrontation with Venus. With the entry of his guiding muse, Calliope, and her coterie his physical symptoms of feebleness transform to strength and confidence. The dreamer’s reaction to the harmonic music of Calliope’s retinue is contextualised in its role as a feature of the dreamscape in the preceding chapter, but his affective transformation in this moment might also be read against the humanist interpretation of the Muses as conduits for God’s divine energy. Ficino’s Platonic explanation for the Muses as originators of poetic furor is particularly fitting to the relationship between the dreamer and the Muses in Palyce: He who without being aided and inspired by them [the Muses], draws close to the door of poetry, hoping with some learned t­echnique to

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 93 become a good poet, will not succeed and his poetry will be worth nothing. […] But many others, with more firm judgement, imitating the divine and heavenly harmony, order and compose in verses and feet and measures what they have a hint of through the sense and notion of their inner reason. These are those who, aided by the divine spirit, compose very deep and very learned poetry. This Plato called more worthy music, and this is a very effective imitator of the heavenly harmony.36

The dreamer has demonstrated that when left to his own guidance he is liable to attack passers-by with biting invective. According to Ficino’s interpretation of Plato, a poet cannot fully realise his potential without the aid and inspiration of the Muses and the ‘divine spirit’. The metaphor of entering ‘the door of poetry’ is especially provocative in the context of Palyce where the dreamer peeps through a chink in the door of the Palace of Honour for the briefest moment before his blinding fall. Calliope’s entrance marks the pivotal moment in which the dreamer acquires support from the Muses and even a personal guide towards Honour. Calliope’s intercession initiates the narrator’s intellectual transformation. Venus sentences him to write a ‘schort ballat in contrare pane and wo, / Tuychand my laud and his plesand releif’ (995–6) (short ballad contrary to pain and woe, concerning my praise and his pleasant relief). The dreamer now sits upon a stump to compose a written poem – a marked contrast to his previous behaviour where he hid inside a stump and yelled his poem at Venus in the manner of a flyting. Furthermore, when the poem is delivered the narrator passively states that ‘this lay wes red in oppyn audience’ (1045) (this lay was read in open audience), insinuating that one of the courtiers or another individual recited the poem in a formal setting. Considering that the narrator happily claims all of his dialogue, it is notable that he does not claim this role, therefore suggesting that he is no longer merely a common, mud-spattered poid yelling invective like a fishwife. The transition from invective to ballad demonstrates the elevation in his poetic craft and simultaneously confirms the necessity of divine inspiration and guidance in the poetic process. The dreamer’s elevation continues as he joins Calliope’s company in feasting, declamation, singing, and other courtly pastimes. The dreamer is not an active participant; however, he does present

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

94

The Palyce of Honour

himself as a member of the company. After the feast he says, ‘of all that rout wes never a pryk disjoynt / For all our tary, and I furth with my mate, / Montyt on hors, raid sammyn in gude poynt’ (1240–2) (of all that company there was never a jot out of place for all our sojourn and I with my companion mounted on horses rode together in fine style) and ‘with syngyng, lauchyng, merines, and play / On till that roch we rydyng furth the way’ (1252–3) (with singing, laughing, merriness, and play we [rode] forth towards that rocky cliff). This contrasts his relationship with Minerva’s similarly harmonious and ordered court, which he observed alone from his stump. At this moment of harmony and fellowship the narrator interjects with a visceral declaration of his inability to recount the perfection of that procession: The hevynly blys, the perfyte joy to ken Quhilk now I saw; the hundreth part all day I micht not schaw, thocht I had tonges ten. Thocht al my membris tongis were on raw, I wer not abill the thousand fald to schaw, Quhairfore I fere ocht forthirmare to wrtye; For quhiddir I this in saule or body saw, That wait I not, bot he that all doth knaw, The gret God wait, in every thyng perfyt. (1258–66) [The heavenly bliss, the perfect joy to know which I now saw; the hundredth part I could not show, even if I had ten tongues. Though all my body parts were tongues in a row, I would not be able to show the thousandfold wherefore I fear to write anything more; For whether I saw this in soul or body, I know not, but He that knows all, the great God knows perfectly in every way.]

The narrative grotesque is apparent at another crucial milestone in the dreamer’s development through this evocative image. The dreamer finally experiences pleasure at his surroundings and company and the narrator acknowledges that it was hevynly blys and perfyte joy to be among Calliope’s court. Yet the narrator recalls the scene with fear (‘for fere trymlys my pen’, 1254) and his imagery is disturbingly grotesque as he envisages a body made up of tongues as a way to express his inability to describe his dream.37

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 95

Once again, there is a clear disjunction between affective experience and setting, but in this case the fear belongs to the narrator rather than the dreamer. Resisting the paralysis frequently experienced by the dreamer, the narrator uses it as a constructive and motivational energy by persevering in his project despite asserting that no one could accurately describe the company. This moment is essential in the process of (self-)development, since it shows the growing status of the dreamer, signals the narrator’s transformation, and makes the first open assertion about the role of poetry in society and its limitations. Poetry may be inspired by divinity, but it will never capture it fully. Moreover, the narrator admits that he cannot separate the vision as something experienced either physically or psychologically (1264–5). The extreme physicality and embodiment that characterises the vision is destabilised through the narrator’s recognition of the absence of his physical body in the dream state. As a consequence, the tension between dream and reality is forcefully asserted and blurs not only the boundaries between embodiment and disembodiment, but also dream vision and reality. Late in the journey the dreamer’s Nymph guide begins to lead him uphill for the first time. As they summit the hill the dreamer’s transformation is asserted both geographically and figuratively. Recall that when the narrator first falls into the dream vision he wakes up near a horrible river ‘lyke tyll Cochyte the ryver ­infernall […] Rynnand overhed, blud red, and impossybyll’ (137–8, 140) (like Cocytus the infernal river […] rushing headlong, blood red, and impossible to cross). Adding to the terrible aspect, its occupants are fish that ‘yelland as elvys, schoutyt. / Thair yelpis wylde my hering all fordevyt’ (146–7). The opening of the third part foils the first dreamscape as the dreamer observes a burning ditch from his high vantage, ‘quhair mony wrechit creatour lay deid / And miserable catywis yeland loude one hie’ (1319–20) (where many wretched creatures lay dead and miserable wretches yelling loudly on high). Besides which, he sees ‘quhilk den mycht wele comparit be / Till Xantus the fluid of Troy so schill / Byrnand at Venus’ hest contrar Achill. (1321–23)38 (a ravine that might well be compared to Xanthus, the river of Troy so cold, burning at Venus’s command against Achilles).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

96

The Palyce of Honour

The Xanthus proves an apt simile. Book 21 of the Iliad follows Achilles’s bloody battle in the Xanthus, where ‘[the Trojans] flung themselves in with great din, and the sheer-falling streams resounded, and the banks round about rang loudly; and with noise of shouting they swam this way and that, whirled about in the eddies’.39 Achilles shortly joins the battle in the water and strikes down men on every side: ‘and from them rose up hideous groaning as they were struck with the sword, and the water grew red with blood. And as before a monstrous dolphin other fishes flee and fill the recesses of some harbor of fair anchorage in their terror, for greedily does he devour any he catches, so cowered the Trojans in the streams of the dread river beneath the steep banks.’40 This scene neatly laces together the depictions of the two rivers in the dream vision. In part one, the bloody hue of the Cocytus-like river is paired with shrieking fishes from which the dreamer recoils. The dreamer’s loose affiliation with the yelling fish and later with the fish afraid of sound is insinuated through his cringing at every new sound and by his incensed outburst at Venus from the mire. Despite the dreamer’s continual alignment with a variety of beasts, critics have never linked fish with the motif of transfiguration or the persistent confusion of man and beast in Palyce. When the dreamer encounters the burning ditch filled with yelling wretches the strange simile between the dreamer and fish takes on more depth and texture. The dreamer describes the creatours in the gulch as miserable catywis. The dreamer himself has been likened to a catyve repeatedly: he describes himself as dizzy like ‘a catyve ydronken in slep’ (357), aligns himself with catyves that suffer from melancholia, and calls his heart a catyve in his complaint to Venus, while in the charges read against him at the trial he is referred to as a ‘wikkyt catyve, wod and furious’ (668) (wicked wretch, insane and raging). In the third part, the dreamer – now at a safe remove – observes a scene similar to the fish yelling in the original laythly flude (145), but through the mirrored descriptions it is instead wretched humans screaming from the gulch that are equated with the similarly hideous fish of the opening. In turn, this elevates the dreamer from his earlier bestial and uninformed position, as lowly as a fish, to a point where he can observe the souls who have been unsuccessful in their poetic service and appear themselves to be such distressed fish as those



Identity crisis 97

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

at the opening of the dream. The scene is deeply disturbing to the dreamer, and the narrator recalls ‘trymland I stud with teith chatterand gud speid’ (1330) (trembling I stood with teeth chattering at high speed). The Nymph confirms the dreamer’s fears and his suspicion that he could have followed the path of the burning wretches, but seeks to reassure him that he has passed from that danger: ‘To me thou art commyt. I sall thee keip. Thir pieteous pepill amyd theis laithly deip War wrechis quhilkis in lusty yeris fair Pretendit thaym till hie honour to creip Bot suddandly thay fell on sleuthfull sleip Followand plesance, drynt in this loch of cair.’ And with that word, sche hynt me by the hair, Caryit me to the hillis hed anone. (1333–40) [‘You are entrusted to me. I shall take care of you. The piteous people in this horrible chasm were wretches who in cheerful, easy years put themselves forward to creep towards high Honour, but suddenly they fell into slothful apathy following pleasure, drowned in this lake of sorrow.’ And with that word she grabbed me by the hair [and] carried me to the summit.]

The dreamer of course did his fair share of creeping on hand and foot at the opening the dream vision and even his aimless wandering in the frame garden might align with the slothful pursuit of pleasure that condemned the wretches in the burning gulch. The gravity of the scene is undercut when the Nymph’s tender guidance includes dragging the dreamer up the mountain by his hair. Her abusive treatment confirms that the dreamer has not yet reached an Ovidian stature among the court, but nonetheless has elevated himself at least partially above the miserable wretches of the chasm. Across the final section of the dream the dreamer confronts the literal and figurative pinnacle of his journey when he observes Venus’s garden, the palace complex, its guards, and its courtiers. The Nymph repeatedly jolts the dreamer out of his ‘prolixt’ admiration of the divine court and, for the first time, gives the dreamer direct poetic guidance: ‘go efter me, and gud attendence tak. / Quhat thow seyst, luke eftirwartis thow write’ (1463–4) (follow me and attend well. What you see, take care to write [down] ­afterwards).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

98

The Palyce of Honour

This direction is often overshadowed by Venus’s command to translate the Aeneid. The Nymph’s guidance is provocative insofar as her role as guide was previously limited to explaining the environs of the dream. From this point onwards the Nymph takes more care to supervise the dreamer’s observations by admonishing him to refrain from merely gawking like a fool and counselling him to moderation lest he become completely dazed (1870–2). The Nymph truly displaces the narrator as the dream guide and as the source of humorous commentary; the narrator’s patronising comments are now replaced by the Nymph’s more haughty and cajoling remarks. Dream and narratorial identities are definitively melded in the last moment of the dream vision as the Nymph leads the dreamer across a narrowly bridged stream near the palace. The narrative grotesque is at the forefront in this scene, owing to the dreamer’s comically terrified and cowardly reaction to the crossing. The Nymph crosses the bridge quickly while the dreamer observes that: Hir till obbey my spretis woux agast, Swa peralus wes the passagis till aspy. Away sche went, and fra tyme sche wes past Apon the bryg I entrit at the last; Bot swa my harnys trymlyt bissyly Quhyl I fell ovir, and baith my fete slaid by, Out ovir the hede, into the stank adoun, Quhare, as me thocht, I wes in point to droun. (2081–8) [My spirits grew aghast to obey her, so perilous it was to see such a path. Away she went, and from the time she was past, I finally went upon the bridge; but my brains trembled so ceaselessly that I fell over and both my feet slipped by, out over [my] head down into the stream, where, as I thought, I was about to drown.]

The fishy associations stretching across the dream have come full circle as the dreamer falls into a stream where ‘fysches wer enew’ (2073) (fish were plentiful) as a result of his ‘trembling brains’ (2085). Like his previous confrontations with danger, he fears for his death, but quickly finds these fears unfounded as he wakes from the dream in the frame garden. He has been cast away from the dizzying heights of the dream world – once again down with the fishes – but he now has the tools and ‘map’ to navigate his way back

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 99

towards Honour. The frame garden no longer holds the wonder he initially expressed, but nor is it the barren landscape of the dream vision. His perceptions have shifted in order to allow him the skills to identify the important differences between the earthly and divine realms and his role as mediator. This transformation highlights the artistic development that is necessary for his personal and poetic elevation. The punctuation of this scene by the dreamer’s grotesquely exaggerated fear and his comical fall proves that he is not ready to remain in Venus’s garden, much less Honour’s palace. But it establishes the trajectory of the journey he must complete in order to fulfil the promise of the dream – that he might one day reach the illustrious heights of the Palace of Honour.

Notes  1 Translation by A. Young as quoted in McNair, Cristoforo Landino, p. 135 (square brackets original). See also B. McNair, ‘Cristoforo Landino, Poetry, and Divine Illumination’, Fides et Historia 31.1 (1999), 82–93; and C. Kallendorf, ‘Cristoforo Landino’s Aeneid and the Humanist Critical Tradition’, Renaissance Quarterly 36.4 (1983), 519–46.  2 C. C. Greenfield, Humanist and Scholastic Poetics, 1250–1500 (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, 1981), p. 235. Douglas insinuates this connection when Minerva’s entourage is introduced during the first procession.  3 Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Oration on the Dignity of Man, trans. and ed. Francesco Borghesi, Michael Papio, and Massimo Riva (eBook: Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 135.  4 Bawcutt, Gavin Douglas, esp. pp. 32–5.  5 Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to line 1. Ficino describes dawn as the ideal time for productive contemplation and scholarly pursuit (Kaske and Clark (trans. and eds), Three Books on Life, I.VII, esp. [500–1] pp. 125–9).  6 See Ficino on environmental factors conducive to scholarly pursuit (Kaske and Clark (trans. and eds), Three Books on Life, I.X, esp. [502] pp. 135).  7 Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, gloss to line 64.  8 Kruger, Dreaming, pp. 136–40, here quoted pp. 136–7.  9 Borghesi, Papio, and Riva (trans. and eds), Oration, p. 135.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

100

The Palyce of Honour

10 The gates have been variously interpreted either as indicating the ‘paradoxical nature of earthly love’ or ‘as contrasting the different types of love’ (Benson (gen. ed.), The Riverside Chaucer, note to lines 123–41). 11 Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to lines 100–8. 12 Borghesi, Papio, and Riva (trans. and eds), Oration, p. 151. 13 A. Bernau, ‘Affecting Forms: Theorizing with the Palis of Honoure’, in G. D. Burger and H. A. Crocker (eds), Medieval Affect, Feeling, and Emotion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019), pp. 181–202 (p. 185). 14 See Bernau, ‘Affecting Forms’, esp. pp. 185–6. 15 Amsler, ‘The Quest for the Present Tense’, pp. 191–2. 16 J. Hollander, The Untuning of the Sky: Ideas of Music in English Poetry, 1500–1700 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961), esp. pp. 64–5. 17 Hollander, The Untuning of the Sky, p. 83. Robert Henryson, too, delivers a complex rendering of musical theory in Orpheus and Eurydice. Douglas refers to Henryson’s ‘New Orpheus’ in the Eneados in a marginal note on the word Muse, something noted by John MacQueen in Complete and Full with Numbers: The Narrative Poetry of Robert Henryson (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006), pp. 273–4. In the same study, see MacQueen more broadly on the Platonic influence on Orpheus and Eurydice (The Tale of Orpheus), pp. 251–72. 18 Amsler, ‘The Quest for the Present Tense’, p. 188. 19 W. D. Paden, ‘Aesthetic Distance in Petrarch’s Response to the Pastourelle: “Rime” LII’, Romance Notes 16.3 (1975), 706–7. 20 Osgood (trans. and ed.), Boccaccio on Poetry, esp. pp. 14.7. See also G. Gullace, ‘Medieval and Humanistic Perspectives in Boccaccio’s Concept and Defense of Poetry’, Mediaevalia 12 (1989), 225–48 (pp. 237–8). 21 Osgood (trans. and ed.), Boccaccio on Poetry, p. 40. 22 P. Toohey, ‘Some Ancient Histories of Literary Melancholia’, Illinois Classical Studies 15.1 (1990), 143–61, esp. pp. 143–7. 23 Toohey, ‘Some Ancient Histories’, translation of the Problemata (30.1), footnote 45, p. 153. 24 Toohey, ‘Some Ancient Histories’, p. 153. 25 D. P. Walker, Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to Campanella (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1975), pp. 4–5. Cf. Kaske and Clark (trans. and eds), Three Books of Life, I.V [498] p. 119: ‘Melancholy has a similarly great tendency towards either extreme, in the unity of its fixed and stable nature. This extremism does not occur in the other humors. Extremely hot, it produces the extremest boldness, even to ferocity; extremely cold, however, fear and extreme cowardice.’

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Identity crisis 101

26 J. Finlayson, ‘The Form of the Middle English “Lay”’, The Chaucer Review 19.4 (1985), 351–68 (p. 367). 27 W. Calin, ‘Medieval Intertextuality: Lyrical Inserts and Narrative in Guillaume de Machaut’, The French Review 62.1 (1988), 1–10 (pp. 6–7). 28 Calin, ‘Medieval Intertextuality’, pp. 3–4. 29 Line references from Richard Holland, The Buke of the Howlat, ed. Ralph Hanna (Edinburgh: Scottish Text Society, 2014). (Square brackets original). 30 Kaske and Clark (trans. and eds), Three Books on Life, I.II [496] p. 111. See also Walker, Spiritual and Demonic Magic, p. 3. 31 Ovid, Tristia. Ex Ponto, trans. A. L. Wheeler, rev. G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 151 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1924), p. 53. 32 Translation by McNair in Cristoforo Landino, p. 169. 33 DSL, ‘demerit, -merei, n.’: ‘desert for misdoing; wrong-doing deserving of punishment; misdeed’. 34 This mobbing explicitly references Howlat when the avian feast devolves into a mob after a Rook attempts to disrupt the order of the avian court. In calling to mind that mob, Palyce also recalls the humorous tones accompanying it. The dreamer is punched, his hair is pulled, and his face is smeared with blacking while his attackers yell: ‘Pluk at the Craw’ and ‘deplome the Ruik!’ (651), mimicking the mobbing of the Rook in Howlat (820–32). 35 Wheeler (trans.) and Goold (rev.), Tristia, p. 63. 36 Quoted in translation from Greenfield, Humanist and Scholastic, p. 235. 37 Bernau, ‘Affecting Forms’, reads this image as the dreamer considering himself to be ‘a kind of failed list’, p. 191. 38 In Parkinson’s notes to lines 1322–23 he observes that Douglas seems at a remove from Homer’s original since he attributes the burning river to Venus. In the Iliad it is Hephaestus who burns the river at Hera’s behest. Parkinson speculates that Douglas’s (mis)reading might be attributed to Raffaello Regio’s commentary. 39 References from Homer, Iliad, Volume II: Books 13–24, trans. A. T. Murray; rev. William F. Wyatt (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1925), p. 405. (Square brackets added). 40 Murray (trans.) and Wyatt (rev.), Iliad, p. 407.

3

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Heavenly harmonies: classical and Christian divinity in Palyce

Were I wise I should justly hate the learned sisters, the deities fatal to their own votary. But as it is – such madness accompanies my disease – I am once more returning my luckless foot to the stone it has struck, just as the vanquished gladiator seeks again the arena or the battered ship returns to the surging sea. Perchance, as once for him who ruled the Teuthrantian kingdom, the same object will both wound and cure me, and the Muse who aroused the wrath will also soften it. (Ovid, Tristia, Book II)1

Ovid’s description of his torment as a poetic furor incited by the Muses is apposite in the context of the dreamer’s conflicted and desperate interaction with the deities populating his vision in Palyce. Classical writers often used the motif of the poet infected by a frenzied madness to depict the process of poetic composition. Italian humanists, particularly, took to this image of poetic furor with gusto. One venue in which this motif gained a renewed prevalence was in theories of translation. The evolution of translation practices is most evident in the conception of translation as an art form. Earlier medieval scholars, according to humanists such as Leonardo Bruni, produced rather utilitarian and literal renderings of classical texts. In response, humanists sought to elevate translation as a poetic form that offered more ‘accurate’ and vibrant editions of Latin and Greek works.2 In addition to this impulse towards versified eloquence in translation, poetry itself was elevated as a mode of instruction – moral, philosophical, and theological. In the previous chapters two aspects of Palyce’s narrative grotesque came under scrutiny. The first chapter set Palyce in

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 103

c­ onversation with other medieval Scottish and English dream visions in order to highlight Douglas’s destructive and recreative treatment of the form. The second chapter built upon this foundation in order to show the ways in which the narrator’s and dreamer’s voices both reflect and react to this setting as cast in the frame and the dream. The following discussion takes up this conversation by examining the narrator’s (and poet’s) quest to render the dream as beautifully and precisely as possible. His endeavour is deeply influenced by the various deities that he encounters in the dreamscape. These deities are shown to be fractious entities that overspill boundaries between allegorical and astrological, classical and Christian. Venus especially embodies this fluidity, recalling once again van Vianen’s Lidded Ewer in which forms and figures morph and meld together across the sculpture. Punctuating these boundary-rupturing elements, the dreamer and the figures populating the dream all act, at times, with farcical brutishness thereby undercutting the intensity of the dreamer’s oneiric experience. By highlighting these junctures, the narrative grotesque aids in untangling the dense web of allusion and fusion that characterises the portrayal of divine inspiration and poetic making in the poem. Palyce’s instrumentalisation of divine figures exemplifies the issue of aesthetics and composition. Divinity is reified and mediated in Palyce primarily through classical figures (Minerva, Diana, Venus, and Calliope) and allegories (Honour and his palace attendants). However, as the dream develops, the classical goddesses are increasingly presented within a Christian worldview. These constellations of power are brought into focus most pointedly through the figure of Honour, who sits at once within the classical-allegorical hierarchy and the Christian hierarchy through his description in Christ-like terms. Douglas’s creative melding of classical and Christian thus elevates the status of his poetic inclinations by asserting the mediating and instructive role of poetry; the poet is a divine emissary to the mundane court in the same way that the Muses act as intermediaries and guides to the poet.

104

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Divine inspiration: Venus in humanist poetics Venus occupies a complicated position in medieval writing; she was mobilised in a multiplicity of contexts to represent the entire spectrum of views regarding love and poetic inspiration. Most often she is identified as a dual-natured figure, but the range of Venuses is vast and contradictory. One interpretation of Venus’s influence relates to cosmology. Venus is the brightest object in the sky besides the Moon; the planet is so bright that at times it can even be viewed in broad daylight. Additionally, it appears as both the evening star and the morning star according to its orbital cycle. Thanks to Venus’s persistent presence in the sky, humans have been fascinated with the planet for millennia. In the Genealogy Boccaccio refers to the planetary Venus as the Venus magna. His discussion of the Venus magna melds together diverse conceptions of the planet’s astrological power with traits common to the classical goddess. Theresa Tinkle aptly summarises his interpretation as it relates to poetic creation: Boccaccio grants the planet a generative and sensual power that fosters mental as well as physical creation […] The entire account neatly resurrects the classical goddess of generative vitality: Venus genetrix in her most extensive, cosmological role. This Venus fully evidences a union of physical sensuality and verbal art – in other words, she fully represents the sensuousness of poetry, its appeal to both mind and body.3

Boccaccio’s interpretation of Venus, which privileges the powers of the celestial sphere over the allegorical-historical figure, is closely aligned with the figure created by Douglas in his dream vision. In the following discussion it will become evident that Douglas’s treatment of Venus diverges sharply with Chaucerian precedent. However, his interpretation of venerean influence finds resonance in Henryson’s declaration that the planetary Venus revitalises his heart – and thus poetic capabilities – in The Testament (a circumstance addressed in Chapter 1). Douglas’s Venus therefore provocatively situates the figure at the nexus of Scottish and English medieval traditions as well as humanist interpretations of venerean cosmology.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 105

Throughout the poem Douglas refers to cosmological events and celestial bodies and links Venus’s shining countenance with Phoebus: ‘For lyk Phebus in hiest of his spere / Hir bewtye schane, castand so gret a glance / All farehed it opprest, baith far and nere’ (451–3) (For like Phoebus at the height of his course, her beauty shone, casting so great a flash it oppressed all beauty, both far and near). Several aspects of this observation are essential to untangling Douglas’s portrayal of Venus’s role in the poetic process. Foremost, the correlation with Phoebus is significant, since Phoebus was commonly used as a synonym for both the sun and Apollo: the latter was traditionally associated with poetics and the former was considered part of the triptych of graces beneficial to poets in humanist thought (along with Jupiter and Venus). In his discussion of Venus, Boccaccio links her with ‘Day’ owing to ‘her clarity, whereby she shines more brightly than the other stars’.4 Casting Venus’s shining mien as reminiscent of Phoebus privileges these multiple associations with poetic inspiration, clarity, and insight. Douglas achieves yet another echoing effect by characterising Venus’s beauty as casting a glance. A ‘glance’ is a lightning-like flash – an image which distinctly evokes the impressioun that first stupefied the dreamer in the frame. This is striking in cosmological terms. The narrator asserts that he was wandering the garden at dawn just as the first rays of sun peaked over the horizon. Typically Venus is in its cycle as the morning star by the month of May, making it possible, in literal terms, for the planet to be brightly visible at that time. In fact, Parkinson notes that Venus would have been visible in the north-east of the morning sky on 1 May in 1495, 1501, and 1502.5 The correlation between the two flashes raises questions about the source of the first flash. Is it possible that Venus did, in fact, send him some sign of her regard? Douglas does not resolve this question, but he does achieve a foiling effect between the initial catalyst for the dream vision and the event that prompts the dreamer’s next stage of metamorphosis. By also observing that her beauty, as a light flashing across the landscape, all farehed opprest, the sensual aspect of Venus as an allegorical figure is retained. In its evocation of cosmological influence, physical sensuality, and its allusion to poetic authority, Palyce thus constructs a cosmological iteration of the Venus genetrix reminiscent of Boccaccio.

106

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Douglas’s later work demonstrates his nuanced understanding of Boccaccio’s Venus magna through his explanation for her relationship to Eneas in the Eneados. In Book I Chapter VI Eneas meets Venus disguised in the likeness of Diana or a similarly foresty ‘nymph’ (Eneas is unsure of which). Douglas includes a marginal commentary to the scene, which pays special attention to Venus’s repeated casting as Eneas’s mother: In this cheptir ȝe haf that Eneas met his moder Venus in lykneß of a virgyn or a mayd, by the quhilk ȝe sall ondyrstand that Venus is fenȝeit to be modyr to Eneas becaws that Venus was in the ascendent and had domynation in the hevyn the tym of his natyvite; and for that the planet Venus was the signifiar of his byrth and had domination and speciall influens towart hym, tharfor is scho fenȝeit to be his mother; and thus it that poetis fenȝeis bein full of secreyt ondyrstandyng ondyr a hyd sentens or fygur. And weyn nocht for this, thocht poetis fenȝeis Venus the planet, for the cauß foirsaid, tobe Eneas mother, at thai beleve nocht he was motherleß, bot that he had a fayr lady to his moder, quhilk for hir bewte was clepit Venus. And that Venus metis Eneas in form and lykneß of a maid is tobe ondirstand that Venus the planete that tym was in the syng of the Virgyn, quhilk betakynnyt luf and fawouris of wemen.6 [In this chapter you have that Eneas met his mother Venus in the likeness of a virgin or a maiden, by which you should understand that Venus is falsely shown to be mother to Eneas because Venus was in the ascendant and had rule of the heavens at the time of his nativity; and for that the planet Venus was the signifier of his birth and had authority and special influence over him, therefore she is said to be his mother; and thus it is that poets’ metaphors contain secret knowledge under a concealed meaning or symbol. And thus do not surmise, though poets falsely portray Venus the planet, for the cause said before, to be Eneas’s mother, that they believed he was motherless, but that he had a beautiful lady as his mother, who for her beauty was called Venus. And that Venus meets Eneas in form and likeness of a maiden is to be understood that Venus the planet at that time was in the sign of the virgin [i.e. Virgo], which signifies love and the good will of women.]

Douglas’s lengthy marginal commentary establishes the symbolic function of Venus as a maternal figure by ascribing astrological influence with significant power over individual character and

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 107

behaviour. His note becomes slightly muddied as he compounds his point by speculating that Eneas’s real mother was so beautiful that she was referred to as Venus. Most important for this discussion, Douglas uses the allegorical figure of Venus to explicate the imitative or deceptive quality of poetic metaphors (fenȝeis) that conceal knowledge and meaning within symbols and images, while still maintaining that the planet exerts influence over individuals and their personalities or actions. Tinkle brings into conversation with Boccaccio’s astrologised version of Venus the Pervigilium Veneris (‘The Vigil of Venus’), a poem likely composed by the early fourth-century poet Tiberianus.7 This poem casts Venus as the source of spring’s regenerative energy and, in Tinkle’s words, it ‘leads the poet to aestheticise sensuality in verse: absence and exclusion transform desire into poetry’.8 This impulse is demonstrated in the last lines of the poem: ‘When will my spring come? When shall I become like the swallow, that I may cease to be voiceless? I have lost my Muse through being voiceless, and Phoebus regards me not: so did Amyclae, through being voiceless, perish by its very silence.’9 Beyond the correlation between Phoebus’s and Venus’s regard as inherent to the poet’s ability to compose poetry, these lines compellingly echo the sentiments of Douglas’s dreamer. He, too, feels mute and invisible from the very outset of the poem. His opening song confuses Nature, May, and Venus as triplicate sources of poetic inspiration and creativity and he laments his inability to connect with them or draw their attention. Throughout the opening section of the poem the dreamer apparently speaks into an abyss and receives no response except when he manages to flag down Sinon and Ahithophel. Just as the spring motif opens the frame and is used to explain the ambivalence of wisdom by Ahithophel, so too is it given as a metaphor for creative generation in Pervigilium Veneris. Venus’s entrance following the introduction of the spring metaphor enhances the generative and astrological aspects of the poem. In purely astrological terms, Boccaccio notes that the planetary Venus brings the constellations Aries and Scorpio into Mars. This cosmological event marks the onset of spring and thereby invests Venus with a generative role in a seasonal sense.10 Boccaccio uses these multiple facets of Venus to reinforce his interpretation of her

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

108

The Palyce of Honour

as an entity conducive to poetic creation. By extension, he is able to justify the use of classical deities as agents of artistic inspiration and guidance in a Christian context. Douglas’s interpretation of the physicality of poetic creation coincides with the mood of poetic angst described by Ovid in Tristia as well as that expressed in Pervigilium Veneris: his dreamer is initially both mute (insofar as no one of import listens to him) and invisible (since he hides himself in a stump). Astrological events briefly restore his compromised senses at various points in his journey. The dreamer sees, for instance, ‘a schynand lycht out of the northest sky’ (359) (a shining light in the north-east sky) preceding Venus’s appearance. Shortly after, the ‘brychtnes’ (460) (brightness) of Venus’s beauty pierces through his addled mind and muddied vision, bringing with its intensity clarity and harmony; she shines so brightly that the narrator recalls, ‘For till behald my sycht myght not endure / Mair than the brycht sonne may the bakkis e’ (461–2) (my sight could not endure to behold [her beauty], more than the bat’s eye can [endure] the bright sun). Douglas later uses remarkably similar imagery when Eneas describes Venus’s appearance to him at an emotional nadir after the fall of Troy. He says that he was ‘half wod and furyus’ (II.x.53) (half insane and raging) when, As owt of wit my mynd was cachit thus, Quhen that my blissit moder, of sik bewte, Apperit farer than euer I dyd hir se, Schynyng ful cleir for al the dyrk nycht. (II.x.54–7) [as out of [my] senses my mind was thus driven, whence my blessed mother, of such beauty, appeared fairer than ever I did see her, shining very brightly for all the dark night.]

Venus takes his hand and proceeds to inquire after his circumstances. The mirroring between the passages in the Eneados and Palyce is strongly indicative of Douglas’s developing sense of Venus’s nature and role within his poetic universe. The metaphorical power of illumination is magnified at the end of Palyce when the dreamer approaches Honour’s palace. The dreamer is first transfixed by the golden aura and esoteric engravings on the palace gate. But their light is only a fraction of



Heavenly harmonies 109

that embodied by Honour, whom the dreamer glimpses through a chink in the door to the palace. Honour’s intensity is such that the dreamer is only able to observe him for a moment:

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Intronyt sat a god armypotent, On quhais gloryus vissage as I blent, In extasy, be his brychtnes, atonys, He smate me doun and byrsyt all my bonys. (1921–4) [Enthroned sat a warlike god, on whose glorious visage as I looked, in ecstasy by means of his brightness, suddenly he knocked me down and bruised all my bones.11]

Fittingly, the progressive mirroring of the illumination motif across the poem reflects the unequal power of the allegorical and astrological figures: the dreamer, while blinded and entranced by Venus, is able to look at her long enough to provide a detailed description of her appearance and raiment. Conversely, the dreamer barely turns his eyes to Honour before he is violently knocked down. The hierarchy developed by this progression is essential because it creates a space for classical deities within a Christian worldview: Venus and later Calliope and the Nymph are valuable guides and inspirational forces. Honour himself, while still allegorical, is closely correlated with a Christian concept of honour in its elevated moral sense. This linking of classical allegorical figures with God is a key argumentative strand in humanist defences of poetry. The various light-bringing visions encountered by the dreamer lead him to uncover truth and thereby divine knowledge. Ficino uses the metaphor of light similarly to explicate the health and wellbeing of the scholar (in both medical and moral terms) in the Three Books on Life. In the chapter entitled ‘Care for the Corporeal Spirit; Cultivate the Incorporeal; and Lastly, Venerate Truth’, he ends with the statement: Just as when the eyes have been purged and are looking at the light itself, suddenly its radiance pours in, reflecting abundantly from colors and shapes of things, so, as soon as the mind is purged of all fleshly perturbations through moral discipline and is directed towards divine truth (i.e., God himself) through a religious and burning love, suddenly (as the divine Plato says) truth from the divine mind flows in and productively unfolds the true reasons of things – reasons which

110

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

are contained in it [i.e., in the divine mind] and by which all things remain in existence. And the more it surrounds the mind with light, the more it also blessedly fills the will with joy.12

Just as Ficino describes a radiantly divine light purifying and clarifying the soul, so too does the dreamer gain clarity and insight after each of his ‘blinding’ episodes. The impact of the narrative grotesque is such that these moments are fixed as loci in the chaotic diegesis; it fuses together the disparate elements so that the divine radiance of poetic inspiration is ingeniously framed by the surrounding tumult. By the time the dreamer makes contact with Honour, however briefly, he has begun to inhabit his poetic identity. His voice is first asserted in the aggressive lay he ‘sings’ to Venus upon working himself up into a fury at her passing retinue. True to Tinkle’s words in reference to Pervigilium Veneris, ‘absence and exclusion transform desire into poetry’. The invective, addressed in the previous chapter, asserts the dreamer’s poetic voice and thus initiates his evolution as well as the transformation of the dreamscape. Reorienting our focus to consider Venus in other medieval dream visions, it is evident that Douglas’s creative choices diverge remarkably from precedent. Cupid frequently takes centre stage as the primary patron of poets in medieval narratives, while Venus fulfils an almost subservient role. This is the case, for instance, in The Romance of the Rose.13 In The House of Fame Venus is briefly described as naked, holding a comb, and accompanied by her blind son, Cupid, and her husband, Vulcan, dressed in brown. Following the initial description at Venus’s temple, Cupid takes precedence in the conversation between the dreamer and his guide. Tinkle notes that this Venus is divested of mythographic associations and her depiction privileges English over Latin discourse. She concludes that Chaucer’s reading ultimately elevates poetic ambiguity over moral allegory or hermeneutics.14 Chaucer’s depiction of Venus as established in The House of Fame is consistent across his other works. The Complaint of Mars and The Complaint of Venus both attest this: in The Complaint of Mars the identities of the lovers are only revealed towards the end of his complaint and there is no cosmological or mythographical allusion. The Complaint of Venus is even

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 111

more problematic since it is never made clear that the complainant is Venus and the apparently female voice of the narrator directs her words to Love, who is thus cast as superior to the venerean speaker; there are no astrological or mythical allusions to Venus. Douglas’s Venus evidently shares little in common with her Chaucerian counterpart. But, that is not to say that she is completely divested of all medieval frameworks. The following section assesses Venus in connection with several medieval Scottish texts. Through these texts it is possible to locate several important literary allusions which underpin the depiction of Venus and her court and, by extension, elucidate the narrative grotesque as it functions through her character. Upon hearing the dreamer’s defamatory exclamation Venus halts her procession: Tho saw I Venus on hir lyp did byte, And all the court in hast thair horsys renyeit, Proclamand loude, ‘Quhare is yone poid that plenyeit Quhilk deth diservis committand sik dispite?’ (639–42) [Then I saw Venus bite her lip, and all the court hastily reined in their horses, proclaiming loudly, ‘Where is the toad that deserves death [for] committing such [an] offence?]

Venus, biting her lip in anger and threatening death for the insult, in some sense fulfils the expectation of her ‘court so variabill’ (484) (court so mutable) by demanding such a harsh sentence for the dreamer’s lay. Yet, as we shall see, it also imbues her character with a marked multidimensionality. Venus’s angry outburst invokes her subjects to action. The courtly figures devolve into an animalistic mob reminiscent of the avian mobbing in Holland’s Howlat and of the mobbing pigs in the anonymously composed The Tale of Colkelbie Sow, Pars Prima (c. 1450–1500).15 The apparently refined court of the goddess descends into brutish violence with alacrity: ‘Than all the court on me thayr hedis schuke, / Sum glowmand grym, sum grinand with vissage sowr, / Sum in the nek gave me feil dyntis dowr’ (648–50) (Then all the court shook their heads at me, some scowling fiercely, some snarling with hostile faces, some gave me many heavy blows to the neck). Comic discordance is evoked when the harmonic beauty of Venus’s retinue, which is expounded across nearly 200 lines of

112

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

text (415–606), becomes little more than a film that conceals their more bestial inclinations. Amplifying the destabilised image of Venus’s court, the dreamer is repeatedly depicted as a lowly, bestial creature, so the attack by her retainers is apposite – they literally meet the dreamer on his level. In the context of the mobbing in Howlat, Parkinson observes: But while Holland’s fools were clearly putting on a show for their bird-audience in buffetting the Rook, Douglas’ malicious goblins do it primarily to punish their victim. One may laugh but the narrator insists on his own fear and humiliation. Granted this difference between these two mobbings, there is a similarity worth mentioning: like the Rook, Douglas’ dreamer gets mobbed for reciting a kind of poetry which in the immediate courtly context is deemed indecorous.16

This comparison is certainly accurate, although it might be pushed further. Within the tumultuous diegesis, the narrative grotesque, as centred on Venus, crystallises the web of allusion and affective antinomy advanced in this scene and connects it to other features of the grotesque at work in the poem. The allusion to animal mobs is thus integral as it invests this destructive disillusionment with a humorous edge. The narrative grotesque in Palyce continuously destabilises the diegesis by disjointing perception, reality, and fantasy. Rather than breaking down completely, the text is able to hold together multiple conflicting realities at once. In contrast to this savage mobbing, Dunbar’s The Goldyn Targe (terminus ad quem 1508) presents the attacking allegories as far more courtly than Venus’s retainers in Palyce. In The Goldyn Targe Dunbar’s dreamer cowers in a bush watching the gathering of deities, including Venus, May, Nature, Flora, Fortune, Minerva, and Diana (Clio takes precedence among the Muses in favour of Calliope). When ‘all throu a luke’ (135) the dreamer is caught by Venus, her entourage attacks him with far more ceremony than the scuffle to which Douglas’s dreamer is subjected: And schortly for to speke, be lufis quene I was aspyit. Scho bad hir archearis kene Go me arrest, and thay no tyme delayit. Than ladyes fair lete fall thair mantillis gren,



Heavenly harmonies 113

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

With bowis big in tressit hairis schene All sudaynly thay had a felde arayit. And yit rycht gretly was I noucht affrayit, The party was so plesand for to sene. A wonder lusty bikkir me assayit. (136–44) [And shortly to say, I was seen by love’s queen. She bid her fierce archers to arrest me and they delayed not. Then [the] fair ladies let their green cloaks fall, with large bows [and with] shining, braided hair, suddenly, they had arrayed the field. And yet, I was not terribly afraid [because] the company was so pleasant to see. A wonderfully lovely missile attack assailed me.]

Dunbar’s poem constructs a strikingly comparable scenario, but the depiction of Venus’s assault elevates the action far above the grappling dints sustained by Douglas’s dreamer. This difference is essential, since it further highlights the grotesque character of Douglas’s narrative. Compounding the grotesque nature of the dreamer’s encounter with Venus is his unexpected reaction to the civilising landscape. When he is brought before the enthroned Venus the ground seems to be ‘ovirspred with carpetis fare, / Quhilk wes tofore brint, barrant, vile, and bare’ (660–1). Yet, the narrator asserts that the transformation of his surroundings ‘Micht not amese my grewous pane full sare’ (663) (might not assuage my grievous pain most sore). This further serves to impress the dreamer’s horror and misery: in spite of any fantastical or humorous contexts influencing the rendering of the dream into verse, the dreamer’s affective experience is decidedly relegated to horror. The narrator’s recollection and interpretation of his dream intentionally evokes both of these affective states in order to punctuate crucial turning points in the vision. Impressing the comic aspect of the grotesque aesthetic marking the scene is the dreamer’s ill-advised legal defence, which questions the legitimacy of Venus’s court and her position as judge (691–702). As Parkinson notes, ‘bemoaning his fate from his lonely rotten tree stump, the dreamer seems distinctly owlish. It is as a particularly owlish cleric that he later cries out against the inconstancy of earthly love and questions Venus’ authority over him.’17 Predictably, this

114

The Palyce of Honour

does not go well for him and his i­ mpertinence lowers the tone of the proceedings. Venus condescendingly responds to his accusations,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Thow subtyle smy, God wait! Quhat wenys thou? Till degraid myne hie estate? Me till declyne as juge, curst creature, It beis not so […] (705–8) [Thou tricky rascal, God knows! What dost thou intend? To debase my high estate? To reject me as judge, cursed creature, it shall not be so.]

Venus’s apparently candid speech invests her character with vivid personal attributes not often observed in other interpretations of Venus; indeed, her reaction is surprising insofar as she is at all concerned by the opinions of the pitifully bestial dreamer. Levelling the playing field in this way adds comic texture to the scene – the line between stupidity and bravery is worryingly obscured when the dreamer provokingly confronts Venus, but Venus gamely plays counterpoint with her irate and scandalised response. Despite the poetic transformation initiated by the exchange, Venus’s ruling paralyses the dreamer with abject fear for the integrity of his body. His terror is so intense that he cannot say his Creed ‘for feir and wo, within my skyn I wryith. / I mycht not pray, forsuyth, thocht I had neid’ (734–5) (for fear and woe I squirmed in my skin. I could not pray, forsooth, though I had need [to]). But, in an unexpected turn, the dreamer perceives God: Lo thus amyd this hard perplexité, Awaytand ever quhat moment I suld de Or than sum new transfiguration, He quhilk that is eternall verité, The glorious Lord ryngand in personis thre, Providit has for my salvation Be sum gude spretis revelation, Quhilk intercessioun maid, I traist, for me; I foryet all imagination. (772–80) [Lo, thus amid these troubled circumstances, awaiting at any moment to die or [to turn] into some new transfiguration, He who is eternal truth, the glorious Lord reigning in trinity, [had] provided for my



Heavenly harmonies 115

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

s­alvation by some good soul’s revelation, that made intercession, I trust, for me; I forgot all my fanciful notion[s].]

The dreamer is unable to pray or control his body in any way; his mind races with memories of variously transformed individuals. Unexpectedly, the perception of God’s grace blooms within his roiling mind. This revelation takes place in the midst of the trial and at the juncture between the first and second parts of the poem. The soothing presence of God finally grants the dreamer the solace, however momentary, that he has been desperately searching for throughout the poem. The scene mirrors neatly the dreamer’s initial fall into the dream vision between the prologue and the first part. At the point of swooning the narratorial voice cuts in: ‘I shall descryve, as God wil geve me grace, / Myn avision in rurell terms rude’ (125–6) (I shall describe, [should] God give me grace, my vision in rough rustic words). The narrator then opens the dream vision by warning the audience about his shameful behaviour and ‘bad nystee’ (129) (deplorable silliness). That passage alerts the audience to the dreamer’s silly behaviour, but it also telegraphs the critical transformation subsequently undergone by the narrator. The explicit entreaty to God immediately places the narrator at a temporal remove from the dreamer, who is busy cursing May, Nature, and Venus. Setting this swooning realisation at the next structural division of the poem showcases the crucial ‘lesson’ of part one of the dream vision: as Greenfield paraphrases Ficino, ‘the true poet receives his art from God and must return to God by making him the object of his poetry’.18

Calliope’s intercession and the fusion of Christianity with classical allegory The dreamer’s affective state is buoyed immediately subsequent to this revelation. Following precedent, his shifting mood takes on sensory markers: he looks up to see a new procession emerging from the woods. His changing fortunes and status are signalled, furthermore, by the fact that Venus’s courtiers clarify the identity

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

116

The Palyce of Honour

of the new procession: it is the ‘court rethoricall’ (835) (court of rhetoric), which is led by ‘thair prynces, / Thespis, the mothyr of the Musis Nyne’ (851–2) (their princess, Thespis, the mother of the nine Muses). This contrasts strikingly with the dreamer’s original sources of information about Minerva’s court – Sinon and Ahithophel. The dreamer may be a prosecuted ‘member’ of Venus’s court, but he is now elevated enough to interact with her retinue. One fascinating feature of this fourth court is that the dreamer interacts with Calliope rather than Thespis, the identified matriarch. In the first three cavalcades the dreamer is primarily concerned with the figure central to each court: Minerva, Diana, and Venus, respectively. Here, Calliope emerges as the dreamer’s champion and after the trial she appoints an unnamed nymph to act as the dreamer’s personal guide. Calliope’s description includes several markers that establish her as the Muse most suited to resolve the dreamer’s problems: Caliopé, that lusty lady clere, Of quham the bewtye and the worthynes, The vertuys gret, schynis baith far and nere, For sche of nobillis fatis hes the stere Till wryt thair worschyp, victory, and prowes In kyngly style, quhilk dois thair fame encres. (872–7) [Calliope, that fine bright lady, of whom beauty and nobility, the great virtues, shine both far and near, for she has control of nobles’ fates, to write to their renown, victory, and prowess in kingly style, which increases their fame.]

Calliope’s physical description sets her up as a refraction of both Honour and Venus. She has a clear, bright appearance that illuminates her surroundings. This sets the Muse in conjunction with Honour and Venus, though at a lower point in the hierarchy. She is the most accessible source of divine wisdom the dreamer has yet encountered. This hierarchy, furthermore, tracks against the humanist argument that ‘the old gods were ministers of the true God but were imperfectly understood for lack of revelation, and that celestial bodies, too, reflected the will of God’, and that ‘the basis of myth is an intuition of the true God, originating in wonder at the forces of nature and giving birth to liturgy and poetry’.19

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 117

Venus’s courtiers declare that Calliope of nobillis fatis hes the stere by means of her immortalising words. This is pivotal. The dreamer enters the dreamscape in solipsistic pursuit of his poetic identity, but in the course of discovering his fate and identity he gains a more universal understanding of poetics. Calliope is the Muse of epic poetry – she immortalises historical figures and events with poetic eloquence – and she is exalted as the leader of the dreamer-narrator’s poetic idols. Her championing of the dreamer signals a crucial philosophic grounding in Palyce. The poet serves an essential function in the mundane world, specifically the court, by mediating history and elevating worthy figures. When Venus’s court establishes the Muse as possessing the power to define and perpetuate fate, the dreamer’s potential power as a poet is simultaneously asserted. The fact that the dreamer has the sense that God has directed Calliope towards him as an intercessor legitimises this duty/fate as divinely inspired and sanctioned within the Christian worldview. This divine sense of vocation is confirmed at the close of the dream vision. Upon reawakening in the garden, the dreamer composes a poem in laud of Honour. The dreamer’s transformation is reflected on two levels: firstly, his style of composition has been elevated from the original invectives directed against May, Fortune, and Venus. Secondly, the dreamer’s journey has led him to redirect his attention towards the true wellspring of poetry – God, as represented by the allegory of Honour. The dreamer-narrator supplicates himself to Honour’s guidance and inspiration in his three-stanza poem: O hie Honour, swete hevynly flour degest, Gem vertuus, maist precius, gudlyest For hie renoun, thow art guerdoun condyng, Of worschyp kend the glorius end and rest, But quham, in rycht, na worthy wicht may lest. Thy gret puissance may maist avance all thyng And poverale to myche avale sone bryng. I thee requere, sen thow, but pere, art best, That eftir this in thy hie blys we ryng. (2116–24) [O high Honour, sweet, dignified, heavenly flower, excellent gem, most precious, worthiest for high renown, you are the fitting reward,

118

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

of renown known to be the glorious goal, without which, indeed, no worthy person may last. Your great power most benefits all things and common people much good soon brings. I make request to you, since you, without peer, are best, that after this we continue in your high bliss.]

The persistent floral connection to May/Nature in the prologue has been redirected to praise Honour. Figuratively, this reflects the gaze of the poet which is no longer focused on worldly comforts and pleasures. The image does double work by engaging conventional images associated with Christ: he is called a heavenly flower (as quoted above), ‘hail rois’ (2134) (choicest rose), and ‘hail stone quhilk schone apon the trone of lycht’ (2135) (choicest gem that shone upon the throne of light). This final poem reveals fully the transformation undergone by the dreamer as he finds ‘comfort and reid’ (2130) (comfort and guidance) in Honour’s presence. The dreamer-narrator’s words are refracted in the Dedication, which Douglas directs to James IV. His praise of James establishes yet another network of power and divinity: Douglas’s language mimics that directed towards Honour in the final stanzas of the poem. Already he claimed to see Scottish kings in attendance to Honour, whereby proximity represents the divinely ordained rule of Scottish monarchs. By using similar language and a tone of gracious subservience, Douglas weaves James IV into Palyce’s tapestry of power, honour, and divinity. He addresses James: Thy majesty mot have eternally, Suppreme honour, renoun of chevalry, Felycité perdurand in this erd, With etern blys in the hevyn by fatal werd. Resave this rusty, rurall rebaldry Lakand cunnyng, fra thye puyr lege onlerd. (2146–51) [May your kingship have, eternally, supreme honour, renown of chivalry, happiness enduring in this world, with eternal bliss in heaven by destined decree. Receive this crude, rustic discourse, lacking wit, from your poor, unlearned subject.]

As the narrator praises Honour for lifting the poverale (the common people),20 so too does Douglas appeal to James IV to protect and support his crude, rustic discourse. The Christ-like associations

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 119

evident in the stanzas addressing Honour are echoed in the language Douglas uses to describe James and his relationship with the king. The cascading effect establishes a sort of synecdoche between James, Honour, and God, which, in turn, plays off the allegorical hierarchy of the dream with Calliope, Venus, and Honour as they variously illuminate the poet’s world. Looking back to the juncture between parts one and two of the poem, it is evident that the narrator already establishes the foundation for his eventual enlightenment. This turning point, ­ which leads the dreamer to accede to his vocation as poet, is punctuated by the terms in which Calliope intercedes for the dreamer. Venus addresses Calliope as ‘syster’ (943) and describes the court proceedings to Calliope and her retinue. Venus summarises: ‘Yone cative hes blasphemyt me of new / For tyl degraid and do my fame adew’ (946–7) (That wretch has blasphemed me just now to diminish and dismiss my fame). So, the dreamer already engages with the sort of fate-impacting power attributed to Calliope, but, as Venus asserts, his efforts are being misused by attacking her and calling her integrity and authority into question. One of Venus’s arguments against the dreamer is that he is aligned with clerical writers, who, she argues, show a propensity for blasphemy. The dreamer’s defence, which questions the court’s validity with Venus presiding as judge, is surprisingly undercut by his joy and relief at his new, feminine, advocate: Than Lord quhow glad becam my febil gost! My curage grew, the quhilk afore wes lost, Seand I had so gret ane advocate That expertly, but prayer, pryce, or cost, Opteynit had my frewel accion all most Quhilk wes afore perist and desolate. (970–5) [Then Lord how glad my feeble spirit became! My spirits revived, that which was lost before, seeing [that] I had such a great advocate that expertly, without prayer, fee, or bribe, had won my frivolous lawsuit, which was demolished and abandoned before.]

Although the dreamer maintains that the lawsuit is frivolous, he lauds his new representation. He seems not to notice that in her defence Calliope refers to him as a ‘fule’ (960). Her argument is,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

120

The Palyce of Honour

in essence, that the dreamer is so insignificant that Venus need not concern herself with his slander and that she should show such a sorry creature benevolence and mercy. This dismissive attitude is confirmed when Venus’s court vanishes and the grovelling dreamer attempts to shower Calliope with praise to which she responds: ‘“Silence,” said scho, “I have eneuch heirfore. / I will thow passe and vissy wondris more”’ (1068–9) (‘Silence’, she said, ‘I have had enough of this. I decree you to go and see more marvels’). As is always the case in Palyce, dissonant actions and reactions permeate the poem and cultivate the grotesque at important narrative turning points. The dreamer, while ostensibly elevated, is still expected to be ‘seen and not heard’; his nascent poetic status is unstable and he is too inexperienced to integrate fully into Calliope’s entourage. The affective dissonance between elation, relief, and terror is crystallised throughout this section, owing to the comedy invoked by the sharp and condescending comments made by the various allegorical interlocutors. The trial scene is an essential element of the self-reflexive character of the dream vision. It is the first time that the dreamer finds his voice and tests its capacity and its limits. The dreamer’s sensory experience may still be heavily influenced by unexpected fits, but the narrator’s temporal distance allows him space to order and thus interpret his experience. Creating extensive lists and prolix descriptions is just one method he employs to affect this structuring project. The intervention of the allegorical figures in crucial ways forcibly enacts order on the dreamer’s dizzy and confused mind. The trial itself is evidence of this, since the judicial setting is an important symbol of order and authority. Venus’s strict reprimand and Calliope’s intervention jolt the dreamer out of this paralysis; they bring into focus the insecurities and potentialities of the poet and eventually provide the dreamer the means to gain both direction and purpose. By incorporating self-reflexive analysis and descriptions of the dreamer’s wildly fluctuating feelings with the surprising individuation of the interceding allegories, the narrator magnifies and punctuates crucial moments of juncture and development.



Heavenly harmonies 121

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

The dreamer’s journey, Venus’s court, and the Palace of Honour After joining Calliope’s retinue the dreamer travels with her court across the dream world. Rather than relating any specific experiences of the journey, the narrator catalogues the destinations in an extensive compendium of geographical landmarks. Active narration of the dreamer’s experience resumes when the company takes a break for refreshment at a ‘cristall strand swete and degest’ (1135) (crystalline stream sweet and calm). The narrator recalls, ‘amang the layf, ful fast I did persew / Tyll drynk, bot sa the gret pres me opprest / That of the watir I micht never tast a drew’ (1141–3) (among the others, I quickly hastened to drink, but the great crowd overcame me so that I never tasted a drop of that water). Unable to drink himself, the dreamer instead watches the party. The narrator observes, Quhat creatour amid his hart imprentis The fresche bewty, the gudly representis, The mery spech, fare havinges, hie renounn – Of thaym wald set a wyse man halfe in swoun. (1156–9) [Whatever being on his heart imprints the fresh beauty, the distinguished appearances, the merry speech, fair manners, high renown – of these things [it] would cause a wise man half to swoon.]

In his recognition of the overwhelming sublimity of the scene, the narrator projects a more balanced and sedate tone than in previous interjections. The rhetoric used by the narrator also responds to the earlier experiences of the dreamer: in his complaint against Venus, the dreamer commanded his enslaved heart to break in two and pour out its misery into poetry. The inverse is indicated here – the dreamer’s heart is depicted as absorbing the perfect joy, merry speech, and renown of the party. The narrator recognises that even a wise man would struggle to describe the scene before concluding, ‘I wyll na mare thairon my forhed ryve, / But breifly furth my febill proces dryve’ (1165–6) (I will no longer rack my brains [about it], but briefly direct my feeble course forward). The narrator’s more selfconscious doubts have been to some extent resolved as he ­marshals his poetic powers to continue forward with his composition.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

122

The Palyce of Honour

When the party eventually enters the royal grounds the narrator claims to have ‘knelyt law and onheldit my heid’ (1175) (kneeled low and uncovered my head). This starkly contrasts the dreamer’s earlier entrance to Venus’s presence: ‘All in ane fevyr out of my muskan bowr / On knees I crap and law for feare did lowr’ (646–7) (All in a fever out of my decayed bower I crept on knees and cowered low from fear). In effect, the dreamer’s psychological transformation has equipped him with the skills and self-possession to integrate himself into Calliope’s company; he is now able to behave with some modicum of composure and dignity in a courtly, otherworldly milieu. At Calliope’s behest, Ovid takes centre stage at the feast. Douglas multiplies the already numerous allusions and references by assigning Ovid a speech on the topic of transfiguration, among other esoteric subjects. Ovid describes Hercules slaying ‘lyonys, monstreis, and mony fell serpent’ (1193) (lions, monsters, and  many fierce serpents) and then recounts a number of transformation stories.21 He goes on to describe Achilles’s feats before the  dreamer-narrator summarises the remaining portion of the speech: He schew full mony transmutationis And wondirfull new figurationis Be hondris mo than I have here expremyt. He tald of lovys meditacionis, The craft of love and the salvationis, Quhow that the furie lustis suld be flemyt. Of divers other materis als he demyt, And, be his prudent scharpe relationys, He wes expart in all thyng, as it semyt. (1216–24) [He presented very many metamorphoses and wonderful new forms by hundreds more than I have here identified. He expounded on discourses of love, the art of love and the remedies, how that the frenzy [of] lusts should be expelled. Of diverse other subjects he gave his opinion, and in his politic and sagacious discourses he was [an] expert in all thing[s], as it appeared.]

The dreamer’s lengthy exposition of Ovid’s talking points is essential to the humanist complexion of the dream vision. Parkinson’s

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 123

notes to these lines point out that ‘Raffaelo Regio establishes a key humanist perspective on Ovid as the conveyor of the breadth of curricular learning and on Metamorphoses as “the basis for geography, astrology, music, rhetoric, and philosophy, both moral and natural”’.22 Ovid’s poetic control over the stories of transformation provides a compelling alternative to the dreamer’s persistent and incapacitating fear of transformation and annihilation. His example is worthy of emulation and the dreamer’s careful attention to his recitation bears witness to this fact. Virgil and a host of other classical authors follow Ovid, each contributing to the dignified, learned, and courtly atmosphere. The narrator, while still selfconscious, attempts to reproduce the experience and in this process of invention and elocution begins to fulfil his calling as a poet and to connect the worldly to the divine. Following his description of the feast, the narrator uses a grotesque image to convey the challenging furor of poetic creation: the narrator laments that even if he was covered in tongues he would be unable to describe the scene before him. His exclamation intensifies the temporal gap between dreamer and narrator by using a grossly physical metaphor to express the narrator’s desperate attempt to translate divine insight and vision into poetic language. It also arrives at a crucial juncture – it directly precedes the narrator’s reflective commentary about God as a wellspring of poetics. Although the narrator still works within the typical modesty topos, he adopts, for the first time, a self-encouraging tone: Furth till proceid this proces I pretend, Traistand in God my purpose till escheve. Quhowbeit I may not every circumstance Reduce perfytly in rememorance, Myn ignorance yit sum part sal devyse Twychand this sycht of hevynly, swete plesance. (1277–82) [I propose to continue this discourse, trusting in God to achieve my purpose. Even though I may not capture every circumstance perfectly in memory, my ignorance shall yet some part describe regarding this sight of heavenly, sweet pleasure.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

124

The Palyce of Honour

The narrative, its structure, and various motifs are mirrored and refracted across the poem. At the point where the dreamer swoons and falls into the dream vision the narrator begs God to give him grace and guide his poetic retelling of his dream (125–6). And during the transition between parts one and two of the poem, in the midst of his trial, the dreamer first perceives God’s presence (772–80). That transformative moment seems to bewilder the ­ dreamer as he is confronted by an inexplicable feeling of safety and protection despite being unable to pray, owing to his paralysing terror of physical transformation. At this juncture the narratorial voice once again surfaces, but this time he defends his craft, expounds his purpose at length, and attributes his gift to God. The narrator’s opening remarks at lines 127–35 apologise for his rude style and beg patience from the audience – he commands his consciousness, ‘schaw furth thy cure and wryte thir frenesyis / Quhilkis of thy sempyll cunnyng nakyt thee’ (134–5) (manifest thy [spiritual] charge and write these frenzies / which exposed thy humble skill). This early statement immediately recalls the humanist adoption of the classical concept of poetic furor as the narrator claims the requisite furor and invention but not the skill of elocution or expressive technique. There is a marked development in the narrator’s style and confidence in this third transitional moment: Now empty pen, wryt furth thy lusty chance, Schaw wondris fele, suppose thow be not wyse Be dilligent and rypely thee avyse, Be qwyke and scharpe, voydit of variance, Be swete, and cause not jentill hartis gryse. (1283–7) [Now empty pen, write onward thy fine opportunity, reveal many marvels though thou be unwise, be diligent and maturely bethink thyself, be lively and witty, purged of inconsistency, be sweet and cause gentle hearts not to shudder.]

While certainly self-deprecating and falsely modest, the narrator does not so harshly or comically condemn himself – originally he accused himself of ‘exhaust inanytee’ (133) (empty inanity) and ‘harlottree’ (132) (ribaldry), and referred to his vocabulary as ‘beggit’ (131) (scrounged). His tone is now elevated and he excuses his skill deficit to some extent by asserting that no one could accurately

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 125

convey the magic of Calliope’s company, even if their body was covered in tongues. Perhaps the most striking conclusion that can be drawn from this comparison is that the dreamer is not the only entity undergoing transformation: the narrator, too, has developed in the course of recording his dream. This double transformation takes place in two temporal and spatial contexts. The poem, then, follows the transformation of the dreamer to the narrator and the narrator to the poet. The defining factor for the narrator’s transformation is the extent to which he accepts and follows God’s guidance. Humanist poetic theory asserts that the poet is a teacher and that poetry should be both useful and delightful (mimicking the Horatian concept of utile et dulce23). Greenfield summarises this idea with the observation that ‘when humanists say that poetry is theology, they do not mean scholastic theology, but the kind of intuitive knowledge about nature and the universe of the Aristotelian poet-theologians’.24 Boccaccio integrates this view of poetry’s raison d’être with the humanist interest in classical writing. Greenfield describes one of Boccaccio’s key defences of poetry: ‘the association of the gods of mythological poetry with angels, demons, and planetary influences puts myth in a Christian light, for the basis of myth is an intuition of the true God, originating in wonder at the forces of nature and giving birth to liturgy and poetry’.25 Palyce strikingly integrates medieval motifs with this humanist impulse by creating a constantly transforming worldview. The dream vision setting and the figures that the dreamer encounters appear in any number of other medieval texts. What is unusual is that the dreamer comes to the explicit realisation that May/Nature, Venus, Minerva, and the other classical figures are not merely decorative narrative devices nor are they sources of poetic inspiration. Rather, they are conduits for poetic composition. In the close of the second part the narrator reiterates that God is the ultimate wellspring of poetic inspiration. Part three opens with the narrator beginning to reorient his narrative and the reconstruction of his vision by turning to the Muses for guidance in the technical aspects of expression: Ye Musis nyne, be in myne adjutory, That maid me se this blys and perfyte glory.

126

The Palyce of Honour

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Teche me your facund castis eloquent. Len me a recent, scharp, fresch memory And caus me dewly til indyt this story. Sum gratius swetnes in my brest imprent Till make the heraris bousum and attent, Redand my wryt illumynyt with your lore; (1288–95) [You nine Muses, come to my aid, that made me perceive this bliss and perfect glory. Teach me your ample, eloquent techniques. Lend me an undiminished, keen, vivid memory and cause me to compose this story appropriately. Some grace-endowed delightfulness in my heart embed to make listeners compliant and attentive, reading my words enlightened by your teaching.]

The narrator now invests the Muses with a very specific remit within poetic practice. Just as the various hierarchies in Palyce create networks that revolve around God, this correlation between God as poetic source and the Muses as instructors of technique productively integrates classical mythology into a Christian worldview. The physicality of the narrative is repeatedly expressed in the dreamer’s variously pulsing, pounding, and poisoned heart. The narrator links into this motif in his request that the Muses embed gratius swetnes in his heart and, thus, writing. This image recalls the dreamer’s initial declaration that he was predestined to misery with ‘every greif amyd myn hart ingrave’ (619) (every grief engraved on my heart) in his angry lay sung to Venus as well as his heart’s absorption of delight and joy during the feast. One might wonder whether the dreamer’s metaphorically heart-rending lay might have purified his heart and readied it to receive this gratius swetnes in the same way that he absorbs the angelic joy of Calliope’s court at the cristall strand. The narrator proposes to extend this gift of grace by asserting that his poem will act as a conduit for this sensation to transfer to his listeners. Douglas thereby sets out explicitly the conjunction of instruction and delight inherent to poetry. Finally, he presents the poet (and poetry) as the mediator between his audience and God. Ovid observed in himself a sort of obsessive madness with ‘the learned sisters, the deities fatal to their own votary’.26 The dreamer inhabits this madness and experiences a similarly conflicted fixation throughout his journey. Eventually he realises the true utility of the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 127

Muses as guides to conveying history and truth in the most eloquent and appealing way possible. In Palyce the narrative grotesque takes on many guises: in deeply physical embodiments as the narrator describes a body covered in tongues or a mouth full of tongues and as the dreamer constantly fears his bodily boundaries will be breached, overspilled, or transfigured. It also occurs in the cascading affective and temporal antinomies that meld together opposed states of mind and being. This framework centres the many bizarre conjunctions found in the poem in order to unravel the profusion of subjectivities, temporalities, and commentaries, which often occur en masse in an explosion of interpretative possibility. This dream vision, in its riot of potentialities, encapsulates Connelly’s assertion that ‘the grotesque opens up a liminal space, full of ambiguity and contradiction, that requires us to “overleap the gaps” in order to make meaning.’27

Notes  1 Ovid, Tristia, p. 57.  2 Leonardo Bruni (1370–1444) exemplifies this impulse in his translation of Plato. Celenza describes Bruni’s attitude, ‘if you want to teach morals (and even philosophical truths) to readers, you need to do it in a way that is appealing, that induces people not only to learn the intellectual architecture of those truths but also believe them internally. The only way to accomplish this aim? Through eloquence.’ C. S. Celenza, The  Intellectual World of the Italian Renaissance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), p. 78. See especially his chapter, ‘Florentine Humanism, Translation, and a New (Old) Philosophy’.  3 T. Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids: Sexuality, Hermeneutics, and English Poetry (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996), p. 109.  4 References from Giovanni Boccaccio, Genealogy of the Pagan Gods, Volume I. Books I–V, ed. and trans. Jon Solomon (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), p. 385.  5 Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to line 359.  6 Douglas, Eneados, Douglas’s marginal note at the chapter heading for Book I, Chapter VI.   7 See Catullus, Tibullus, Catullus. Tibullus. Pervigilium Veneris, trans. F. W. Cornish, J. P. Postgate, J. W. Mackail, rev. G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 6 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1913).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

128

The Palyce of Honour

 8 Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, p. 108.  9 Catullus, Tibullus, Pervigilium Veneris, p. 359. 10 Boccaccio, Genealogy, p. 389. 11 This passage has a distinctly Ovidian feel; Ovid perceives Janus to have a similarly stupefying effect on the poet in Fasti: ‘While thus I mused […] methought the house grew brighter than it was before. Then of a sudden sacred Janus, in his two-labelled shape, offered his double visage to my wondering eyes. A terror seized me, I felt my hair stiffen with fear, and with a sudden chill my bosom froze.’ Ovid, Fasti, trans. James G. Frazer, rev. G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 253 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1931), p. 9. 12 Ficino, Three Books on Life, I.XXVI [509] p. 163. (Square brackets original). 13 See Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, pp. 100–35. 14 Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, esp. pp. 113–17. 15 See C. Flynn, ‘Mobbing (Dis)order and the Literary Pig in The Tale of Colkelbie Sow, Pars Prima’, Studies in Scottish Literature 41.1 (2016), 47–61; D. J. Parkinson, ‘Mobbing Scenes in Middle Scots Verse: Holland, Douglas, Dunbar’, The Journal of English and Germanic Philology 85.4 (1986), 494–509. 16 Parkinson, ‘Mobbing Scenes’, p. 504. 17 Parkinson, ‘Mobbing Scenes’, p. 502. 18 Greenfield, Humanist and Scholastic, p. 234. 19 Greenfield, Humanist and Scholastic, p. 112. 20 See Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to line 2122. 21 Pico also alludes to Hercules grappling with beasts in his Oration: ‘Manifold indeed, O fathers, is the discord in us; we have grave internal, more than civil, wars in our home. […] If our man [body/exterior self] would just seek a truce from his enemies, moral philosophy will beat down the unbridled stampede of the manifold beast and the aggression, ire, and arrogance of the lion. Then, if we yearn rightmindedly for the safety of perpetual peace for ourselves, it will come and liberally satisfy our desires; indeed, both beasts having been sacrificed like a stuck sow, it will ratify an everlasting pact of the most holy peace between the flesh and the spirit.’ Borghesi, Papio and Riva (trans. and eds), Oration, p.  151. Landino uses the motif too: ‘Nor can anyone move weighed down with so many various vices which are obstacles to living virtuously … either the lion – the corruption of pleasure – of the wolf – cupidity – or the desires of honors and states and signories, no such vice is able to be overcome’ (McNair, Cristoforo Landino, p. 169).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Heavenly harmonies 129

22 Parkinson (ed.), Palyce, note to line 1224. He quotes P. E. Knox, ‘Commenting on Ovid’, in P. E. Knox (ed.), A Companion to Ovid (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013), pp. 327–40. 23 See Gullace, ‘Boccaccio’s Defense’, p. 237. 24 Greenfield, Humanist and Scholastic, p. 44. 25 Greenfield, Humanist and Scholastic, p. 112. See also Gullace, ‘Boccaccio’s Defense’, p. 232. 26 Ovid, Tristia, p. 57. 27 Connelly, Image at Play, p. 12.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Part II

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo, William Dunbar

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

4

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Making demandes: frame, form, and narratorial persona

From the proliferation of temporal and affective potentialities in Douglas’s dream vision poem, discussion here shifts to William Dunbar’s The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo (c. 1507). Whereas Douglas’s text is deeply solipsistic and achieves its narrative grotesque within the psyche(s) of a single persona, Dunbar’s work creates antinomy – and ultimately the narrative grotesque – via its complex interplay of speakers and poetic form. These multiple ‘voices’ offer to the audience a similar profusion of subjectivities, temporalities, and commentaries, which challenge conventional modes of affective expression and poetic making. The framework of the narrative grotesque thus elucidates the text’s interrogation of poetics wherein a variety of forms, such as the demande d’amour, the love complaint, and even the sermon, are stitched together in order to create a poetic chimera that dislocates, distorts, and ruptures traditional narratological boundaries and modes of poetic expression. Visually graphic descriptions of sex, love, and marriage amplify the narrative grotesque by adding visceral sensory components to these commentaries. Amid this fractious narrative Dunbar opens up a space to think more critically about the means by which poetics construct and convey meaning. The narrative is set in the context of a conversation among three noblewomen over questions of love and marriage. Although the narrative is focused on the demande d’amour posed by the widow, the Tretis is comprised of a pair of demandes d’amour. The first is set by the eponymous widow and asks whether the women are happy in their marriages or whether they would choose different, better lovers, given the chance. The first wife seems to

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

134

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

launch into a typical response to the demande, thus maintaining the a­ssumption of courtliness, but quickly veers into invective; the second wife enhances the dialogic and cross-referential nature of the conversation by engaging in a similar invective against her husband. But she diverges from the first wife by shifting to complaint midway through her response; lastly, the widow delivers a sermon that skilfully laces the entire narrative together and expands the various themes and motifs introduced in the preceding contributions. The second demande is posed by the narrator in the last two lines of the text. He asks the audience, ‘Of thir thre wanton wiffis that I haif writtin heir, / Quhilk wald ȝe waill to ȝour wif, gif ȝe suld wed one?’ (529–30) (Of these three unruly wives [about which] I have written here, which would you wish to be your wife, if you should wed one?) This comment shifts the orientation of the narrator’s frequent discursive interruptions. Up to this point he remained in the role of observer; now, however, he directs himself to the audience and challenges them to interact with the narrative in a wholly new way. Throughout the text, the narrator’s interjections frame and editorialise the women’s responses, and his final demande insists on a moral judgement of the preceding text, an exercise which demands that the audience revise their engagement with the poem and startlingly undermines the private, passionate responses of the women. The discomfort elicited by the final demande is made possible by the structure and content of the preceding narrative(s): each speech manifests cracks in the audience’s expectations and perceptions until the narrator’s final ‘playful’ comment essentially implodes the narrative on itself. This process begins when the narrator describes the locus amoenus and the nobility of the women. These features suggest that the narrative will adhere to a courtly ethos, but this expectation is destroyed when the women begin to speak. In previous scholarship the uneasiness resulting from the narrative’s profound transgressions has been attributed to the salacious tales recounted by the women.1 In fact, I argue that the carefully constructed narrative uses a compounding sense of distortion not solely linked to bawdy or transgressive language to reassess and rework late medieval poetic forms. Morality as reflected

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 135

by ‘adept speech’ (to use Hasler’s term) is shown to be a relative commodity; veracity and authenticity, here intrinsically linked with morality, are presented in the Tretis as elastic aesthetic constructs that may be manipulated with impunity by the poet. On a formal level, the narrative uses a sort of multiple exposure to reveal the frauds that courtly poetic conventions engender and encourage; the women themselves seem to be neither pastiche nor parody but, rather, three-dimensional figures that hover between fantasy and reality. The narrator’s role and the poem’s formal structure will be the subject of this chapter where the narrative grotesque is employed as a strategy for identifying the multiple ruptures and fusions of form and function underpinning the diegesis. Establishing the ways in which the narrative frame disrupts conventional expectations creates an essential foundation for the subsequent chapters, which examine the women’s speeches in turn.

Genre trouble in the Tretis Margaret Felberg-Levitt identifies two types of demande in the French tradition: verse and prose. The verse demande is linguistically simple, impersonal, and is meant to neutralise sexual tensions while reasserting courtly norms. The prose demande, on the other hand, depends on linguistic skill and mental acuity, creates sexual tension, is personal in nature, and is meant to be both didactic and ­entertaining.2 Before considering the ways in which the Tretis reimagines the conventions of the demande d’amour it is useful to consider briefly a more conventional appearance of the form in Older Scots literature. Sir Gilbert Hay’s mid-fifteenth-century romance The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour (hereafter BKA) contains an exemplary instance of the verse demande. Firstly,  BKA establishes the terms of the courtly debate: the gallant ‘ȝoung Betis’ is chosen as the ‘King of Lufe’ from a mixed group of courtly participants. Upon his election, he ‘maid ane aith þat he sould, but reprufe, / Off all demandis gif richtwis iugment / Belangand lufe, treuly by his entent’ (7958–60) (made an oath that he should, without censure, give virtuous judgment of all demandes pertaining to love, faithfully by his opinion [on the matter]).3

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

136

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

According to Oruch, the figure of the judge is often a classical god (such as Venus or Jove), an allegory (Love), or a noble person.4 Betis’s election as King of Lufe fulfils this ­requirement, since, in addition to his noble pedigree, he has proven himself to be a brave warrior and close companion to Sir Cassamus of Effeȝoun, a key figure advancing the courtly ethos of the narrative. As the King of Lufe, Betis announces that he will pose three questions unique to each person in the group (8003–7) and in return ‘thai till ansure [in] þare best maner, / The lawte for to say, vnfenȝeitly’ (8008–9) (they [are] to answer [in] their best manner, [in] good faith that is to say, without dissembling).5 As the demandes develop, the questions are tailored based on the interjections and reactions of the participants as they listen to each demande and response cycle. One of the demandes the King of Lufe poses to Dame Ydory reflects the question asked by the widow (41–8): Quhe[r] ȝe haue chosin ane to ȝoure lufe-drowry, On quhome ȝoure hart is sett alhalely, To bruke and iois vnto ȝoure lettir age, To lufe in lamenry or in mariage. (8070–3)6 [To whom have you chosen to [give] your gift of love, on whom is your heart set completely, to possess and enjoy the rest of your life, to love in secret [i.e. in concubinage or illicitly] or in marriage.]

She responds: As to the first, I ansure ȝow treulie That I haue chosin, bot I watt nocht gif I Be chosin agane, for my lufe is bot grene, And may sa fall þat lett sall cum betwne; Bot war it at my will, I say for me I sould him neuer change quhill I de – In quhat kynd that euer likis him best me haue, I sall him lelely lufe oure all þe laif. (8084–91)7 [As to the first, I answer you truly that I have chosen, but I don’t know if I would choose [him] again since the love is still green [i.e. new], and it may pass that something shall impede it; but if it were my will, I say for myself, that I would never change my lover until I die – in whatever way he prefers to have me [i.e. in lamenry or mariage], I shall faithfully love him all my life.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 137

This exchange fulfils the typical requirements of verse demandes in its simple and focused response to the set question. Dame Ydory does not deviate from the theme and seeks to answer diplomatically and in a manner which maintains courtly etiquette and decorum; her language is relatively unadorned. The majority of BKA’s demandes and responses mirror this tone, format, and length. There are some exceptions, such as a catalogue of the desirable qualities of a lover (8281–322) and the interpolation of The Thewis off Gudwomen (terminus a quo c. 1450, hereafter Thewis) beginning at line 8475. The inclusion of the Thewis in BKA is provocative, since it is a tonally complex commentary on the qualities appropriate to women and is actually an independent poem that is grafted into BKA in the midst of the demande passage (the Thewis is discussed in more detail later).8 Another relevant feature of the standard demande–response pattern is the stipulation that responses are relatively impersonal in their verse iterations. Indeed, despite the participants confessing various levels of experience or knowledge in BKA, the responses are normally vague on details and anecdotal evidence, as illustrated in Ydory’s response above. As will become evident in the Tretis, though the women are unnamed, thus to some extent obscured and blurred as individuals, their stories are nothing if not personal and exuberant. Dunbar’s demande is composed in the alliterative long line – a tellingly elastic form with which to approach the demande. Ian Simpson Ross considers the verse form from an exclusively thematic perspective: ‘the ampler, more discursive form of the alliterative line chosen by Dunbar […] allows him to deal with topics such as the impatience of women with monogamy, the horrors of being bound to impotent men, and the fantasy of complete sexual freedom outside of marriage’.9 Further, Ross observes that it is unsurprising that Dunbar is ‘reviving deliberately an archaic form to develop a theme that Chaucer his master in rhetoric had handled in the couplets of the Wife of Bath’s prologue’.10 Dunbar handles challenging and complex verse forms dextrously in his other works; the sheer diversity of his extant corpus of writing attests his interest in experimenting with form and subject, as well as his talent in this arena. It therefore seems unlikely that Dunbar’s choice of alliterative long line developed from a specific motivation to respond

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

138

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

to Chaucer or from a perceived sense of poetic inadequacy to his ‘master in rhetoric’. To qualify Ross’s comparison further: Dunbar is not only handling conventional themes of female sexuality as they relate to the Wife of Bath or Chaucerian poetry. The core narrative themes of the women’s stories may be power, agency, and marriage, but the complex pattern of stylistic, generic, and thematic rupture and fusion ultimately invests the narrative with deep ambivalence in order to experiment with the modes of expression available to medieval poets. Recontextualising the frame against the tradition of demandes d’amour allows for a reading not limited to Chaucerian precedent. This mix of form and context results in a deep disjunction between expectation and reality. From the most basic level of metrical construction to the wider thematic grounds of composition, Dunbar creates an illusory and unstable narrative grounded in an essential English verse form. In contrast to the verse conventions observed in BKA’s demandes, Dunbar’s use of the continuous, unrhymed alliterative long line achieves an almost prose-like sense. From his eighty-four extant poems this is the only example of alliterative long line and the only poem above 300 lines (it reaches 530 lines, while his nextlongest poem, another relative outlier, is 279 lines. Excepting the Tretis, his average poem is 61 lines). Typically, Dunbar prefers to use a wide variety of tightly constructed stanzaic verse forms, but ventures into tail rhyme in four poems, and four- and five-stress couplets in five instances. Despite the fact that this poem seems to be an outlier in his extant corpus, J. Derrick McClure’s assessment of the Tretis shows Dunbar’s mastery of the form through his highly unusual patterns of stress, alliteration, and pitch prominence coupled with his unerring use of the four-stress line.11 In cases where the lines might appear to exceed four stresses McClure demonstrates that Dunbar does not, in fact, transgress this pattern. Instead, he asserts that lines which, ‘in a metrical context, could be read as having five, six or even seven stresses […] in fact [fit] with little or no difficulty into the steady four-beat rhythm of the lines; the impression of increased weight or pace often […] contributing to the impression of elation, agitation, mockery or revulsion conveyed by the words of a speaker (including the narrator)’.12

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 139

This greater ability to impart feeling on behalf of a given speaker via distinct metrical techniques fits closely with the ends sought in the prose demande. The unrhymed alliterative long line, then, allows Dunbar to impart intense pathos to the narrative. In turn, this metrical flexibility and dynamism reinforces the reservations voiced above in reference to Ross’s analysis of the verse form. Conveyed through a trio of unlikely female speakers, this four-beat line, which McClure calls ‘the most radical in the history of the form’,13 epitomises the linguistic skill and mental acuity which Feldberg-Levitt attributes to the prose demande in French.14 This ‘radical’ reimagining of the heroic line – interlaced with both colloquial and courtly diction and put into the mouths of courtly women – embodies the kind of distortion and illusion inherent to the grotesque. Instead of depending on more typical combinations of stress, alliteration, and pitch prominence, Dunbar uses already rare combinations in surprising fashions. For instance, ‘a deceptive effect is occasionally gained by beginning a line with an alliterating and pitch-prominent syllable which turns out not to take a stress  […] Dunbar’s free use of […] [these] syllables, results  […] in numerous lines which could be read as having more than four stresses; though notably, scarcely one line of the poem could be read as an iambic pentameter’.15 In effect, Dunbar creates a verse form that is at once immediately and obviously identifiable (by rigorously maintaining the four-beat rhythm), and distorted in ways that imbue the text with both linguistic and emotional complexity. Dunbar’s revolutionary treatment of the verse form is not incidental, rather, it demonstrates the strong connection between subject matter and prosody in the poem. McClure’s description of Dunbar gaining a ‘deceptive effect’, in this respect, is telling: deception is a signal motif in the text that is used to counterpoint the search for veracity, sincerity, and authority. In this way the surprising, horrifying, and comical tone(s) of the female speakers’ candid revelations in the context of courtly pastime and the challenging prosodic techniques are not only complementary but interconnected aspects of the poem. On a linguistic level, the Tretis mixes stylistic and formal elements from a variety of Older Scots poetic traditions. Metrically, the poem is an impressive example of the alliterative long line, but

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

140

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Dunbar continually strays from its associated tonal register and lexicon in Older Scots. A. J. Aitken writes extensively on the linguistic principles governing Older Scots generic forms.16 For Aitken, so-called ‘Low Life Verse’ and ‘Alliterative Verse’ are distinct, even opposed forms at all levels. ‘Alliterative Verse’ is defined not only by structure, but also by lexicon. He observes that ‘items of heroic (narrative) diction […] are most often found in simple and alliterative narrative verse, and, less regularly, other verse of the more vernacular kinds’.17 Despite the occasional presence of heroic diction within this so-called ‘vernacular kind’ of verse, Aitken argues that it by no means extends to ‘Low-Life Verse’, which he says, ‘lies at an opposite pole from courtly verse. This is that varied class of burlesque, comic and vituperative poems.’18 Perhaps uniquely, then, Dunbar creates a mosaic of Scottish forms, registers, and lexicons: his 530-line alliterative poem impressively swerves between heroic and ‘crude’ low-life vernaculars as well as moral and courtly modes of expression. Not only does Dunbar mix these registers, but he also flips the expected themes and narratives associated with such language. As a result he questions the rigorous and artificial boundaries governing medieval poetics and frustrates modern attempts at a neat, formal categorisation. From the perspective of lexis, William Calin links Dunbar’s speakers with the registre popularisant (as opposed to the registre aristocratisant) identified by Pierre Bec in relation to the chanson de mal mariée.19 Indeed, the speech of the women is disconcertingly ‘popular’ and seems to be at odds with their noble bearing. Notably, Calin’s assertion that Dunbar engages the registre popularisant overlaps to some extent with Aitken’s description of Scottish ‘Low-Life Verse’. This tension between ‘aristocratic’ and ‘popular’ is illuminated by some of Aitken’s remarks regarding the mixed lexicon of Scottish courtly poetics. On one hand, ‘the unvernacular character of the courtly and other non-narrative serious verse results not only from the avoidance of lexical northernism, but also from the frequent employment of many comparatively recent word-­borrowings of Latin and French origin’.20 On the other hand, he notes that in ‘[descriptiones loci amoeni] the poets draw on a traditional, highly poetic and uncolloquial diction which is nevertheless very predominantly of native origin’.21 As Aitken’s observations attest, Scots

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 141

c­ onsistently employed an etymologically diverse vocabulary. In spite of this precedent, Dunbar pushes the elasticity of the boundaries separating specific registers and lexicons to such an extent that neither Calin’s nor Aitken’s systems of classification seem sufficient. Dunbar does not simply employ the conventional courtly vernacular of the locus amoenus, nor does he straightforwardly engage modes typical of ‘Low-Life Verse’. Rather, through the voices of the three women, he experiments with contrasting generic conventions and registers to convey nuanced emotional narratives that invest the speakers with complex psychological and intellectual lives. When the narrator begins to eavesdrop on the women’s conversation the audience is immediately introduced to the demande d’amour.22 This demande d’amour, asking whether the wives would choose better husbands, given the chance, loosely fits with the traditional form of the medieval demande convention, which asked ‘which lover, or which kind of love, a person should prefer’.23 Rather than simply imitating the convention, Dunbar’s use of the demande initiates the poem’s narrative grotesque. The widow opens the discussion with a well-defined and appropriately courtly question: ‘Bewrie,’ said the wedo, ‘ȝe woddit wemen ȝing, Quhat mirth ȝe fand in maryage sen ȝe war menis wyffis. Reveill gif ȝe rewit that rakles conditioun, Or gif that ever ȝe luffit leyd vpone lyf mair Nor thame that ȝe ȝour fayth hes festinit for euer, Or gif ȝe think, had ȝe chois, that ȝe wald cheis better. Think ȝe it nocht ane blist band that bindis so fast, That none vndo it a deill may bot the deith ane?’ (41–8) [‘Reveal’, said the widow, ‘you young wedded women, what joy you have found in marriage since you have been men’s wives. Disclose if you regret that reckless contract, or if you have ever loved [a] man more in life than the one that you are fastened to by your troth, or if you think, had you the choice, that you would choose better. Do you not think it a blessed bond that binds so fast, that nothing can undo it a bit but through the death [of] one?’]

Immediately, the first wife capitalises on the comic potential of the demande by responding: ‘It that ȝe call the blist band that

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

142

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

bindis so fast / Is bair of blis and bailfull, and greit barrat wirkis’ (50–1) (‘What you call the blessed bond that binds so fast is bare of bliss and miserable, and greatly distressing work’). Rejecting completely the institution of marriage, the wife undermines expectations for the genre with unforgiving immediacy. Strikingly for the genre, the widow insinuates her seniority in terms of age and experience – indicated, for instance, in her addressing the women as ȝing (young) – but does not appoint herself judge, which would effectively distance her from the other women by creating a formal hierarchy. The egalitarian nature of the demande is made clear when she assures the wives that she too will answer the question with candour. As such, this demande is already set apart because it does not develop an outrightly competitive tone, nor does it pursue the essential function of the form, which is to judge the participants’ answers. Judgements which, moreover, would normally carry clear moral implications. Instead, the widow presides over the game more or less ceremonially and her speech is the rhetorical climax of the narrative. Comic and sexual demandes are certainly not unprecedented and the first wife’s ejaculation sets the tone for the following responses. Michel-André Bossy demonstrates the potentially comic and lewd tones of demandes d’amour through an examination of the manuscript illumination accompanying the demandes in British Library MS Royal 16 F ii. This manuscript includes a selection of demandes d’amour that are headed by an elaborate illumination of a group of women admiring the partially untied codpiece of a young man. Despite this potentiality for sexual overtones, Derek Brewer indicates that more salacious demandes tend to be competitive and set before a judge – a role conspicuously unoccupied in the women’s discourse.24 Against the widow’s framing of the demande in these terms, the narrator introduces a wholly new demande that specifically addresses the male ‘auditoris’ (527) (listeners) in the final lines. As quoted above, he asks: ‘Of thir thre wanton wiffis that I haif writtin heir, / Quhilk wald ȝe waill to ȝour wif, gif ȝe suld wed one?’ This question is unusual since, conventionally, a mixed audience may have debated the responses within the narrative, but they would not have participated in a separate demande.25 In effect,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 143

this meta narrative form, presenting a demande within a demande, ­punctuates the chimeric nature of the composition and introduces a commentary on courtly pastime as well as a moral conclusion. Where the widow’s demande expressly requests a true accounting of the women’s experiences in love and marriage (a remit that is problematic in its own right), the secondary demande manipulates the candour and sincerity of the respondents to indict them for their obscene and ‘unladylike’ language and behaviour. By definition the demande is meant to judge the perspectives and arguments of participants, but this layering of demandes disrupts and problematises its essential purpose and form. More generally, the mood of the poem has some distinctly ‘Continental’ markers, which Calin attributes mainly to the work of Jean de Meun, but which he contests also indicate a more general French influence.26 His reading brings together a variety of French sources by which the varied generic and thematic influences in the poem come into focus. His argument is primarily focused on a comparison between the widow and Roman de la Rose’s La Vielle (hereafter Rose). He observes that Dunbar finds in Rose ‘a world of disguise, hypocrisy, deceit, and manipulation, of falsity, treachery, and delusion, one in which masters dominate slaves, and, again and again, reality proves to be illusion, and illusion reality.’27 Calin goes on to identify the instability in the Tretis – the shifting illusions, realities, and disillusionments – as a feature heavily influenced by Jean de Meun’s narrative world. It is worth noting that by the time Dunbar was writing the Tretis, Rose pervaded the Western literary imagination, especially in the contexts of loci amoeni, courtly poetry, and iconography. While Calin attributes Jean de Meun’s work as a primary stylistic source, the more nebulous influences create a shimmering and vaporous text which resists generic or typological analysis at every turn. Dunbar certainly connects with the literary tradition originating from Rose, but the Tretis’s world is also distinct. Calin’s study concludes: ‘one of Dunbar’s achievements in the Tretis is the undermining and the mockery of courtly conventions; this he does by a magnificent assault on the conventions and on the women who purportedly benefit from them.’28 This observation might be pushed further: on one level courtly conventions and the women are

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

144

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

indeed mocked, but so is the audience. And, crucially, the mocking, ­moralistic reading of the women emanates primarily from the discursive interruptions of the narrator. Yet, the charisma and panache of the female speakers persistently resists this reading and tempts the audience to empathise with their sinful behaviours. The confusing array of perspectives and the vertigo imparted by the shifting narrative voices relentlessly deconstruct and undermine meaning in the poem. Throughout the following examination, the personas and narratives which comprise the Tretis are shown to perpetuate the grotesque as they interact with these foundational elements. Metrical and lexical invention is used to create instability in the generic and thematic aspects of the text. Each narrator – whether the observer or the women – contributes to the compounding sense of disorientation and confusion that emanates from these most basic components of the poem. Formal elements perpetuate the grotesque by preventing the audience from accurately anticipating the movement, tone, and form of the narrative. Built on this unstable foundation are the four figures who engage a variety of forms, topoi, and motifs in order to evoke deep ambivalence, which, in turn, compels the audience to laugh and recoil in rippling and irregular patterns. Thus Dunbar challenges the modes of expression available to him in order to offer wholly new ways of understanding poetic composition.

Narratorial persona and frame interventions The narrator’s role in shaping the narrative grotesque begins with his characterisation and contextualisation of the women in the frame: his depictions of the locus amoenus and the women share so many features that they seem to be inextricably connected; just as the grotesque was originally used to describe foliate shapes unfurling from animate bodies, so too do the women appear intertwined with their environment. As the narrator enters the garden he hears simultaneously ‘ane bird on ane bransche so birst out hir notis / That neuer ane blythfullar bird was on the beuche hard’ (5–6) (a bird on a branch so burst out her notes that never a more joyful

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 145

bird on the bough was heard) and ‘vnder ane holyn hewinlie grein hewit, / Ane hie speiche at my hand with hautand wordis’ (11–12) (under a divinely green-hued holly tree, a high speech with haughty words nearby).29 Birds and women are thus conflated for their similar vocalisation, which bursts into the idyllic garden in the very first lines of the poem. Beyond the vocalising qualities of the women and birds, the narrator observes that both groups are playful and loud. In the final lines of the poem the narrator observes the behaviour of the birds at dawn: ‘berdis shoutit in schaw with ther schill notis. / The goldin glitterand gleme so gladit ther hertis, / Thai maid a glorius gle amang the grene bewis’ (516–18) (birds shouted into [the] wood with their shrill notes. The golden glittering gleam so gladdened their hearts, they made glorious music among the green boughs). Earlier, the narrator described the nocturnal ‘birds’ as playing games among the bewis: ‘Thir gay wiffis maid gam amang the grene leiffis’ (241) (the joyful wives made game among the green leaves). In this way, the schill notis of the birds and their playful behaviour reflect the preceding games and speech of the women. Yet, it is not only the narrator that correlates the two: throughout their speeches the women aspire to the freedom of mating that birds enjoy, evidenced through recurring references to and puns about birds and mating. Some aspects of the narrator’s descriptive choices reveal echoes of Dunbar’s other poems. The Goldyn Targe (terminus ad quem 1508) was composed contemporaneously to the Tretis and in it Dunbar mobilises similar idealised imagery, also transmitted through a wandering narratorial figure.30 In this poem the narrator describes a dazzling May garden replete with birds and flowers, but when he falls into a dream vision the garden is transformed by the sudden appearance of a crowd of green-clad allegories. Unlike the narrator of the Tretis, who watches the women during the night, The Goldyn Targe’s narrator enters the garden at dawn: Wp sprang the goldyn candill matutyne, With clere depurit bemes cristallyne, Glading the mery foulis in thair nest. […] Full angellike thir birdis sang thair houris Within thair courtyns grene in to thair bouris. (4–6; 10–11)

146

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

[Up rose the golden candle of morning, with clear, pure, crystalline beams, gilding the merry birds in their nest[s]. […] Very angelically those birds sang their hours [i.e. as in church services] within their green curtains of their bowers.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

While the frame garden is initially occupied solely by birds, upon falling into his ‘dremes fantasy’ (49) the narrator marks: Ane hundreth ladyes, lusty in to wedis, Als fresch as flouris that in May vp spredis, In kirtillis grene, withoutyn kell or bandis. Thair brycht hairis hang gleting on the strandis, In tressis clere wyppit wyth goldyn thredis. (58–62) [A hundred ladies, beautifully attractive in their garments, as fresh as flowers that bloom in May, in green kirtles, without cap[s] or headbands. Their bright locks of hair hung, gleaming on the banks, in tresses brightly bound with golden threads.]

Alongside the narrator’s crossing from wakefulness to dream, from reality to illusion, the garden’s occupants similarly disperse and reform anew. The disembodied voices of the birds concealed behind the green curtains of their hidden bowers transform into the hundred green-swathed ladies of the garden court. This transformative quality is manifest down to the gilding of the birds’ feathers, which is reflected in the similar gilding of the women’s hair. The Goldyn Targe, in its overt mirroring of the frame and the oneiric setting, highlights the subtlety of the correlations set up by the Tretis’s frame, in which there is no dissolution into a dream state. Rather, the waking world appears almost as illusory and unstable as a dream. Although the women in The Goldyn Targe are revealed to be various allegories and goddesses, the female speakers in the Tretis take on distinctly similar physical features: All grathit in to garlandis of fresche gudlie flouris. So glitterit as the gold wer thair glorius gilt tressis, Quhill all the gressis did gleme of the glaid hewis. Kemmit war thair clier hair and curiouslie sched, Attour thair schulderis doun schyre schyning full bricht, With curches cassin thair abone of kirsp cleir and thin. Thair mantillis grein war as the gres that grew in May sessoun. (18–24)



Making demandes 147

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[All adorned in garlands of fresh goodly flowers. Their glorious gilt tresses were made glittering as gold, while all the plants gleamed off the joyful colours. Their bright hair was combed and curiously parted, down over their shoulders, gleaming [and] shining very brightly, with kerchiefs of delicate fabric, shining and thin, thrown around. Their green cloaks were as the grass that grows in [the] season of May.]

Bawcutt notes that ‘the women’s dress is rich but decorous and their loosened hair is partly covered’.31 Bawcutt’s comments might rather be expressed in the inverse: their loosened hair is partly uncovered and, consequently, their rich and decorous garments are undermined by the fact that they are worn incorrectly. Decorum as a motif is key to the advancement of the poem’s exploration of veracity and authenticity, since it is the baseline from which the women’s speech is judged. Dunbar’s careful elaboration of their physical appearance telegraphs the more problematic indecorum of their impending conversation. The colour of their garments adds texture to this moralistic aspect of their characterisation. Green garments have wide-ranging associations: they are symbolically linked to hunting, May rites and festivities; maidens, nature, and youth; and also inconsistency and lust.32 Crucially, allegories and goddesses are garbed in green in The Goldyn Targe, while in the Tretis three noblewomen wear the garments. This has the effect of creating a double vision of the women as ‘typical’ high-born ladies and also allegorical or divine figures of femininity. In this way the garments and appearance of the female speakers accentuate and even mirror the philosophic and intellectual project that underpins the narrative by presenting an array of conflicting interpretations. Beyond more general correlations between physical environments and appearances in the two texts, the figure of Venus in The Goldyn Targe offers another fruitful opportunity for comparison. Although Venus has been addressed at some length in the preceding chapters, it is useful to iterate some qualities ascribed to her in medieval literature: she is cruel and kind, unknowable, seductive, changeable, intemperate, and inspirational. In The Goldyn Targe Venus’s entrance into the narrative marks a pivotal moment in the dream. To begin, she enters the garden serenaded by birds:

148

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

And to dame Wenus, lufis mychti quene, Thay sang ballettis in lufe, as was the gyse, With amourouse notis lusty to devise, As thay that had lufe in thair hertis grene. Thair hony throtis opnyt fro the splene With werblis suete did perse the hevinly skyes, Quhill loud resownyt the firmament serene. (102–8) [And to Dame Venus, love’s mighty queen, they sang ballads of love, as was the fashion, with amorous notes beautiful to describe, as them that had love in their green [i.e. young] hearts. Their honeyed throats opened from the heart with sweet warbles piercing the heavenly skies, [which] loudly resounded in the serene firmament.]

The narrator’s connection between the avian and female occupants of the garden in the Tretis recalls and perhaps even mimics the relationship between the birds that sing ‘ballettis in lufe’ to Venus. The narrator says of the wives and widow ‘all the pertlyar, in plane, thai put out ther vocis’ (244) (all the more boldly, frankly, they raised their voices)33 and describes the first wife’s response as being related with ‘lustie effeiris’ (49) (cheerful demeanour). The second wife, meanwhile, declares, ‘I sall a ragment reveil fra rute of my hert’ (162) (I shall deliver a discourse from my heart). The ‘heartfelt’ aspect of her discourse reflects Venus’s warbling birds singing with thair hony throtis opnyt fro the splene. The phrase fro the splene indicates that something is from the heart or heartfelt, since the spleen was considered the seat of emotions.34 Yet, unlike the visceral expositions delivered by the three women, Venus’s songbirds represent the idealised and poetic version of love as they accompany the allegorical goddess. In effect, the ‘birds’ in the midnight-hued garden of the Tretis sing sharper, more cynical notes; each speech seems to lance a toxic boil rather than deliver a sentimental or heartfelt plea and this sense only intensifies throughout the discourse. Consequently, this painful embodiment distorts the already fractious setting even further and upsets conventions with such tonally discordant expressions of courtly tropes. Venus is always surrounded by a coterie of allegorical and divine women who embody various aspects of her attributes. Most notable among them are the three Graces. Earl Schreiber collates several views on Venus and highlights both Boccaccio’s and Alberic

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 149

of London’s integration of the Graces within the framework of Venus’s companions. He notes that they represent the bonds of friendship forged through Venus (pleasure) and Liber (wine).35 The Graces are typically listed as Aglaia (splendour/brightness), Euphrosyne (mirth/joyfulness), and Thalia (festivity/bloom);36 all of these qualities are actively embodied by the women meeting in the secluded garden. Tinkle traces the implications of Alberic’s inclusion and treatment of the Graces as Venus’s attendants: The Graces can obviously complicate moralized iconography: no matter how fervently a mythographer asserts that Venus signifies the shame or pollution of sexuality, the Graces associate her with pleasing and virtuous charms, with attractions to love. The incongruity in the image can, as here, fragment the interpretation. Since mythographers typically defer to their authorities, the Graces nonetheless remain part of the image, sometimes leading the severest of moralizers into apparent ambivalence.37

Tinkle’s identification of the moral ambivalence of the Graces in medieval commentaries and their connection to Venus is easily grafted onto the three women as they are first encountered by the narrator. The floral imagery used to describe the women follows in this general ambiguity insofar as they are likened to roses, which might symbolise either the Virgin Mary or Venus. And beyond merely being found among the flora, they appear to be flowers themselves: All full of flurist fairheid as flouris in Iune – Quhyt, seimlie and soft as the sweit lillies, Now vpspred vpon spray as new spynist rose, Arrayit ryallie about with mony riche wardour That Nature full nobillie annamalit with flouris, Off alkin hewis under hewin that ony heynd knew, Fragrant, all full of fresche odour fynest of smell. (27–33) [Full of flourishing beauty as flowers in June – white, beautiful and soft as the sweet lilies, now blooming upon the branch like newly opened rose[s], apparelled royally with many rich green plants that Nature very nobly enamelled with flowers of all hues under heaven that only courteous people knew, fragrant, full of fresh scents most fine of smell.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

150

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

This botanical characterisation persists until the end of the n ­ arrative, when the narrator observes: ‘Than rais thir ryall rosis in ther riche wedis, / And rakit hame to ther rest throw the rise blwmys’ (523–4) (Then these royal roses in their rich garments rose and went home through the flowering bushes to sleep). Klaus Bitterling asserts that ‘the rose is equally frequent in religious contexts and as the lily it is a common image for the Virgin Mary […] In addition to that, it serves as a symbol of secrecy on medieval confessionals. On the other hand, the rose is also the symbol of transitoriness.’38 He concludes his discussion with the comment that the poem has a general ‘impression of transitoriness and decay’ that contributes to the incongruity between the competing realities in the poem.39 The complex floral symbolism is even more deeply embedded in the narrative if Boccaccio’s moralising commentary on the rose as it relates to Venus is taken under consideration: [roses] seem to be appropriate for lust since we grow red from the disgrace of a sin and are vexed by the thorn of a sin of which we are conscious. And as a rose delights for a brief time and then after a short while it withers, so also passion is the cause of small, brief delight and long penance, since that which one enjoys quickly fails, and that which harms vexes for a long time.40

The ambivalent symbolism of the rose and the women’s green garments as well as the conflation of bird, allegory, and mortal woman create the foundation for the grotesque ruptures and distortions pervading the poem: the frame is constructed in such a way to suggest competing identities and voices – first impressions might suggest the women to be either paragons of maidenly virtue or venerean fantasies of a narratorial dreamworld. The women navigate these competing moralistic readings in a sharply incisive and destructive fashion. In turn, the audience must reconcile the layered promises of either delicately floral ladies or thorny viragos – a process which exemplifies the narrative grotesque by provoking dismay, horror, and laughter. Beyond the narrator’s ‘practical’ role of recording the vivid setting as context for the demandes d’amour, he has variously come under scrutiny as either representative of the sometimes marginal roles of eavesdropping narrators or a symbol of the gender d ­ ynamics

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 151

underlying the composition.41 The eavesdropping ­narrator motif is well established in medieval narrative. Some critics have speculated about whether the women are aware of the eavesdropper, owing to the declaration, ‘I sall nought spare, ther is no spy neir’ (161) (I shall spare nothing, there is no spy nearby). The ambiguity prompted by this potential awareness only sharpens the effects of the narrative grotesque. If the women are indeed aware of the eavesdropper, then an additional layer of self-reflexivity and artifice is added to the already chimeric composition; performativity is multiplied and emotional authenticity is convoluted further. Unfortunately, the evidence for this awareness is rather slim, so it must remain speculation. Concealed narrators in Older Scots literature generally conform to a comic type; for instance, the narrators in the Tretis and Palyce situate themselves in undignified hiding places: a hawthorn bush and a stump, respectively. By hiding themselves so ignominiously, among other high jinks, the narrators adhere to this trope. Although medieval Scottish poets frequently introduce this comic element, concealed narratorial observers need not play on this sort of bumbling persona. In thematic terms Rasmussen suggests that the purpose of the concealed narrator is to expose a threatening female sphere of discourse. She uses German Minnereden to illustrate her point: these Minnereden create their own discourse of ‘women’s secrets.’ Within them, oral communities are staged that are feminized and constructed as being private and concealed, at best hospitable to men, at worst communities of stigmatized and dangerously uncontrollable oral exchange – gossip – between women, while communities of writing are constructed as being authoritative in a larger, public or semipublic realm and as being masculine.42

In Rasmussen’s texts the eavesdropper is invariably male while the person(s) observed is nearly always female (with notable exceptions, which she contends ‘prove the rule’). The narrator in the Tretis asserts that the women ‘carpit full cummerlik’ (510) (chatted like gossips), a characterisation which lends some credence to the idea of the dangerous and clandestine conversation expressed by Rasmussen. But Rasmussen’s texts also exhibit a strict dichotomy:

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

152

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

narratives with sexually explicit content always take place in ­urbanised settings while non-sexually explicit narratives take place in ‘gallant’ settings (a sort of courtly locus amoenus). The Tretis, in contrast, takes place in a brilliantly described locus amoenus among noblewomen and contains sexually explicit content. Adding to this disconcerting effect is the language, which veers between courtly, Latinate diction and broad Scots. Despite this departure from Rasmussen’s reading, the observer in the Tretis participates in similarly gendered politics; his interpolations elucidate the separation between the male and female spheres and, as a function of this dichotomy, the ventriloquising (or perhaps instrumentalisation) of the women as emissaries of courtly and romantic ‘truth’ brings questions of narratorial reliability, veracity, and authority to the fore.43 Saliently, the function of the women either as mere puppets or as fully realised characters is not a question of absolutes. The layering of voices, avian and human, feminine and masculine, narratorial and authorial, creates an obscuring artifice that defamiliarises and distorts conventions. Bawcutt considers the gender politics underlying the concealednarrator motif in the context of their comic implications more specifically: the device is principally a means of comic self-betrayal. It is a major source of dramatic irony: there is no hint that the women are aware of an observer, and they speak indiscreetly, because they think they are alone […] There is a comic parallelism between the core-story – women talking together about men – and its frame – the male poet reporting to male ‘auditoris’. […] His presence thus reinforces our sense of the poem’s male–female polarization.44

Bawcutt goes on to warn against overemphasising the narrator’s role, but it is clear that he has an indisputable impact on the tone and pace of the narrative, in addition to his explicit interventions which encourage the audience to make specific moral interpretations. And the gender politics evident in the narrative are complicated by the ambivalent terms in which the narrator describes the speakers. Ambivalent, however, is not a synonym for innocuous. There is an underlining threat in their flouting of decorum and in their repudiation of their husbands. The narrator skilfully invests the frame

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 153

with hints of discord, but he weaves these unsettling aspects into an extensive network of ambivalent motifs and symbols. The Maitland Folio Manuscript (c. 1570) (hereafter MF) recension of the text, on which Bawcutt partly bases her edition, includes Latin rubrication absent from the earlier Chepman and Myllar print (c. 1507). Bawcutt observes that, besides the rubrication and title in MF, the two recensions display only minor lexical discrepancies.45 In MF each speech is separated and punctuated by short Latin commentaries on the previous or upcoming content; they are essentially headings that provide directions such as ‘see how the wife responds’ or similar. Each is carefully situated within the text, which suggests a clear understanding of the divisions within the narrative. Although the content of the headings appears to be mundane, these paratexts complement and even intensify the narratorial interjections by physically interrupting the path of the eye as it moves through the poem, thus reinforcing the diegetic disturbances fabricated by the narrator. A productive point of comparison in regard to the relationship between speaker, audience, and narrative level is found in Chaucer’s Wife of Bath’s Prologue. The sense of distance between audience and speaker(s) in the Tretis forms a marked contrast to the Chaucerian text, despite parallels having been drawn between the widow and Alison, the titular Wife of Bath.46 A key difference pertains to the narrative control exerted by the female speaker, Alison, versus that of the women in the Tretis. Alison’s rhetorical performance dominates her intradiegetic audience. While the relationship between audience and speaker is not unproblematic, since Alison is very clearly performing the role of virago irrespective of how authentically it reflects her ‘true’ self (however far that is possible), the narrator does not intervene in her performance or narrative; in this way he fulfils a truly passive role. After the Pardoner’s exclamatory interjection, Alison authoritatively silences him: ‘Abyd!’ quod she, ‘my tale is nat bigonne. Nay, thou shalt drynken of another tonne, Er that I go, shal savoure wors than ale. And whan that I have toold thee forth my tale Of tribulacion in mariage, Of which I am expert in al myn age –

154

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

This is to seyn, myself have been the whippe – Than maystow chese wheither thou wolt sippe Of thilke tonne that I shal abroche.’ (169–77)

This dynamic forms an obvious contrast to the private setting of the Tretis. Alison, unlike the women, exerts full control over the publicising of her narrative to a captive intradiegetic audience. As a result, she is able to garner a wide range of affective responses from her listeners. The complex narratological considerations informing the Wife of Bath’s Prologue are the source of the contradicting claims often made by critics, namely that Alison’s narrative is either anti- or proto-feminist. Certainly, Alison’s speech is filtered through a male interlocutor and is ultimately the production of a male author. Nonetheless her presentation of her story asserts her mastery over the intradiegetic audience. Meanwhile, the women’s responses in the Tretis are heavily mediated by a narrator who editorialises the women’s conversation from the narrative frame and eventually addresses his (imagined) audience of listeners or readers directly. This commentary disrupts the flow of the narrative and obstructs the kind of personal affective reactions achieved by Alison. The women are weirdly presented as a monolithic triplet – they are for all intents and purposes identical and the narrator’s facetious demande not only confirms the universal undesirability of the women but also attempts to mitigate the (male) horror induced by their conspiratorial laughter. The ambiguity asserted by this lack of individuation only strengthens the venerean traits of the women, particularly their similarity to Venus’s three Graces. This intricate grafting together of compounded female voices with a convoluted narratological and temporal frame reflects the narrative grotesque pervading the poem. There is no single, stable perspective or ‘truth’ that can be divined from the competing levels of storytelling, despite multiple claims to superior authority. These overspilled structural and narratological boundaries are amplified via the affective reactions of the figures populating the poem, whose opposed emotional states are presented simultaneously with the multiple subjectivities. A. C. Spearing addresses the idea of voyeurism in the Tretis, but his treatment primarily focuses on decoding specific allusions

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 155

and episodes in the women’s speeches.47 His rather narrow view of the narrative lacks wider insight into gender politics related to and exposed by the eavesdropping narrator frame. Spearing has an awareness of the discomfort underpinning the humour in the narrative, but he contends that the poem provokes an embarrassed laughter aroused by low comedy. Spearing’s reading highlights an abhorred reaction to the women’s conversation: ‘when the first wife in the Tretis finishes her speech, all three cackle with laughter and pass the wine round. In its appalling way, it is funny, and may well have appealed to the sense of humour at the Scottish court.’48 Spearing exposes his own condescending view of the Scots by insinuating that their sense of humour was somehow crude, distasteful, and unintellectual. Furthermore, he seems to be the narrator’s target audience, owing to his equally horrified and disgusted reaction. His reading overlooks the multiple levels of humour at work in the poem. There is certainly a bawdy aspect as well as an anti-feminist. But Dunbar does much more than construct a risqué group of badly behaved women: he manipulates, subverts, and even tears apart medieval poetic conventions. The narrative grotesque recontextualises the laughter of the women and the narrator’s ironic demande and it expands the tandem effects of horror and humour in the poem to expose Dunbar’s irreverent (re)creation of poetics. Spearing summarises the narrator’s role (whom he closely identifies with Dunbar the poet): ‘he [Dunbar the narrator] writes what he has heard, and it is significant that the watcher of the prologue, whose penetrative secret gaze could make some claim to mastery, is so soon reduced to a listener, passive before women who actively “put out ther vocis”’.49 As the preceding discussion establishes, this reading is shallow and misleading: although the narrator does not engage the women in direct conversation, he exerts multivalent forms of control over the narrative pace and tone as well as the characterisation of the women and their stories. A bewilderingly tangled web of (un)realities is formed by the constantly shifting perspectives induced by each change of speaker (inclusive of the narrator), by the subjective fluctuations within each response, and by the appropriation of a wide range of poetic forms. In the ambiguous spaces formed at these grotesque nexuses Dunbar is able to redefine the parameters of poetic making and narratology.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

156

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Across this chapter, two key aspects have been central to discussion: firstly, the genre and language of the poem were established as an essential marker of Dunbar’s process of prying apart conventions in order to recreate new forms. And secondly, the narrator’s role in framing and editorialising the speeches came under scrutiny. Regarding the first point, the demandes d’amour do not adhere to the typical expectations of the verse form as it is found in French or in other Scottish demandes, as exemplified in BKA. Through its vivid and comic exposition of highly detailed anecdotal responses, the Tretis reimagines the love debate as a venue for expressing visceral and condemning commentaries on love and marriage. The language and forms Dunbar employs in this process upset at every level expectations associated with any given metric or category of composition. The female identities of his primary speakers sharpen these aspects as they contravene cultural mores and lean into gendered stereotypes in their unfiltered conversation. Gender dynamics are evidently central to the poem. Yet the narrator’s interventions destabilise morality as a static quality in poetic works. His ironic tone and shift to direct address in the culminating demande betray the performativity and artificiality of the entire piece, thus complicating any straightforward reading of the text as simply anti-feminist. The competing subjectivities undermine constantly any firm perception of veracity or sincerity as immovable narratological qualities. Dunbar’s use of a concealed narrator thus sets expectations for the subsequent narrative that are immediately compromised: the narrator’s introduction lushly details the appearances of the women and their idyllic setting, but he interweaves this imagery with ambiguous symbolism; his final commentary and demande reasserts the performative bent of the text as an interactive courtly game. His editorial remarks bookending each of the speeches, not discussed in detail here, will be brought to bear on the speeches as they become relevant in the following chapters. The goal of this chapter, rather, was to highlight the constant transfigurations of form and perspective that create the poem’s narrative foundation. The distorted demandes d’amour alongside the invention of an unsettlingly illusory locus amoenus and the disruptive narratorial interventions combine to create a grotesque that is embedded at every narrative level.



Making demandes 157

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Notes   1 See L. Ebin, ‘Dunbar’s Bawdy’, The Chaucer Review 14.3 (1980), 278–86; E. Newlyn ‘Luve, Lichery, and Evill Women: The Satiric Tradition in the Bannatyne Manuscript’, Studies in Scottish Literature 26 (1991), 283–93; and L. Perfetti, Women and Laughter in Medieval Comic Literature (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2003), among others.  2 M. Felberg-Levitt, ‘Dialogues in Verse and Prose: The Demandes d’amour’, Le Moyen Français: revue d’études linguistiques et littéraires dirigée par Giuseppe di Stefano 29 (1991), 33–44 (p. 35).  3 Line references from Sir Gilbert Hay, The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour, ed. John Cartwright (Edinburgh: The Scottish Text Society, 1986).  4 J. B. Oruch, ‘Nature’s Limitations and the “Demande d’Amour” of Chaucer’s Parlement’, The Chaucer Review 18.1 (1983), 23.  5 Square brackets original.  6 Square brackets original.  7 Italics original.   8 See E. Wingfield, ‘The Thewis off Gudwomen: Female Advice in Lancelot of the Laik and The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour’, in J. H. Williams and J. D. McClure (eds), Fresche Fontanis: Studies in the Culture of Medieval and Early Modern Scotland (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2013), pp. 85–96, for a thorough examination of the various versions of the Thewis.  9 I. S. Ross, William Dunbar (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981), p. 220. 10 Ross, William Dunbar, p. 236. 11 J. D. McClure, ‘The Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo: Final Fling of the Heroic Line’, in Williams and McClure (eds), Fresche Fontanis, pp. 127–42. J. D. McClure, ‘Prosody of the Middle Scots Alliterative Poems’, Florilegium 25 (2008), p. 197, defines stress and pitch prominence. McClure stresses that pitch prominence ‘is wholly distinct from stress, though often confused with it’. 12 McClure, ‘Final Fling’, pp. 136–7. 13 McClure, ‘Final Fling’, p. 137. 14 See Felberg-Levitt, ‘Dialogues in Verse and Prose’. 15 McClure, ‘Final Fling’, p. 136. 16 A. J. Aitken, ‘The language of Older Scots Poetry’, in C. Macafee (ed.), Collected Writings on the Scots Language (online: Scots Language Centre, 2015). Originally published in J. D. McClure (ed.) Scotland

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

158

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

and the Lowland Tongue. Studies in the Language and Literature of Lowland Scotland in honour of David D. Murison (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1983). 17 Aitken, ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, p. 8. 18 Aitken, ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, p. 5. 19 W. Calin, The Lily and the Thistle: The French Tradition and the Older Literature of Scotland (North York: University of Toronto Press, 2014), p. 105. 20 Aitken, ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, p. 14. 21 Aitken, ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, p. 18. 22 Calin, The Lily and the Thistle, sets the Tretis in the context of the French poetic tradition more widely. Specifically, he considers the chanson de mal mariée to be an important source for the text. See also Bawcutt’s notes to the poem. 23 D. S. Brewer, ‘The Genre of the “Parlement of Foules”’, Modern Language Review 53.3 (1958), 321–6 (p. 325). 24 See M.-A. Bossy, ‘Charles d’Orléans and the Wars of the Roses: Yorkist and Tudor Implications of British Library MS Royal 16 F ii’, in D. E. O’Sullivan and L. Shepard (eds), Shaping Courtliness in Medieval France: Essays in Honor of Matilda Tomaryn Bruckner (Boydell and Brewer Online: D. S. Brewer, 2013), pp. 73, 75; and Brewer, ‘The Genre of the “Parlement of Foules”’, p. 325. Ross, William Dunbar, p. 223, refers to the widow as the ‘president’ of the court of love. 25 M. Felberg-Levitt, Les demandes d’amour (Montréal: Ceres, 1995), pp. 16–17; 23–5, and ‘Dialogues in Verse and Prose’, p. 34. 26 See Calin, The Lily and the Thistle. P. Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 324, recognises other modes and motifs at play in the text, including chanson d’aventure and the ‘wicked wife’ motif. In his attempt to assign a firm genre to the text R. J. Pearcy, ‘The Genre of William Dunbar’s Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo’, Speculum 55.1 (1980), 58–74, suggests that the Tretis belongs to a subcategory of the chanson de mal mariée mode, which he terms the jugement. 27 Calin, The Lily and the Thistle, p. 111. 28 Calin, The Lily and the Thistle, p. 115. 29 Ross, William Dunbar, p. 219, observes that this hautand speech already introduces complications to the narrative: ‘[it suggests], on the one hand, elevated speech, and so raising expectations about the moral or social status of the speakers; on the other hand, there is a hint of loud talking, for as we discover, the ladies “wauchtit at the wicht wyne” and are consequently inspired to be forceful and outspoken’.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Making demandes 159

30 For the poem’s dating see Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2. 31 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 286; notes to lines 19–25. E. Burness, ‘Female Language in The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo’, in D. Strauss and H. W. Drescher (eds), Scottish Language and Literature, Medieval and Renaissance. Fourth International Conference 1984, Proceedings (Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Peter Lang, 1986), p. 362, interprets the loose hair worn by the women as in some way symbolic of the relative masculinity of their speech and the free rein given to their conversation and language. 32 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 418; note to The Goldyn Targe, line 127. Cf. Ross, William Dunbar, pp. 218–19, which also discusses the locus amoenus. 33 The transgressive or aggressive quality of their speech has been discussed elsewhere. Cf. A. C. Spearing, The Medieval Poet as Voyeur: Looking and Listening in Medieval Love-Narratives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 266; Ross, William Dunbar, p. 219; and Perfetti, Women and Laughter, pp. 101–2. 34 Cf. Dunbar’s ‘Now cumis aige quhair ȝewth hes bene’, in which the refrain reads: ‘And trew luve rysis fro the splene’. 35 E. J. Schreiber, ‘Venus in the Medieval Mythographic Tradition’, The Journal of English and Germanic Philology 74.4 (1975), 519–35 (p. 524). 36 Boccaccio names them Pasithea (attracting), Aglaea (charming), and Euphrosyne (retaining) in his Genealogy. See Boccaccio, Genealogy, Volume I, Books I–V, pp. 742–5. 37 Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, p. 86. 38 K. Bitterling, ‘The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo: Some Comments on Words, Imagery, and Genre’, in Strauss and Drescher (eds), Scottish Language and Literature, pp. 337–58 (p. 350). Bitterling responds to and expands on Ross’s mention of the rose and lily complexion of the first wife and the abundance of flowers surrounding the women in William Dunbar, pp. 223, 219. 39 Bitterling, ‘Words, Imagery, and Genre’, p. 350. He looks to the metallic imagery in the text as a sign of the transitory and artificial tone. 40 Boccaccio, Genealogy, p. 405. Cf. B. Windeatt, ‘Afterlives: The Fabulous History of Venus’, in C. Brewer and B. A. Windeatt (eds), Traditions and Innovations in the Study of Medieval English Literature: The Influence of Derek Brewer (eBook: D. S. Brewer, 2013), pp. 262–78 (esp. pp. 263–4 where he quotes Fulgentius). 41 See Ross, William Dunbar; Spearing, The Medieval Poet as Voyeur; and Perfetti, Women and Laughter.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

160

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

42 A. M. Rasmussen, ‘Gendered Knowledge and Eavesdropping in the Late-Medieval Minnerede’, Speculum 77.4 (2002), 1168–94 (p. 1171). 43 Perfetti, Women and Laughter, p. 105, considers the gender dynamics at play in the text more generally. Her analysis depends on a preceding assessment of Boccaccio’s Decameron. Essentially, she demonstrates the various ways in which the women emasculate men and asserts that the role of the narrator is, figuratively, to expand the number of eavesdroppers on the narrative and, finally, that ‘this ironic invasion of the women’s privacy makes clear the collision between the positions held by the women: as speaking subjects and as objects of the male gaze’. 44 Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar, p. 330. 45 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 285. 46 In the most immediate terms, the Wife of Bath and the widow both reflect the ambiguous status of older women. Ross, William Dunbar, pp. 225–7, outlines the widow’s relation to the cunning old woman motif at length. As detailed above, Calin, The Lily and the Thistle, considers this motif through a comparison with La Vielle in Rose. 47 Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar, pp. 328–30, qualifies the terms ‘voyeur’ and ‘peeping Tom’ by demonstrating the popularity of the concealed observer as a mode through which medieval authors were able ‘to establish a sense of intimacy and self-revelation’. 48 Spearing, The Medieval Poet as Voyeur, p. 257. 49 Spearing, The Medieval Poet as Voyeur, p. 266.

5

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Flyte of fancy: the first wife’s response

The frame narrative enclosing the women’s speeches instigates an underlying sense of instability in the poem; and the persistent conflation of the botanic environment and its avian and human occupants creates an illusory space where boundaries are fluid and transform according to perspective. The first wife’s speech perpetuates the uneasy insubstantiality of this environment by initially engaging in an apparently conventional, if sexually suggestive, response only to disrupt the narrative trajectory by veering into invective halfway through her speech. This unexpected shift to the language of flyting, a Scottish form of poetic invective marked by its highly colloquial, vituperative lexicon and impressively complex stanzaic forms, undermines the refined and courtly expectations associated with the demande d’amour. Through this process of rupture and fusion, the wife’s response initiates an intricately constructed interrogation of medieval poetics. As such, the narrative grotesque opens up a space to examine dissonant narrative moments and it elucidates the ways in which Dunbar instrumentalises opposing forms, registers, and tones. The previous chapter established the tendency for verse demandes to offer simplistic and direct answers to set questions pertaining to love. Dame Ydory’s response in BKA, as described there, follows the structure and tone typical of the genre. As noted, there is precedent for participants in demandes to use sexual innuendo. Yet, sexual undertones rarely, if ever, transgress boundaries by falling into outright obscenity. By first appearances, the first wife’s response seems to adopt this suggestive language and content as she envisions a new world order in which romantic relationships are ephemeral and

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

162

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

women dictate their terms and conditions. But she unexpectedly shifts tone and register to indict her husband’s sexual shortcomings and even to conflate him with demons and Satan. This shift disintegrates her utopian vision of free love and feminine power to reveal the reality of her powerlessness. The horror she expresses in relation to her experience of sex sits in stark counterpoint to the image of a virago on the prowl that dominates the first half of the response. This tension between illusion and reality is immediately upset as the wife reveals her own moral shortcomings (as far as her behaviour reflects generalised anti-feminist sentiment): from one line to the next her horrific experiences in the bedchamber are shadowed by her use of sex to manipulate her husband into lavishing her with gifts of clothing and jewellery. The dissonance between these competing realities provokes laughter, owing to the surprising process of revelation that continually upends expectations. Contrary to the fluid character of the narrative content, the wife’s speech is tightly and coherently structured, in part as a result of her dexterous use of language, allusion, and theme. This structurally elegant form thus showcases the various contradictions and tensions contributing to the narrative grotesque by evoking both horror and humour. The narrative grotesque refracts across the wife’s speech at all levels: at the lexical level she employs specific, contradictory vocabularies that evoke either courtly or obscene modes; at a generic level she manipulates the conventional parameters of the demande d’amour to lambast her husband; thematically, she engages an uncomfortable range of motifs and metaphors – from martial imagery to agrarian, from invoking the devil to calculating profits for her sexual acquiescence. All of these aspects become grotesque as contradictions between decorum and obscenity, authenticity and performance, lead to a disturbing, yet humorous, deconstruction of expectation and reality. The wife’s frequent use of puns showcases the pervasiveness of the grotesque on the most granular narrative level. In this respect it is useful to consider Rhodes’s definition of the grotesque: he asserts that unexpected verbal combinations and neologisms are key aspects of the grotesque which ‘evoke that sense of insubstantiality and lack of solidity which Vasari described, rather than the gross physicality we associate with Bruegel’.1 The first two responses, delivered by the wives, achieve a sense of

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 163

insubstantiality and lack of solidity in form and style through an intricate lattice of metaphor and simile. At a linguistic level, the wives’ puns contribute to the ‘impossible verbal connections’ that often mark the grotesque.2 Tonally, the unsettling emotional resonance between horror and humour becomes more pronounced in the flyting portion of the first wife’s response where she likens her husband to Satan in vivid detail. Heightening this grotesque is the wife’s instrumentalisation of the unique register and lexicon available to flyting, which is distinct for its use of neologism, punning, and linguistic inventiveness. The metaleptic dissonance between speaker and narrator immediately problematises the audience’s perception of the wife’s response. Following the demande posed by the widow the narrator editorialises the next block of dialogue: ‘Than spak ane lusty belyf with lustie effeiris’ (49) (Then one of the beauties spoke quickly with a cheerful demeanour). This sets an expectation of cheerful festivity and the narrator establishes a pattern of using adjectives for beauty as nouns – when he first introduced the wives he referred to them as ‘fair wlonkes’ (36) (lovely beauties). Wlonk is most frequently recorded as an alliterative adjective that means splendid, fair, or beautiful, and is often applied as a superlative. The narrator reasserts this lexicon by referring to the first wife with another common poetic adjective: he calls her a lusty, someone who is fair, beautiful, or lovely. The term has manifold applications, most often relating to sensory perception (visible objects/persons, food and drink, music), and in all scenarios it pertains to delightfulness, cheerfulness, beauty, and festivity. His characterisation of her bright and energetic demeanour sits uncomfortably against the content of her initial response: ‘It that ȝe call the blist band that bindis so fast Is bair of blis and bailfull, and greit barrat wirkis. Ȝe speir, had I fre chois, gif I wald cheis bettir? Chenȝeis ay ar to eschew and changeis ar sueit. Sic cursit chance till eschew, had I my chois anis, Out of the cheinȝeis of ane churle I chaip suld for euir.’ (50–5) [It that you call the blessed bond that binds so fast is bare of bliss and full of grief and brings about great distress. You ask, had I free

164

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

choice, if I would choose better? Shackles are always to be avoided and changes are pleasant. Such cursed chance to avoid, once had I my choice, I would escape from the chains of a churl forever.]

The aggressive alliteration on [b] across the first lines starkly emphasises the misery of her marriage and is tonally dissonant from the apparently lusty effeiris with which the narrator claims she speaks. The next four lines repetitively alliterate on chenȝeis and chois and, rather awkwardly, on the second syllable of the non-pitch prominent eschew, also repeated twice. Dunbar’s canon is notable for lexical diversity and virtuosic prosody; the emphasis created by this unusual alliteration at lines 52–55 accentuates the sentiments of the passage and thus the theme of the discourse, namely the multiple forms of freedom and imprisonment. In spite of the tonal dissonance between the content of her response and the narrator’s description of her mien, the opening lines of the first wife’s response fit comfortably within the conventions associated with the prose demande as it is defined in French literature: the respondent must display linguistic skill and mental acuity, the response must create sexual tension, it must be personal in nature, and it is meant to be both didactic and entertaining. In  terms of narrative content, the wife’s response achieves all of these requirements while capitalising on certain stylistic elements of  the flytings to enhance her speech. She continues her response from the lines quoted above by overtly introducing an avian topos laden with sexual innuendo: It is agane the law of luf, of kynd, and of nature, Togidder hartis to strene that stryveis with vther. Birdis hes ane better law na bernis be meikill, That ilk ȝeir with new ioy ioyis ane maik And fangis thame ane fresche feyr, vnfulȝeit and constant, And lattis thair fulȝeit feiris flie quhair thai pleis. (58–63) [It is against the law of love, of kind, and of nature, to bind hearts tightly together that [are] attached to another. Birds have a much better law than men, that each year with new joy [they] choose a mate and take a fresh partner, unwearied and steadfast, and let their exhausted lovers fly where they please.]



Flyte of fancy 165

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

The wife’s use of the mating bird motif recalls the trope that birds mate on Valentine’s Day, which is most notably expressed in Chaucer’s The Parliament of Fowls.3 Her statement seems to transpose the fight over the formel’s affections but she inverts the formel’s reluctance to choose a mate with her eagerness. The formel’s reticence is described: Ryght as the freshe, rede rose newe Ayeyn the somer sonne coloured is, Ryght so for shame al wexen gan the hewe Of this formel, whan she herde al this; (442–5)

The wife rather goes on to luxuriate in the attentions she imagines. Note, too, that the rose in the formel’s case is a symbol of purity, while in the Tretis the conflation of floral and feminine in the locus amoenus, especially the equation of the women with ‘ryall rosis’ (523) at the close, seems perhaps more rightly linked with the rose’s venerean associations. Lines 62–3 assertively demonstrate the wife’s verbal dexterity. Foremost, both alliterate on [f], thereby achieving a prose-like effect, since the line seems twice as long owing to this sustained alliteration (coupling alliterative initials is a pattern seen throughout the poem). She maintains the avian metaphor, but extends it to incorporate martial imagery. And, although these lines depend on repetitive vocabulary, the wife neatly inverts the alliterative words with their antonyms. She lauds the ‘better law’ of birds that ‘fangis thame ane fresche feyr, vnfulȝeit and constant, / And lattis thair fulȝeit feiris flie quhair thai pleis’ (62–3). Two lexical choices are of particular note: first, she refers to the birds’ mates as feiris. Feir is used in other Older Scots works to indicate a companion or comrade, a mate or spouse. The former usage appears, for instance, in Barbour and Wyntoun. It also occurs in an avian context in Howlat. This amplifies the preceding use of the term bernis (60; 74), which is a poetic and alliterative noun for man, but with specific martial connotations that are attested in The Knightly Tale of Golagros and Gawane, Hary’s Wallace, and The Taill of Rauf Coilȝear. These choices are important, since they connect into a courtly, alliterative poetic lexicon, which is perpetuated in the following lines when she uses similarly poetic diction to refer to potential lovers.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

166

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

The second lexical point of note is the use of the ­ adjectives fulȝeit/vnfulȝeit, which carry distinctly martial tones as well. Unfulȝeit, meaning ‘not exhausted or worn out; still vigorous’ is first recorded by the Dictionary of the Scots Language (DSL) in the Tretis. Subsequent examples, including the variant onfowllit, arise in translations of Hector Boece’s Historia Gentis Scotorum. William Stewart’s Scots translation (1535) uses onfowllit in a description of a battle between the Picts and the Scots during which King Kenneth scares the Picts into abandoning the battle in a hasty retreat: Kenethus than, knawand that it wes so, In gude array maid efter thaim till go The freschest men onfowllit wer in feild, Waldin and wicht that waponis weill culd weild. (32,619–22)4 [Kenneth then, knowing that it was so, in good arrangement made to go after them, the freshest, unwearied men were on [the] field, agile and strong, that could wield weapons well.]

The Picts flee from Kenneth’s army after divesting themselves of their ‘cot armour and scheild, / And harnes als’ (32,611–12) (coat[s] of mail and shield[s] and armour also). In this way the sexual connotations available to the terms as they appear in the Tretis are strongly linked to concepts of masculinity: in the martial context attested by Stewart’s translation the Picts figuratively emasculate themselves by stripping away their armour and weaponry when faced with Kenneth’s army. Meanwhile, Kenneth’s soldiers are depicted as wielding their weapons ably and acting with vigorous intensity. The concept of wielding weapons and masculinity, as developed in Historia, might be transposed onto the wife’s imagined world of sexual freedom when she describes the qualities of her potential lovers, namely that they ‘suld my womanheid weild the lang winter nicht’ (77) (should possess my womanhood [during] the long winter night). It is a striking image – she effectively objectifies herself as a measure of her lovers’ virility. The wife elaborates: ‘And quhen I gottin had ane grome ganest of vther, / Ȝaip and ȝing, in the ȝok ane ȝeir for to draw, / Fra I had preveit his pitht the first plesand moneth. (78–80) (and when I had acquired the man fittest of [all] others, active and young, to draw the yoke for a year, after I had

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 167

proven his sexual potency the first pleasant month). She envisions a process whereby the most suitable grome would have to prove his worth before being officially ‘employed’ for the year. A mixed metaphor at line 79 invokes two ‘agrarian’ puns: ‘bearing the yoke [of marriage]’ and ‘ploughing the field’ (sexual innuendo) thus conflating domestic imagery with the language of martial exploits. Compounding these metaphors and illusions, she incorporates an age-related commentary on exchanging worn-out lovers for younger replacements when she continues by observing that she will look across the kingdom for potential ‘Quhair I ane galland micht get aganis the nixt ȝeir / For to perfurneis furth the werk quhen failȝeit the tother’ (83–4) (Where I might get a young fellow in preparation for the next year in order to perform the work when the other was worn-out). Failȝeit can carry a connotation of feebleness due to old age, while galland describes ‘a smart or finely dressed young fellow’.5 This tension is reintroduced later when she describes her husband as old and alludes to younger men (possibly lovers) that catch her eye. In this passage, however, she is describing her fantasy lover, ‘A forky fure, ay furthwart and forsy in draucht, / Nother febill nor fant nor fulȝeit in labour’ (85–6) (A[?] fellow, forward and strong in drawing [i.e. as a horse], neither feeble nor faint nor worn-out in labour). Her ideal lover is portrayed as heroically masculine, as young, and, oddly, he is compared to a plough horse (although her terminology is now obscure to modern readers). By using these varied euphemisms and lexicons in new or unusual ways, and in such quick succession, the wife impressively demonstrates her wit and ability to repurpose familiar tropes to her own ends. Meanwhile, the undercurrent of violence inherent to the martial allusions is elaborated in very different terms in the second half of her speech. As will become apparent, the wife’s fantasy is diametrically opposed to her lived experienced. When the framework of the narrative grotesque is applied to her speech, it clarifies the conflation of these multiple subjectivities. The fanciful assertions of a world in which women could move independently through social spaces and relationships is cast in an initially jocular and comic light. Yet the feminine reality of sexual violence and unhappiness in marriage comes to the forefront during the flyting, which begins at line 89.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

168

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Using flyting as the foil to her dreamworld, as a form conducive to presenting a monstrous marital reality, the speech grotesquely fuses multiple perspectives on love by intertwining horror and humour and casting the wife’s words in a morally ambivalent light. On the level of poetics, Dunbar overspills boundaries by exercising a series of dissonant poetic forms and lexicons to explore the continuums of artificiality–authenticity and veracity–falsity, ultimately proving them to be malleable rhetorical features. Critics have previously noted the manifold allusions, sources, and connections woven into the narrative.6 This insubstantiality and instability of correlation and correspondence is as much an element of the grotesque as the horrified jocularity which characterises the tone of the response. Bounds of (in)appropriate conduct are one prominent current in the poem. On the face, it is rather obvious to note that the women act far beyond the standards of normative, appropriate feminine behaviour. But the nature of the narrative is such that either anti- or proto-feminist analysis proves a reductive endeavour.7 The Thewis is an octosyllabic couplet Scottish advisory poem that provides a compelling comparative opportunity not least because, as Emily Wingfield observes, ‘it is […] difficult to tell how far this is a poem sympathetic to women’s plights (particularly their economic situation) and how far it ascribes to traditional misogynistic views of women.’8 The sexually liberated dream that the wife expresses aligns remarkably closely with some guidance provided in the Thewis: and in þe kirk kepe our all thing fra smyrking, keking and bakluking; and eftir noyne on þe haly day Owþir pray or sport at honest play. (207–10)9 [and in the church keep above all from smiling, glancing about and looking around; and after nine on the holy day either pray or amuse [oneself] at honest entertainment.]

In the wife’s fantasy world she wishes ‘at fairis be found new faceis to se, / At playis and at preichingis and pilgrimages greit, / To schaw my renone royaly quhair preis was of folk’ (70–2) (to be found at fairs to see new faces, at plays and at preachings and great pilgrimages, to display my renown royally wherever crowds of people are);

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 169

and after wearing out her lover she declares she would ‘cast me to keik in kirk and in markat’ (81) (apply myself to look around in church and at market). The alliterative series the wife uses to encompass the breadth of her hunting grounds – plays, preaching, and pilgrimage – sets up an uncomfortable equivalency between profane and sacred spaces. The wife’s imagined keeking about the kirk is later picked up in real terms in the widow’s exemplum, where the behaviour is no longer a fantasy but an actual action undertaken by the widow. A Latin rubric, ‘aude vt dicet de viro suo’ (hear how she speaks of her husband),10 disrupts the first wife’s speech in the MF redaction. After this editorial insertion, the wife shifts from generalised response to tirade against her husband; MF’s compiler clearly recognised this shift in register. The Latin rubrication intensifies the change, since the use of Latin dislodges the reader from the Older Scots in which the poem is written. It is perhaps, then, even more disconcerting to return to the narrative at the point where the wife turns to crude and viciously clever language. In effect, this rubrication highlights the start of her invective, whether in warning or highlight. Ross assesses this passage with its abrupt shift in tone and matter and concludes that ‘the vituperative riches of the language are ransacked to find words contemptuous enough to convey violent rejection of aging flesh and impotent desire. The pointedness of the alliteration and rhetorical devices such as antithesis of sound and sense work devastatingly to force out images of the grotesque and obscene.’11 Rather than ransacking the language, Dunbar, through the voice of the wife, probes the borders of poetic expression to find an authentic, emotive, and authoritative voice. Flytings are intricate narratives of abuse that elaborately deride an opponent. Each flyting exchange reaches a crescendo with assonance, consonance, alliteration, and internal rhyme all jammed into a series of single lines. This creates passages that represent ‘the ultimate extreme of a paratactic, asyndetic syntax, with frequent prosiopesis, [and] […] minimal complexity of sentence-structure’.12 Unlike the first wife’s flyting in the Tretis, Dunbar’s flytings with Walter Kennedy (c. 1490–1505) are conducted in eight-line stanzas with rhyme patterned ababbccb or ababbcbc and which

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

170

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

generally maintain five-stress lines. Flyting places strict confines on ­alliteration and meter, whereas in the wife’s flyting the ­alliterative long line maintains a stronger narrative thread that naturally exhibits less extreme instances of asyndeton and parataxis, though both features are evident. Motifs and insults common to flytings appear with such frequency that the intentionality of this rhetorical association is clear. Directly following MF’s insertion of the Latin rubric the wife exclaims: ‘I haue ane wallidrag, ane worme, ane auld wobat carle, / A waistit wolroun na worth bot wourdis to clatter’ (89–90) (I have a waster, a worm, a hairy caterpillar of an old man, a wasted loafer, his worthless words nothing but chatter). In comparison, Dunbar flytes Kennedy: ‘Dissaitfull tyrand with serpentis tung vnstable, / Cukcald, cradoun, cowart and commoun theif’ (75–6) (Deceitful villain with a serpent’s treacherous tongue, cuckold, craven, coward and common thief). The wife’s invective creates a similar piling of abuse through parataxis and asyndeton; she omits a coordinating conjunction in line 89, while line 90 seems grammatically incomplete, since it continues the paratactic, asyndetic syntax of the previous line. Her words are reminiscent of another Dunbar poem too, ‘Off Februar the fyiftene nycht’, in which the devil’s court is described in wicked detail. The tenor of ‘Off Februar’ is something between flyting, horror, and folk festivity. In the first ten stanzas of the poem the court and company of Satan are described, while in the following ten he calls for a ‘heleand padȝane’ (109) (Highland pageant); this section is famous for the ridiculous, shit-covered joust between the tailor and cobbler (sowtar). In particular, among the personified seven deadly sins that attend Satan, the ‘fowll monstir Glutteny’ (91) (foul monster Gluttony) has beside him ‘full mony a waistles wallydrag’ (97) (very many impotent miserable creatures). In the lines following the wife’s invective these thematic elements of demonic horror give her indictment against her husband a similarly sinister patina. Bitterling notes that wallydrag appears as a term of abuse in both ‘Off Februar’ and the flytings and his analysis lends an important crosshatch to the horror themes immediately recalled by the abuse, namely that the next line in the wife’s response, also

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 171

alliterating on [w], leans on the opening insult ‘waistit wolroun’ (90) (­impotent, despicable creature).13 He observes that wolroun seems most a­ ccurately defined as a wild boar, but notes recent (at the time of his writing in 1984) critical commentary which prefers the definition of wolverine. The DSL currently identifies wolroun as ‘a despicable creature’, firstly, and, in the second sense, ‘a “contaminated” female animal of some sort,? perhaps influenced by Wolvering n. a wolverine, viewed specif. as gluttonous’. Although there is no consensus on the exact meaning of wolroun, the context in which it appears supports the gluttonous sexual connotations of the DSL definition. The combination of wallydrag and wolroun as abusive descriptors strengthens the links between the wife’s flyting and other poetic flytings, as well as horrific and festive poems. It is useful to consider briefly the Tretis’s pervasive animal imagery, which is especially pronounced in this invective portion of the wife’s response.14 Beyond referring to her husband as a waistit wolroun, she says his beard is as bristly as a boar (95) and ‘He fepillis like a farcy’ (114) (He sticks out his lip (?) like a draughthorse with farcy).15 The second wife, meanwhile, calls her husband a ‘snaill tyrit’ (176) (exhausted snail) in connection with his virility and says that ‘He dois as dotit dog that damys on all bussis, / And liftis his leg apon loft thoght he nought list pische’ (186–7) (He does as a stupid dog that pees on all bushes and lifts his leg up though he doesn’t wish to piss). It is worth recalling that in Palyce Venus calls the dreamer ‘als scharpe as ony snalys’ (717) (as bright as [a] snail), implying the dreamer is stupid. The wife’s insult maintains these insinuations of dullness, but combines them with a disparagement of her husband’s sexual vitality. Robert Henryson’s Fables offer a productive point of comparison for the obscure and exaggerated correlation between the women’s husbands and animals. In The Cock and the Fox, Henryson’s narrator opens by observing that, Thocht brutall beistis be irrationall, That is to say, wantand discretioun, Yet ilkane in thair kyndis naturall Hes mony divers inclinatioun: The bair busteous, the wolf, the wylde lyoun, […]

172

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Sa different thay ar in properteis Unknawin unto man and infinite, In kynd havand sa fell diversiteis, My cunning it excedis for to dyte. (397–401; 404–7) [Although brutish beasts are irrational, that is to say, without discretion, yet each in their species has many diverse tendencies: the violent boar, the wolf, the wild lion, […] so different are they in [their respective] traits, undiscovered by man and infinite, in nature having so many differences, it exceeds my understanding to write.]

This sentiment is repeated in The Trial of the Fox when the king of beasts, the lion, addresses his subjects as ‘brutall beistis and irrationall’ (857). And later, after the narrator attempts to name all of the beasts in attendance – inclusive of fantastical beasts such as the minotaur, werewolf, and the Pegasus; and animals with obscure names such as the bowranbane, bakon, fibert – he says, ‘and mony kynd of beistis I couth not know’ (920) (and many kinds of beasts I did not know). Henryson is careful to categorise his animals within each catalogue as well as emphasising the varying intelligence and demeanour of each. The attribution of animal characteristics to the husbands associates them with beasts that are perceived as violent, wild, and stupid or irrational. Additionally, there is a lexical connection in the sense that Henryson’s narrator must grasp at the bounds of his taxonomic vocabulary (and exceed modern readers’ knowledge of medieval taxonomy) in order to encapsulate all beasts. In the context of the Tretis the wife similarly searches for words that suitably express and describe her repulsive and violent husband. In this way, animal similes bring overtly sexual and violent themes to the fore, thereby strengthening the increasingly grotesque character of her speech, which melds repulsed horror with searingly witty invective. The first wife must thus probe the very edges of the lexicon available to her, and by extension the various forms of poetic expression, in order to convey her own truth. In the first half of her speech she confines herself to generic expectations and the conventional topoi of love as found in courtly poetics, primarily through the mating bird motif. When she shifts to outright invective she turns to a more vernacular and vulgar mode of expression, thus testing another

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 173

means by which sincerity and authenticity might be achieved. The wife continues her invective, ‘Ane bumbart, ane dronbee, ane bag full of flewme, / Ane scabbit skarth, ane scorpioun, ane scutarde behind. / To se him scart his awin skyn grit scunner I think’ (91–3) (An idiot, a bee, a bag full of phlegm, a scabbed monster, a scorpion, prone to diarrhoea. I’m revolted to see him scratch his own skin). Both Kennedy’s and Dunbar’s flytings offer useful points of comparison. Kennedy insults Dunbar: ‘Ignorant elf, aip, owll irregular, / Skaldit skaitbird and commoun skamelar, / Wanfukkit funling, that Natour maid ane yrle’ (36–8) (Ignorant elf, ape, irregular owl, scabbed bird and common parasite, misbegotten foundling that Nature made a dwarf). Meanwhile, Dunbar calls Kennedy a ‘skitterand scorpioun’ (58) (diarrhoeal scorpion), ‘skolderit skyn’ (122; 171) (shrivelled skin), and ‘Skyttand skarth, thow hes the hurle behind’ (194) (diarrhoeal monster, you have diarrhoea). Similarities in tone, diction, and theme are especially evident in the  concentration of ‘northern words of Anglo-Saxon origin’ or those of ‘uncertain or unknown origin’;16 bumbart, scarth, scutarde, scart, scunner, skaldit, skamelar, skitterand, skolderit, wanfukkit, funling, yrle – essentially every word quoted above fits Aitken’s criteria for vernacular diction and vulgarisms found especially in flyting abuse. Obscure terms of abuse were to some extent intentional: neologisms and anachronistic diction play notable roles in demonstrating the skill of a flyter and their oral-poetic ­language.17 The shift in register from seemingly conventional demande and response to invective shatters the audience’s p ­ erception of the narrative developed over the previous fifty lines. Where the first part of the wife’s speech adheres to courtly convention by interlacing innuendo with a reimagining of marital relations, this invective scathingly reveals her husband’s impotence and worthlessness. These failings are described, moreover, in sexually explicit terms: she refers to her husband’s ‘sary lwme’ (96) (worthless tool) and ‘sakles […] deidis’ (97) (innocent deeds [i.e. impotent advances]), for instance. Overall, her discourse reflects the audacity and skill required for poetic flyting. The humour provoked at this point exemplifies the narrative grotesque by dissonantly mingling opposed contexts and representations of various generic conventions. Setting, speaker, and tone are surprisingly disjointed, the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

174

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

hyperbole of the insults adds to the aggressive and dramatic flyting characteristics, and the abrupt shift between registers destabilises the more general genre categories associated with the poem. Moreover, the veil of secrecy inherent to the women’s discourse and the implication of drunkenness amplifies the humorous aspect of scandalous and unrestrained revelation. This narrative grotesque prompts the audience to question the premise of the demande, the norms of courtly behaviour, and feminine expression and sexuality. Next the wife introduces demonic and supernatural motifs when she identifies her husband as a ‘bogill’ (111) (bugbear), a ‘glowrand gaist’ (100) (staring ghost), ‘Mahowne’ (101) (Mohammed [i.e. the devil]), and ‘auld Sathane’ (102) (old Satan). Demonic imagery is not uncommon in flyting. Kennedy’s final response to Dunbar capitalises on a fantastical etymology for the surname Dunbar – he cites the origins of Dunbar’s surname to be ‘Dewlbeir’ thereby making him kin to the devil and also to every famous traitor in history (Scottish and otherwise). The extended eldritch scene in the Montgomery–Polwarth flyting of the later sixteenth century employs this demonic motif: Montgomery imagines Polwarth’s ancestors and kin to be various demonic and fairy spirits of the wilderness. Whereas the flytings engage in a contest between poets, in which decrying the unseemly origins of the opponent is an important component of the competition, the wife reviles her absent husband within a context of secret revelation and storytelling. Her story is a catalogue of personal experience that is so fraught with conflicting emotions that she must grasp at any and all modes of expression available to her. The turn towards demonic imagery intensifies the atmosphere by instilling a sense of horror within the narrative. While the preceding lines revile marriage, there is a certain light-heartedness as the wife sets her idyllic vision of pulling lads at every social opportunity and testing their sexual prowess. The acerbic tone of the flyting creates a narrative rupture that recasts the humour and tone of her discourse. Her insults, delivered with vicious aplomb, retain a comic tone as she channels flyting abuse where the rollicking pace and heavy alliteration drives the humorous energy. This clipped piling of insult, found at lines 89–99, gives way to an anecdotal narrative that assumes a darker character. The wife’s employment of flyting



Flyte of fancy 175

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

language, with its demonic and supernatural references, distorts the typical romantic and sexual preoccupations of the courtly demande by depicting her experience of the marital bed as a fiendishly horrific experience reminiscent of Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby: Bot quhen that glowrand gaist grippis me about, Than think I hiddowus Mahowne hes me in armes. Thair ma na sanyne me save fra that auld Sathane, For thocht I croce me all cleine fra the croun doun, He wil my corse all beclip and clap to his breist. (100–4) [But when that staring ghost grips onto me, then I think [the] hideous devil has me in [his] arms. There no sign of the cross may save me from that old Satan, for though I cross myself all the way down from the crown, he will embrace my body and amorously hold it to his breast.]

This turn to horror transforms the vitriolic and bawdy insults of the initial ten lines of invective to something eminently darker and more violent. The wife superstitiously crosses herself as protection from her husband’s violent sexual advances and, in characterising him in this fiendish manner, the invective becomes a more dreadful baring of secrets and truths, thereby newly invoking a grotesque sense of disjuncture and disorientation. Once again the wife transforms her discourse by weaving grim anecdotes from the obscene insults of flyting. She further vivifies her commentary on their carnal relations by describing the injuries she sustains in the course of her husband’s attentions: ‘He schowis on me his schewill mouth and schendis my lippis, / And with his hard hurcheone scyn sa heklis he my chekis / That as a glemand gleyd glowis my chaftis’ (106–8) (He shoves his twisted mouth on me and rips my lips, and his rough, hedgehog-like skin so tears and rends my jaw that my cheeks glow like embers). This depiction of her husband’s sexual advances grafts onto medieval accounts of demonic lovers and sex. In Walter Stephens’s analysis of medieval perceptions of demon lovers he observes that accused witches often described sex with demons as ‘joyless’ and he concludes that: ‘if their [the witches’] demon lovers had ever existed, witches might initially have been deceived by them but that, once they experienced such degrading sex, they

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

176

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

would have done their utmost to avoid it rather than eagerly seeking it again, as they were usually made to confess’.18 The first wife is certainly not portrayed as a witch or as having conducted witchcraft. What we might take from Stephens’s summary of corporeal sexual interactions with demonic entities is the apparently accurate analogy the wife draws between her marital bed and the medieval perception of demons and demonic sex. Witches repeatedly report being deceived by their demon lovers so that they believed they were having sex with a human up until the moments following ejaculation.19 Although Kennedy attributes Dunbar with demonic ancestry he does not detail demonic sexual relations beyond his comment that Dunbar’s ancestor was ‘generit betuix ane scho beir and a deill’ (259) (engendered between a she-bear and a devil), hence the corruption ‘Dewlbeir’. Andrew Wyntoun’s The Original Chronicle (c. 1420) provides a more detailed account of demonic lovers; he asserts that Macbeth was fathered by a devil that his mother met in the forest. The account is worth quoting at length: His moder to woddis wald oft repair For þe delite of hailsum aire. Sa, as scho went apon a day To wod all be hir ane to play, Scho met of caiß with a faire man, Neuer nane sa faire, as scho thocht þan, Sa mekle, sa strang, sa faire be sycht […] In sic aquayntans þare þai fell That, schortly þarof for to tell, Thare in þare gamyn and thare play That persone by þat woman lay, And on hir þat tyme a sone gat, This Makbeth […] And fra þis persone had wiþ hir pla[id], And had þe iurnay with hir done, And gottin had on hir a sone, He said he a deuill wes at him g[at], […] And þare apon in takynnyng



Flyte of fancy 177

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

He gaif his lemman þare a ring, And bad at scho suld keip it wei[ll], And for his luf had þat iowei[ll]. And efter þat oft vsit he To deill with hir in prevate. (1941–7; 1951–6; 1960–3; 1969–74)20 [His mother would often go to the woods for the enjoyment of the wholesome air. So, as she went one day all on her own to frolic, she met by chance a fairy man, never [one] so handsome, as she thought then, so vigorous, so strong, so fair to see. […] They fell into such an acquaintance, that, briefly to tell of it, there in their sport and their play, that person laid with that woman, and begot on her a son, this Macbeth […] And about this person that had played with her, and had done the work with her, and had begotten a son on her, he said he was a devil that begat him [Macbeth] […] And thereupon as an indication [of their relationship] he gave his lover there a ring, and asked her to keep it well, and for his love to keep that jewel. And after that he visited often to have dealings with her in private.]

As described by Stephens, the devil initially approaches the woman in an attractive human form and does not reveal his true identity until after conception. However, two further aspects of this scene are compelling when considered against the first wife’s response: Wyntoun calls the tryst between the devil and Macbeth’s mother a iurnay (1961). In this context the term seems to play on a less common meaning of journe(e: ‘a day’s performance in battle or tournament, a battle, a combat; a warlike expedition or excursion, a campaign; a feat of arms or action of war, generally’;21 Wyntoun applies this literal meaning on two other occasions in The Original Chronicle. In the quoted instance, iurnay clearly holds sexual connotations that are otherwise unattested by the DSL. As h ­ ighlighted  throughout this analysis, the first wife persistently mobilises martial and violent imagery in her depiction of sexual interactions. The second point of interest is the fact that the devil gifts Macbeth’s mother a ring (1969–74). The first wife ends her speech with a claim that she extorts all manner of goods from her husband, including, ‘A ring with a ryall stane or other riche iowell’ (140) (a ring with a stone [fit for a queen] or other rich jewel). More ­specifically she says,

178

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Ȝit leit I neuer that larbar my leggis ga betuene, To fyle my flesche na fummyll me without a fee gret, And thought his pen purly me payis in bed, His purse pays richely in recompense efter. (133–6)

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[Yet I never let that impotent creature go between my legs to defile my flesh nor fondle me without a great fee and though his pen pays me poorly in bed, his purse pays richly in recompense after.]

She amplifies this declaration by describing the exact sort of recompense she can expect from their sexual relations: gowns, jewels, and other valuables. Consequently, the grotesque is evoked in part because the first wife portrays herself as, essentially, outwitting the devil with her manipulative use of sex. Rather than succumbing to a ‘devil’, who has bound her with a ring, she demands rings and other luxury items in recompense for her sexual favours. She thus turns from victim to perpetrator and, in this process of ‘overcoming’ the devilish advances of her husband, the narrative metamorphoses yet again. In conclusion, the wife’s language maintains the obscenity of flyting but also becomes something more: although the flytings wallow in the vituperative excesses of obscene language, they do not orchestrate comparably extensive and graphic narratives of sexuality. Such shockingly explicit language plays into negative stereotypes about female concupiscence and the senex amans motif.22 More directly, her scheme reflects an admonishment found in the Thewis: for sum will be sa stoutly cled – þai will crab þar men in bed – Þat half þe richeß þat he haß Sall scant be worth his viffis claß. (59–62)23 [for some will be so richly clothed – they will irritate their men in bed – that half the riches that he has shall scant be worth [the cost of] his wife’s clothes.]

Persistently and pervasively the text insists on moral ambivalence: at one moment the women portray themselves as powerless victims of their feminine fate, while in the next they curl their lips with calculating smiles and devise schemes to enrich themselves. This

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 179

beguiling shift cuts all the more deeply, owing to the extremes achieved from the broadest thematic levels to the most granular lexical combinations. Despite the wife’s apparent triumph of feminine wiles, the horror of her husband’s assaults remains a dark undercurrent in her speech. In addendum to the above description of the wife’s marital relations, she says that she does not openly resist her husband’s advances for fear of his threats – ‘I schrenk for the scharp stound, bot schout dar I nought, / For schore of that auld schrew, schame him betide’ (109–10) (I shrink from the sharp pain, but I dare not shout because of the threats of that old shrew, shame befall him). In her opening taunts she placed herself in a position of power from which she could announce her disdain and disgust. However, alongside this shift towards horror, she portrays herself as a cowering victim who has no means by which to resist her husband’s sexual advances. Rather than the incriminating association of the opponent with fiendish entities as is typical of demonic imagery in the flytings, the wife employs the motif as a hyperbolic device to impress the distress and helplessness she faces. And, as detailed above, her speech culminates with her assertion that she receives material payment for her acquiescence. Consequently, any straightforward interpretation or judgement of her discourse proves elusive, as the audience must grapple with the multi-perspective view of the wife. Dunbar’s poem continually seeks to probe the edges of rhetorical authenticity and veracity; this project is developed through the ever-changing forms, motifs, and narratological styles that are brought to bear on the narrative. The wife’s sudden shift to horror and the extreme simile between her husband and Satan make available several interpretative possibilities: on one hand, as a narrator she seeks to reveal her interior life as authentically, vividly, and impressively as possible. Using this particular style of hyperbolic simile emphasises the extremity of her marital experience. But, in this process, she also exposes the instability and unreliability of her narratorial voice. She first declares that her husband is impotent, then swiftly turns to detailing his rough sexual demeanour from which she can only cower in abject terror, and later she shifts again to explain how she enriches herself from her travails. On the other hand, by portraying herself as engaging in coitus with Satan

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

180

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

she inadvertently raises the spectre of witchcraft and consorting with demonic forces. The first wife not only says that her husband is like Satan, but goes as far as saying she thinks she is actively being accosted by Satan when her husband comes to her, as if he is possessed and stronger than any sanyne (blessing; the sign of the cross). Although it would be imprudent to overemphasise the witchcraft connection, it should not be completely elided, particularly in consideration of the widow’s later sermonising, which instructs the women to conceal their cruel and evil interiority with an angelic mien.­

Anticipating the later Responses The wife’s discourse broadly anticipates the following two contributions. As noted above, the avian metaphors and sexual punning introduced in the early lines of her speech are made more explicitly sexual in the second wife’s response. The following chapter examines the second wife’s manipulation of the complaint form and the ‘courtly’ ethos. The imagery and tone invoked by the second wife  consistently plays off the material used in the first instalment of the first wife’s response and solidifies the link between the responses beyond a shared contempt for husbands. One example of this linking is the second wife’s deconstruction of courtly appearance as frivolous and superficial, which might loosely correlate with the  attractive façades employed by demonic lovers. The first wife foreshadows this intersection by introducing the concept of luf blenkis as an indicator of affection.24 And, as she describes her relationship, she manifests cracks in her own victimhood as she admits that her husband’s hawkish attention to her behaviour is perhaps not completely unfounded. Within her assertion of his anger, ‘euill thewis’ (119) (wicked behaviours), and ‘ymagynyng in mynd materis of euill’ (122) (imagining in [his] mind wicked matters) she laments her inability to ‘luke to my luf’ (120) (look at my love). The idea of love gazes and authentic communication is increasingly at odds as the next two women contribute their experiences with the gesture. More specifically, the second wife and the widow transform the signal into a potentially manipulated or manipulative gesture.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 181

The first wife observes: ‘The luf blenkis of that bogill fra his blerde ene  /  (As Belȝebub had on me blent) abasit my spreit’ (111–12) (The  loving looks of that bugbear from his bleary eyes (as [if] Beelzebub glanced at me) cast down my spirit). The senex amans trope, repeated several times in the text, is asserted with the characterisation of the husband’s poor eyesight. But, what makes this reference unsettling, rather than merely derisive, is the association of luf blenkis with the gaze of Satan. This description is transmuted later as the second wife and widow weaponise the gesture. Throughout the text the roles of victim and perpetrator are constantly in flux – where the first wife is oppressed by her husband’s fiendish luf blenkis, the second wife uses them to mock her husband (she passes off her disdainful glares as loving glances), and the widow uses them to lure unwitting victims. In the Tretis the perspective from which an act or description is viewed affects whether it is seen as harmful or helpful; the grotesque is ideal for untangling these threads, as it makes clear that language  is an ambivalent instrument able to convey a multiplicity of meanings. Furthermore, poetics are shown to be capable of forming a literary work that, while rooted in literary tradition, bursts forth from its constraints. Through an exposition of marital power dynamics and poetic renderings of love, Dunbar thus interrogates the limits of poetic and rhetorical composition by asking what effects narratorial voice, perspective, and form have on poetic making. Beyond the individual renderings of certain motifs such as luf blenkis, thematic trends are also refracted across the speeches. The darker tone showcased during the first wife’s flyting finds an answer readily in the widow’s contribution: the first wife introduces the concept of euill thewis or ‘euill myndis’ (267) (wicked thoughts), which is later reformed in the widow’s response. Expanding and solidifying the theme of monstrosity and horror, the first wife says her husband ‘full of eldnyng is and anger and all euill thewis’ (119) (is full of jealousy and anger and all wicked behaviours) and further, ‘He is sa full of ielusy and engyne fals, / Euer ymagynyng in mynd materis of euill’ (121–2) (He is so full of jealousy and deceptive skill, always imagining in [his] mind wicked things) and ‘For eldnyng of that ald schrew that euer on euill thynkis’ (126) (Because of [the]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

182

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

jealousy of that old shrew that always thinks about ­wickedness). This repetitive emphasis on the jealous and evil/wicked nature of her husband reinforces the disdainful yet victimised role the first wife creates for herself. Beyond the husband’s jealous domination, the assertion of wicked thoughts and conduct – and the condemnation thereof – is, perhaps surprisingly, later echoed in the widow’s command for the wives to take up deceptive behaviour to disguise their wicked thoughts and manipulations. Yet again, the roles of victim and perpetrator are relative to the perspective of the speaker and audience. This contrast is further compounded by the first wife’s identifying her husband as an ald schrew: this quality later reappears under the widow’s proud claim that she ‘wes a schrew euer’ (251) (was always a shrew). The first wife’s speech closes with a return to the narrator’s vantage. In it he again turns the tables with his first refrain-like assessment of the scene. He observes, Quhen that the semely had said hir sentence to end, Than all thai leuch apon loft with latis full mery And raucht the cop round about, full off riche wynis, And ralȝeit lang, or thai wald rest, with ryatus speche. (146–9) [When the beauty had delivered her discourse to [the] end, then all [of] them laughed loudly with very merry demeanours and passed the cup around, full of rich wine, and jested long, without pause, with licentious words.]

Semely is commonly found in alliterative Scots poetry and it indicates an attractive person (both physically and in demeanour). Here, semely alliterates with sentence, which essentially recalls a more formal and elegant mode of discourse than what precedes and it reiterates the courtly mode that contextualises the narrative. The pairing of these terms recalls the refined milieu in which the women apparently circulate. By employing them as an ironic, alliterative pair marking the end of the wife’s speech, the narrator subtly fractures the link between audience and speaker. In the ranting attack against her husband the wife’s nobility has been momentarily ­forgotten – as much a function of the shocking content of her speech as the dexterous linguistic performance she gives. Asserting that the women ralȝeit further impresses the grotesque mood of the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 183

speech and the narrative more widely. The primary meaning is ‘to jest or make merry, to sport’, while the secondary definition is ‘to rail or inveigh’.25 In fact both meanings are well suited to the conversation between the women and their individual contributions therein. Ralȝeit alliterates with ryatus, an equally ‘problematic’ adjective (at least in reference to feminine behaviour), which asserts that their speche is both uncontrolled and licentious. The audience is lured into the wife’s impressive display of rhetorical wit and bawdy invective and, in the process, the ‘proper’ behaviour expected of her social class and gender is elided. The narrator’s interjection recalls the audience to the transgressive quality of her speech. As the Thewis instructs, women are not to ‘rage with rybaldry’ (85) (behave wantonly with debauched language) nor ‘oyß nouþir flyting, sturt no striff’ (117) (practise habitually neither flyting, contentious behaviour, nor discord).26 The narrator’s short commentary appears two more times in similar form (and in modified but thematically matching terms in the Latin rubrics that follow). By emphasising their heavy drinking, laughter, and loud jesting the narrator effectively creates a scene anathema to the image of the courtly or upper-class lady. Lisa Perfetti describes medieval perceptions of female laughter: medieval physicians believed that women were more prone to laughter as a result of their ‘excessive, shifting fluids and wandering uterus [which made them] less able to control any inappropriate impulse to laugh’.27 Based on this perception, medieval decorum manuals for women discouraged unrestrained laughter, arguing that it lessened beauty by creating wrinkles and exposing the gaping mouth.28 The wife’s transgressive diatribe undermines these conventions, while also foreshadowing the next wife’s speech. Her speech, furthermore, sets an expectation of equally lewd content in the next contribution; the premise of the courtly demande game has been so twisted that flyting and ribald jests overtake the ‘courtly’ narrative trajectory.

Notes  1 Rhodes, Elizabethan Grotesque, p. 26.   2 Rhodes, Elizabethan Grotesque, p. 26.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

184

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

 3 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 287; the note to lines 60–3 calls attention to the similarity of the passage with Lydgate’s The Floure of Curtesy (c.1401): ‘[…] “Alas, what may this be, / That every foule hath his lyberté / Frely to chose, after his desyre, / Everyche his make thus, fro yere to yere?’ (53–6). Line references from John Lydgate, The Floure of Curtesye, in The Chaucerian Apocrypha: A Selection, ed. Kathleen Forni (online: Medieval Institute Publications, 2005).  4 Line references from Hector Boece, trans. William Stewart, The Buik of the Croniclis of Scotland or a Metrical Version of the History of Hector Boece by William Stewart, ed. William Turnbull (eBook: Cambridge University Press, 2014).  5 DSL, ‘galland, galand, n.1.’  6 Bitterling, ‘Some Comments on Words, Imagery, and Genre’, outlines a trove of possible textual connections, although his analysis is rather brief.  7 See Perfetti, Women and Laughter, in which she considers the connection between conduct literature and the women’s inappropriate laughter in the Tretis.  8 Wingfield, ‘The Thewis off Gudwomen’, p. 86. See The Thewis off Gudwomen, in Ratis Raving and Other Early Scots Poems on Morals, ed. R. Girvan (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood & Sons, 1939). The poem exists separately in two manuscripts, but also appears within the demandes d’amour in BKA, discussed in the previous chapter.  9 Girvan, Thewis, offers facing texts from the two manuscript witnesses. This passage is quoted St John’s College Cambridge MS G 23 (hereafter MS J), but it is also present in Cambridge University Library MS Kk.1.5 (6) (hereafter MS C). The two passages are worded differently, but express the same sentiments. (Italics original). 10 Translation from Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 288. 11 Ross, William Dunbar, p. 222. 12 Aitken, ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, p. 13. Aitken here refers to Howlat, and he finds similar patterns in Hary’s Wallace. Bitterling, ‘Some Comments on Words, Imagery, and Genre’, 13 pp. 340– 1. 14 David Parkinson brought to my attention the significance of these animal motifs. 15 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, suggests the definition for fepillis, but the word is not recorded in DSL. 16 Aitken, ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, p. 20.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Flyte of fancy 185

17 C. Flynn and C. Mitchell, ‘“It may be verifyit that thy wit is thin”: Interpreting Older Scots Flyting through Hip Hop Aesthetics’, Oral Tradition 29.1 (2014), 69–86. In terms of its roots in oral performance flyting uses a highly specific oral-poetic register that is demonstrated by the flyter’s use of archaic diction and new coinages. 18 W. Stephens, Demon Lovers: Witchcraft, Sex, and the Crisis of Belief (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003), p. 19. 19 Cf. Stephens, Demon Lovers, pp. 13–20. 20 Line references from Andrew Wyntoun, The Original Chronicle of Andrew of Wyntoun, Volume IV, ed. F. J. Amours (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1906) (italics and brackets original). 21 DSL, ‘journe(e, journa(y, jurnay, n. 5.’ 22 Perfetti, Women and Laughter, pp. 104–112, and Ross, William Dunbar, pp. 221–3, discuss the realities of age difference in medieval marriages alongside the literary interpretation and representation of these fears as they appear in the Tretis in more detail. 23 This passage, quoted from MS J, is absent in MS C. 24 Cf. Cupid’s deceptions at Dido’s banquet in Douglas, Eneados, Book I, Chapter XI. 25 DSL, ‘ra(i)lȝe, raleȝe, relȝie, v.’ 26 From MS J. 27 Perfetti, Women and Laughter, p. 6. 28 Perfetti, Women and Laughter, p. 7.

6

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Lovesick or sick of love? The second wife’s response

The labyrinthine network of distortion and rupture found in the Tretis is overlaid with a comic tone that fluctuates between satirical, sarcastic, and ironic. The second wife’s response compellingly asserts the destructive and innovative nature of Dunbar’s poem by reimagining the complaint within the framework of the demande d’amour and the secretive, confessional atmosphere of the women’s conversation. In transition between the first and second wives’ responses the widow reiterates her original demande, exhorts the second wife to be truthful, and assures the general secrecy of the proceedings. Blatantly transgressing courtly norms, the second wife launches into her own invective that revels in a sexually explicit assessment of her husband and marriage. The second wife does not take advantage of the same vitriolic intensity as the first wife though she does develop thematic strands introduced in that speech. Her rebuke is rather abruptly undercut when she drops her bitter and acerbic diatribe to lament her personal fate. This aspect of the response tests the flexibility of the literary love complaint, arguably the most elastic expression of courtly love poetics. Just as the complaint is often found as a lamenting lyric or ballade within a longer text, so too is the second wife’s complaint. The double work of her speech as both a response to a demande d’amour and a complaint is indicative of the genre trouble plaguing the Tretis. Applying the framework of the narrative grotesque to the second wife’s speech makes possible a more nuanced reading of her contribution as a commentary on poetic veracity and authenticity and on rhetorical inventiveness divested from the constraints of tradition.



Lovesick or sick of love? 187

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

The widow begins by entreating the wife to respond to the demande candidly. Her request reflects some markers of the literary complaint, namely that the speaker should express themselves with authenticity and veracity in order to evoke the depth of suffering experienced by the lover. In this regard, the widow exhorts the second wife, How haif ȝe farne? Be ȝour faith, confese ws the treuth. That band to blise or to ban, quhilk ȝow best thinkis, Or how ȝe like lif to leid in to lell spousage? And syne my self ȝe exem on the samyn wise, And I sall say furth the suth, dissymyland no word.’ The plesand said, ‘I protest, the treuth gif I schaw, That of ȝour toungis ȝe be traist.’ The tothir twa grantit. (153–9) [How have you fared? In good faith, confess [to] us the truth. That bond to bless or to curse, which [do] you think best, or how does it please you to lead life in faithful matrimony? And since you will examine me in the same manner, I shall give forth the truth, [without] dissembling a word.’ The pleasing woman said, ‘I demand, that if I reveal the truth, [you will hold your tongues, i.e. be trustworthy]’. The other two agreed.]

Crucially, the pact between the women is based on establishing mutual trust and all three women are expected to answer with veracity and authenticity. A pledge of discretion and secrecy is offered by the widow to ensure that the women feel comfortable exposing their innermost thoughts and feelings. In this way the women’s conversation differs sharply from conventional courtly debate, demande d’amour, or love complaint: while these poetic conversations or monologues may take place in private, there is no sense of secrecy inherent to their expression. The distinction between privacy and secrecy as established in the Tretis deeply affects the mood and tone of the conversation. Even more striking is the division between private and public against this continuum of secrecy and privacy. In their dark, secluded corner of the garden, apparently concealed from other listeners, the women find a space to express their deepest and most private experiences. But, unlike the sort of public affirmation normally required by the demande d’amour, the women come to

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

188

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

an understanding that their words will never be revealed and that they are protected by the fleeting circumstance and company of the night-time setting. Thus the women agree that in order for their expression of love to be achieved most authentically it must be done in secret among trusted companions and away from the tensions and pressures of public expectation. Another facet of the widow’s reiteration of the demande is the latent allusion to conduct literature and standards of decorum, an aspect discussed in the preceding chapters. The widow’s repeated question, ‘That band to blise or to ban, quhilk ȝow best thinkis, / Or how ȝe like lif to leid in to lell spousage?’ (154–5), is characteristic of the textual allusions across the narrative more broadly, since  it evokes etiquette advice on a general scale. The Thewis asserts, ‘and gif scho be in goddis band, / Be leil and trew till hir husband’ (141–2) (and if she is in the bond of marriage, be faithful and true to her husband).1 The rote acceptance of appropriate marital, or rather wifely, behaviour is asserted by such direct statements in conduct discourse. However, the widow’s question carries a ­distinctly sarcastic tone, coming as it does on the heels of the first  wife’s vitriolic and horrifying tirade. The conjunction of a demand for honesty against the sarcasm of the query reifies dire  warnings about appropriate feminine companionship in the Thewis: and our al thing, as oft said I, kep hir fra cankyryt cumpany, Fra foul wordis and wnhonest; Fare langag is euir prasyt best. (179–82)2 [and above all, as I have often said, [she should] keep herself from corrupt company, from ugly words and dishonesty; courteous language is always praised best.]

At this point in the Tretis, the demande narrative frame is becoming increasingly brittle and the expectations normally associated with courtly debate are beginning to fracture under the weight of the wife’s invective and the widow’s leading questions. Additionally, considering this correlation between the Thewis and the Tretis highlights the issue of ‘adept speech’ as an indicator of morality as a signal theme in the discourse.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 189

The second wife’s response continues this grotesque rupturing of form and language, but she focuses on deconstructing the standards by which love is described and judged. Foul wordis are an essential component of this commentary. Indecorous language is repeatedly used by the women as a means for narrating their stories with honesty, despite the fact that it directly contravenes the correlation between fair language and honesty in conduct discourse. The dichotomy between foul language/dishonesty and fair language/ honesty is imploded through the second wife’s rendering of her marriage in obscene detail and with bawdy language, insisting all the while on the absolute veracity of her account. In contrast, when the second wife turns her attention to her husband’s fair wordis (190), she argues that men use pretty language to conceal the ‘eldnyng and anger ther hertis within’ (204) (jealousy and anger within their hearts). Eldnyng is a word of obscure origin and the only examples occur in the Tretis. The verb eindill appears in the second half of the sixteenth century with the sense of ‘to be or to become jealous’. It is found in this context in Richard Maitland’s poem Solace in Age. Several stanzas of this poem provide an intriguing clue to the connotations of word: Off venus play past is 3e heit ffor I may not 3e mistiris beit Off meg nor mald ffor ane 3oung las I am not meit I am sa ald The fairast wenche in all 3is toun Thocht I hir had in hir best gown Rycht braiflie braild Withe hir I mycht not play 3e loun I am so ald my wyff Sum tyme wald telis trow and mony lesingis weill allow war of me tald Scho will not eyndill on me now and I sa ald (26–40)3 [Of Venus’s play, the heat is passed. For I may not relieve mistress nor country girl nor maidservant, I am not fit for a young lass, I am so

190

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

old. The fairest woman in all this town, though I had her in her best gown, splendidly decked out, I could not play the rogue, I am so old. My wife for some time would give credence to gossip and, granted, many lies were told about me, she will not have jealousy of me now because I am so old.]

The discussion of sexual impotence owing to old age is thus connected with the cessation of jealousy – in this case the wife’s jealousy of her husband’s adulterous escapades. In the Tretis, the wives describe strikingly similar scenarios, also with older husbands, except from the feminine perspective. It would perhaps come as a surprise to Maitland’s narrator, but they are not jealous so much as disgusted. Ironically, the second wife goes on to assert her own use of fair wordis via terms of endearment as a cover for her roiling hatred and resentment. In the Tretis the concepts of good/bad and honesty/dishonesty are slippery and elusive. In spite of this constant sense of fluctuation and metamorphosis, the second wife’s narrative flows with dexterous ease, thereby inspiring the grotesque mixture of emotions which dominate the Tretis. Affect and its relationship with rhetoric is an essential component of the poem and the terms in which Dunbar explores this relationship fundamentally upend conventional modes of discourse. This is particularly evident in relation to Dunbar’s innovative take on the complaint form. In an analysis of the literary complaint James Wimsatt identifies the driving forces behind Guillaume de Machaut’s Le Jugement dou Roy de Behaingne (hereafter Le Jugement) and Chaucer’s The Complaint of Mars: ‘Mars’ one-stanza proem and the balade [Le Jugement] have in common a concern with poetics, an argument for sincerity in “making”, a consciousness of audience criticism, and a profession that the complaint arises from genuine wounds of Love.’4 Chaucer’s sly handling of these themes in The Complaint of Mars serves as a good example of a critique which questions but does not deconstruct the tradition; Chaucer creates unreliable narrators that call into question the way poetics shape and convey authenticity, veracity, and trustworthiness, but he does not fully reject the formal conventions.5 The Tretis, on the other hand, warps the complaint completely by redefining how these ­existential questions are understood and reported.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 191

In terms of construction and function, W. A. Davenport points out that the complaint is not so much a form as a mode of expression. It is commonly found inset in longer texts, such as the dream vision or ‘courtly’ verse, and often takes the structure of a lyric or ballade. The essential component underpinning the complaint is the lover’s lament or, as Davenport puts it, ‘the lover’s expression of suffering’. Davenport postulates that the form’s tendency towards dramatic artifice offered poets diverse possibilities because ‘decoration and ceremony were a challenge to the technique of the poet and the Gothic richnesses of patterned exuberance to which a heroine’s distress might give rise could themselves be seen as the source of invention and discovery in poetry’.6 Davenport’s remark is illuminating in the context of Dunbar’s poem, since it privileges the aesthetic appeal of such patterned and ornamented language. In this reading, conventionality itself poses an enticing challenge to the poet who wishes to innovate. Machaut’s Le Jugement, for instance, depicts the suffering of the lovers in rich, even visceral detail, but without transgressing the confined strictures of courtly debate; his lovers remain polite and patient despite their emotional suffering. The Tretis also offers richly ‘decorated’ poetic representations of grief, but Dunbar affects this by constructing a complex mosaic of form, register, and language in which pretence and manners are discarded as impediments to authenticity. Dunbar does not limit his composition to conventional precepts, rather he pulls from any and all sources in order to craft something decorative, poignant, exuberant, and, above all, grotesque. The discordant note already struck in the framing of the demande is underlined in the opening of the second wife’s speech in which she portrays her response as the voiding of venom, a purge of black bile: ‘To speik,’ quod scho, ‘I sall nought spar, ther is no spy neir. I sall a ragment reveil fra rute of my hert, A roust that is sa rankild quhill risis my stomok. Now sall the byle all out brist, that beild has so lang. For it to beir on my breist wes berdin our hevy. I sall the venome devoid with a vent large, And me assuage of the swalme that suellit wes gret.’ (161–7)

192

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[‘To speak’, she said, ‘I shall spare nothing, there is no spy nearby. I shall disclose a discourse from the root of my heart, a rancour that has so festered that it turns my stomach. Now shall the bile burst out, which has built for so long. To bear it in my heart has been a heavy burden. I shall eject the venom with a large discharge and assuage myself of the greatly engorged swelling.’]

The wife is concerned with veracity and authenticity, but of a wholly different kind than that attested by Wimsatt where he notes that Le Jugement and The Complaint of Mars both demonstrate ‘a consciousness of audience criticism’ (75). In the latter two narratives the complainants are acutely aware of reception, whether within or outwith their respective textual universes.7 In contrast, the wife’s speech is validated precisely by the fact that there is no one to overhear her words – she can speak plainly and without artifice. Of course, she does speak to two other women, but the preceding passage illustrates the care they take in establishing the terms of their confessions. By emphasising the private and personal nature of the complaint, the wife is not beholden to the refined language of love or formal courtly love play, as conventionally called for in love debates or complaints. Her ragment mingles both senses of the term – it does double work as a long, slightly rambling discourse and a sort of legal testimony to her marital tribulations.8 Furthermore, this ragment apparently comes from the heart and thus should be a genuine expression of her interior life. In The Quare of Jelusy, an anonymously composed Scottish poem found only in the manuscript compendium Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Arch. Selden. B. 24 (c. 1489), the eavesdropping narrator observes and relates an anonymous lady’s complaint: Sche sorowit, sche sikit, sche sore compleynit; So sobirly sche spak that I no mycht Not here one word quhat that sche said arycht. Bot wele I herd, sche cursit prevaly The cruell vice of causeles Jelousye. (52–6)9 [She grieved, she sighed, she complained grievously; she spoke so quietly that I was unable to properly hear one word that she said. But I heard well [that] she privately cursed the cruel vice of causeless Jealousy.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 193

After listening to the woman curse Jealousy and appeal to the classical gods, including Hymen, Pluto, Diana, and Jupiter, the narrator decides to comfort her, but before he can emerge from his hiding spot another woman appears and the two leave together. Similarly to the second wife, the lady in The Quare assumes complete privacy in her complaint; she rather appeals directly to celestial powers: ‘Sche wepit so a quhile, till at the last / With that hir voce and eyne to hevin sche cast’ (57–8) (She wept so [for] awhile, until at last with that she cast her voice and eyes to heaven). This example of the complaint highlights the dichotomy between private and public in an unusual fashion: the woman does not seek to convey her feelings or distress to an audience of any description. Her interaction with the other woman comes after she finishes speaking and the narrator is unable to report any conversation that they have. Instead, the narrator editorialises her complaint in a lengthy exposition that self-consciously shifts to a stanzaic apostrophe to women, a discourse about jealousy in rhyme royal, and eventually a condemnation of the allegory of Jealousy. Although the narrator seems to take the side of women against their jealous lovers, the woman’s voice is elided in this discourse. In contrast, the Tretis purports to be an honest transcription of the women’s conversation and the narrator makes no overt claim to moral judgement or commentary, despite his critical interjections. Rather, the deconstruction of these principles and poetic techniques is orchestrated by means of the pervasively grotesque narrative. Ultimately, a lengthier comparison between the two complaints might reveal a trend towards re-evaluating the complaint as a form of personal revelation in Scottish writing during the later fifteenth century more widely. Although that is beyond the focus of this chapter, a Scottish tendency towards reworking traditional modes  of poetic expression during the period culminates in both Douglas’s and Dunbar’s work. In establishing the premise and mood of her complaint the second wife employs the medieval medical terminology of melancholia caused by a surplus of black bile and in so doing presents her speech as both a symptom and a curative. Both Galen and Avicenna identify an excess of black bile as a cause of melancholia and describe several forms which it could take: one centred in the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

194

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

mind, one running throughout the blood, and a third centred in the gastric system. This latter manifestation was apparently often accompanied by expulsion – vomiting, flatulence, and burping – and caused melancholia through a sooty, smoky vapour rising to infect the mind, as described by Galen in On the Affected Parts.10 In the wife’s speech melancholia becomes intertwined with lovesickness, a closely linked condition, at least symptomatically. Her entire speech, in fact, sets about conflating the two conditions: this initially bile-induced melancholia slides into a tangled explanation of her interior life before finally morphing into a performance of courtly lovesickness. In this moment, the alliteration on the plosive bilabial [b] in the lines: ‘Now sall the byle all out brist, that beild has so lang. / For it to beir on my breist wes berdin our hevy’ (164–5), especially, evokes a sort of onomatopoeic retching action and sound, in effect highlighting and telegraphing the sustained centrality of the lovesickness motif in her speech.

Puns and play in the first and second responses Although the preface makes reference to lovesickness and establishes the second wife’s monologue as a rambling discourse, she initially adopts the vitriolic tone and quick pace of flyting already introduced in the first wife’s response. In general, this section of her response maintains the form and language conventional to the demande–response mode, though the wife undoubtedly pushes against the bounds of acceptably sexy material. Her confession opens with shocking simplicity and directness: ‘My husband wes a hur maister, the hugeast in erd’ (168) (My husband was a whore master, the biggest on earth), before leaping into an invective which amplifies the first wife’s martial and agrarian puns and euphemisms. The play on fresch illustrates this point well. In the opening of her response the first wife imagines a suitable partner as part of her chimeric sexual fantasy: ‘A forky fure, ay furthwart and forsy in draucht, / Nother febill nor fant nor fulȝeit in labour, / Bot als fresche of his forme as flouris in May’ (85–7). Puns are formed on farm activities: in draucht and labour are linked to ploughing or bearing the yoke and she associates sexual vigour with the concept

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 195

of being either ‘fresh’ or ‘worn-out’. The second wife reiterates these descriptive cues when she describes her husband’s wilting sexual competency: ‘For he is fadit full far and feblit of strenth. / He wes as flurising fresche within this few ȝeris, / Bot he is falȝeid full far and fulȝeid in labour’ (171–3) (For he is fully faded and enfeebled. He was flourishingly fresh in his first few years, but [now] he is completely weakened and worn-out in labour). She mimics the first wife’s metaphorical and lexical catalogue and maintains the same [f] alliterative initial. However, she inverts the first wife’s fantasy. Instead of dreaming about a never-tiring, fresh-as-a-flower lover, she reviles her wilted and enfeebled husband. More generally, the first wife’s exuberantly outlandish fantasy of a rotation of lovers is transformed in the second wife’s response where her cynical perspective mobilises the first wife’s (bawdy) language of fantasy to condemn her husband. This jaded attitude persists throughout the speech and accounts in large part for the dissolution of the complaint and its attendant precepts under the wife’s gimlet eye. The martial connotations available to fresch appear in both wives’ use of the term. The first wife asserts that birds have a better system whereby they ‘fangis thame ane fresche feyr, vnfulȝeit and constant, / And lattis thair fulȝeit feiris flie quhair thai pleis’ (62–3). She contends that humans would be better served by this avian system: ‘We suld haue feiris as fresche to fang quhen vs likit’ (66) (We should have partners as fresh to take when we like). The second wife repeats this sentiment: ‘Than suld I haif a fresch feir to fang in myn armys. / To hald a freke quhill he faynt may foly be calit’ (209–10) (Then I would have a fresh partner to take in my arms. To hold a man while he’s feeble may be called folly). The multilayered meanings available to these lines are apparent when set against a line from The Knightly Tale of Golagros and Gawane (terminus ad quem 1508, hereafter Golagros): ‘On fute freschly thai frekis feghtin thai fang’ (630) (On foot, the warriors freshly engaged in combat).11 When juxtaposed with the battle scene from Golagros, the influence of heroic alliterative narrative is clear: the concept of being fresch in the martial sense indicates the vigour and tenacity with which the men engage. Hanna’s gloss of ‘fresch(ly)’ (adj./adv.) as ‘vigorous(ly), active(ly)’ in his edition of Golagros is provocative, since ‘vigour’ is a common innuendo for sexual ­aptitude and

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

196

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

this meaning is certainly transferred to fresch in the Tretis, thus transforming the word, which has been hitherto unremarked as an innuendo or to be otherwise sexually connotative. Similarly, preceding the demandes d’amour in BKA, Ydea commends Ydory’s taste in men: ‘Ȝe haue nocht falȝeit for to cheis at richt, / For ȝe haue chosin ane freche and wourth knicht’ (7991–2)12 (You have not failed to choose rightly, for you have chosen a vigorous and worthy knight). Again, the martial quality of fresch takes precedence over explicitly sexual connotations. In the Tretis the same sentiments are transferred to the bedchamber, where the man must also fight a ‘battle’. The second wife says later that her husband boasts of his radis (194) (raids) in the bedchamber, further affirming the consistent use of militaristic terminology for sexual exploits. Her statement, moreover, engages the violent language used by the first wife in reference to her husband’s sexual advances and the attendant collocation of these advances with demonic imagery. At the most granular level of individual words, Dunbar invests the narrative with a variety of conflicting, complementary, and new meanings. In the following lines the wife primarily concerns herself with detailing her husband’s numerous sexual imbroglios and, in the excitement of revealing her secrets, she adds increasingly graphic detail to her account: He has bene lychour so lang quhill lost is his natur, His lwme is vaxit larbar and lyis in to swoune. […] He has bene waistit apon wemen or he me wif chesit, And in adultre in my tyme I haif him tane oft. (174–5; 178–9) [He has been a lecher for so long that he has lost his nature, his tool has grown exhausted and lies in swoon. […] He has been wasted on women before he chose me as wife and I have often [committed] adultery in my time.]

She continues to amplify themes and phrases that appear in the first wife’s speech: at line 174 the wife puns on natur; however, unlike the term’s appearance within the avian mating metaphor in the first wife’s response when she refers to ‘the law of luf, of kynd, and of nature’ (58), the sexual innuendo available to the term is now

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 197

f­oremost. Alliteration on [l] continues at line 175 as she intensifies her allusion to the first wife’s speech with her assertion that his lwme is vaxit larbar; the first wife declares that when a woman finishes with a lover she should be able to dismiss him without compunction: ‘And gif all larbaris thair leveis quhen thai lak curage’ (67) (and give all impotent creatures their leave when they lack vigour); and she denigrates her husband’s virility: ‘Bot soft and soupill as the silk is his sary lwme’ (96) (But his worthless tool is soft and supple as silk). Echoes of the first wife’s flyting are also found in the second wife’s assertion that her husband is waistit apon wemen at line 178. Recall that the first wife declares that her husband is ‘a waistit wolroun na worth bot wourdis to clatter’ (90). Foul wordis indeed, the expansion and confirmation of the impotency theme in such graphic terms serves as a strong linking device between the wives’ responses. The second wife thus confirms the dialogic nature of the demande, but in graphic terms wholly unusual to the typical demande d’amour or love debate genre. Cloaked in the protection of confession and a pledge to honesty, her response implies a (pseudo-)guileless claim to truth-telling. This tension between unprompted, vicious, and cruel abuse and ‘innocent’ and truthful response to the widow’s question enhances the comic tension. As evident from the above discussion, her attack begins with an exposition of her husband’s sexual profligacy and subsequent impotency. But it soon extends to an indictment of the fraudulent trappings of courtly behaviour and appearance. The flyting-like response thus exhibits a clever strategy insofar as the wife uses her private revelations to humiliate her husband sexually before she describes his outward show of seductive charm. Rhetorically, his performance of masculine stereotypes becomes the punchline of the joke, owing to the audience’s knowledge of his cuckolded ignorance and sexual inadequacy. She construes his public persona: And 3it he is als brankand with bonet on syde, And blenkand to the brichtest that in the burght duellis, Alse curtly of his clething and kemmyng of his haris, As he that is mare val3eand in Venus chalmer. He semis to be sumthing worth, that syphyr in bour, He lukis as he wald luffit be, thoght he be litill of valour. (180–5)

198

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[And yet he is also prancing [around] with bonnet [cocked] to the side, and glancing to the prettiest that dwell in the town, also courtly in his clothing and [the] combing of his hair, as [one] that is more valorous in Venus[’s] chamber. He seems to be worth something, that worthless creature in bower, he looks as [if] he would be a lover, but he is of little worth.]

By shifting the thematic focus of the flyting to public perception, the wife’s speech also brings to bear the weight of conventional tropes concerning the appearance and manners appropriate to lovers. This unflinching condemnation takes on even greater significance in the following lines where the wife fully commits to her complaint. She foregrounds her complaint by swiftly deconstructing conventional courtly ideals, namely the extreme value placed on appearance and behaviour is revealed to be a fraudulent contrivance. His swaggering demeanour also recollects the figure of ‘Pryd’ (Pride) in ‘Off Februar the fyiftene nycht’ who dances ‘with bair wyld bak and bonet on syd’ (17) (with bare, savage back and bonnet [cocked] to the side). Perhaps even the elderly narrator of Solace in Age presents an inverse view of this situation when he laments his inability to perform sexually with ‘the fairast wenche in all ȝis toun / Thocht I hir had in hir best gown / Rycht braiflie braild’ (31–3) (the fairest woman in all the town, even if I had her in her best gown, splendidly decked out). By reviling her husband and exposing his ridiculous posturing, the second wife calls attention to the superficiality of lovers, husbands, and eventually all men, in addition to love poetry and the conventions it promotes. This condemnation intensifies as she asserts not only the superficiality and worthlessness of outward behaviour and appearance, but also the deceptive or misleading possibilities of verbal expression. She says of her husband’s boasting words: ‘fair wordis but effect, all fruster of dedis’ (190) (courteous words only affected, completely useless in deeds) and that ‘he ralis and makes repet with ryatus wordis’ (193) (he talks wildly and makes a fuss with licentious words). Strikingly, the aspersions she casts on his character reflect back onto the conversation between the women – the narrator concludes his record of the first wife’s response by observing that the women ‘ralȝeit lang, or thai wald rest, with ryatus speche’ (149).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 199

And the first wife certainly makes grandiose claims about her fantasy of sexual promiscuity. The audience’s unique position creates a sort of triple vision between the warring perspectives: the narrator’s presence casts a shadow across the women’s words as he exposes their misbehaviour in the frame, but within their narratives the wives consistently, if subtly, betray their own flaws and dubious actions simultaneous to condemning their husbands. Against this increasingly destructive repurposing of courtly motifs and themes, the biting irony engendered by the multiple perspectives persists: the wives consistently reveal the superficiality and artificiality of their ‘biddable’ and lovely appearances whether via the narrator’s horrified commentary in the frame or their own smirking admissions of cuckoldry and sexual manipulation. The vertigo of their victimised and powerless marital circumstances against their rebellious and wily manipulations drives the grotesque sense of horror, admiration, and humour that characterises the  narratives. The audience must ask whether it is not only the husbands but also the wives that have ‘the glemyng of gold and wes bot glase fundin’ (202) (the gleaming of gold and was found to be glass).

Melancholia, lovesickness, and modes of authenticity Following the opening section of the response, which capitalises on the rhetoric and lexicon of flyting, the wife abruptly shifts tone and content. This change is signalled when she renews the avian metaphor seen early in the first wife’s speech. By reintroducing this motif she steers the conversation back towards the demande, while also reinforcing the dialectical and dialogic nature of their conversation. She observes: Ȝe speik of berdis on bewch – of blise may thai sing, That on Sanct Valentynis day ar vacandis ilk ȝer. Hed I that plesand prevelege, to part quhen me likit, To change and ay to cheise again, than chastite adew! (205–8) [You speak of birds on [the] bough – of bliss may they sing, that on Saint Valentine’s Day are at liberty every year. Had I that pleasant

200

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

privilege, to leave when I liked, to change and continually to choose again, then chastity adieu!]

The theme of mating, birds, and Valentine’s Day is extensive and well recorded.13 In this case, the wife’s allusion to Valentine’s Day subtly invokes the melancholic tones commonly associated with complaint poetry. Her comment effectively acts as both ligature and severance between the dissonant tones and rhetorical strategies invoked in either half of her speech. The grotesque thrives on this constant sense of dislocation; abrupt transitions between forms and points of reference thwart value judgements and apathy. Unlike the burlesque, which caricatures serious forms or themes, grotesque rhetorical fluctuations in the wife’s speech rather emphatically stress the necessity of turning to extreme measures to achieve authenticity and veracity. The layered references to conventional motifs and themes throughout the flyting portion of her response create a sense of opacity and instability. By jumping from sexually provocative response to invective (during the first speech), and then from invective back to courtly response and complaint (in the second speech), all the while preserving the metrical and thematic requirements of the narrative, the audience is prevented from maintaining any consistent expectations. The abrupt tonal shift is immediately felt in the marked reduction in pace. The above rejection of courtly ideals, as seen in the reviling of her duplicitous husband, maintains a relatively snapping tempo. The wife’s reintroduction of the more courtly tones of the avian metaphor at the end of the invective section is transformed when she lapses into a mournful lament: Apone sic materis I mus at mydnyght full oft And murnys so in my mynd, I murdris my selfin. Than ly I walkand for wa and walteris about, Wariand oft my wekit kyn that me away cast, To sic a craudoune but curage that knyt my cler bewte, And ther so mony kene knyghtis this kenrik within. (211–16) [I often muse on such matters at midnight and suffer so in my mind, I murder myself. Then I lie awake from woe, tossing and turning about, often cursing my wicked kin for casting me away to such a coward without [sexual] desire to join together with my bright beauty, and there [being] so many bold knights in this kingdom.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 201

These lines allude to two moments from Howlat. The first occurs at the opening of the narrative when the narrator overhears the eponymous howlat moaning and expressing his plight: ‘Wa is me, wretche, in þis warld wilsome of wane, / With mair murnyng in mynd þan I meyne may’ (43–4) (Woe is me, wretch, in this world wandering [without] home, with more suffering in mind than I can express). The howlat protests his monstrous appearance in his complaint, which he means to take to the ‘pope’ (represented by the peacock) as a legal suit against Nature. In this way the complaint turns from private to public in the way frequently observed in the conventional examples of the form. Nature eventually descends and grants the howlat a feather from each bird, but he soon becomes an arrogant terror and she revokes her blessing, leading the birds to mob the howlat and leave him in his originally drab state. The narrator describes the howlat’s reaction to this reversion: He welterit, he wrythit, he waryit þe tyde That he was wrocht in þis warld, wofull in weir. He crepillit, he crengit, he carfully cryd; He solpit, he sorowit in sighingis seir. (954–7) [He writhed around, he twisted [in anguish], he cursed the time that he was created in this world, woefully clothed. He walked lamely, he cowered, he dismally cried; he steeped in [it], he sorrowed with grievous sighs.]

The howlat’s exceedingly demonstrative expression of suffering over his lost plumage has a distinct feeling of hyperbole edging towards the absurd. This implication is subtly transferred to the second wife’s description of her plight. Her understanding of her own speech as a ragment, furthermore, links into both the mood and the legalistic context of Howlat, thereby amplifying the avian allusions that recur throughout the responses. In both texts the complainants are not blameless in their misfortune, the owl for his arrogance and pride and the wife for her adultery and disingenuous behaviour. In terms of the balance between public and private spheres of discourse, her indictment takes a middle road between The Quare of Jelusy and Howlat, since she presents her suffering to the women, but in a confessional form in which she seeks only catharsis and empathy.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

202

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Regarding the prosodic features of this passage the pace slows with the alliteration on paired lines of sonorants [m] and [wa], both of which have softer and more drawn-out qualities than the stops and fricatives that dominate the alliterative pattern in the flyting. The effect is to invest her discourse with a sense of musing reflection. The rapid fire of insult and graphic language abruptly gives way to this reserved lament, thereby suggesting a sort of rambling narrative which is by turns frenetic and aggressive, plaintive and quiet. This rhetorical grotesque creates a greater sense of overwrought desperation than the grotesque intersection of festive joviality and horror central to the first wife’s response. Her assertion that she muses on materis of love enhances this newly philosophical quality – materis in this context refers to the consideration of a question in soliloquy or meditation. It sets up a contrast to the type of materis her husband is concerned with: ‘He ralis and makes repet with ryatus wordis, / Ay rvsing him of his radis and rageing in chalmer’ (193–4) (he talks wildly and makes a fuss with licentious words, continually boasting of his raids and wanton behaviour in the bedchamber). Unlike her husband’s boasting and bragging, she apparently spends hours in thoughtful, if despondent, meditation over the question of love and the marital status quo. Surprisingly, her plea for a kene knyght appears to be at odds with her earlier reviling of love matches based on appearance. The apparent contradiction only bolsters the argument of her speech in which there is a growing sense of disparity between the genuine experience of love and the lexicon of love. In this moment the clever mosaic of ragment, complaint, and demande is fused together into an unexpectedly coherent whole. Not only does the linguistic shift impart a sense of philosophical reflection, but the concentration on her desolate depression evokes plaintive feelings of emptiness, longing, and isolation. Images of lovesickness and melancholia overtake the acidic hatred characterising her flyting where she calls her husband a ‘hur maister’ (168) and states ‘I hait him with my hert’ (169) (I hate him with my heart). Rather than the vomit of black bile she angrily claims at line 166, the wife exposes a more vulnerable and private image of melancholia. Authenticity is a compelling question in this moment because the explosive ‘venting’ of poison and the exposure of

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Lovesick or sick of love? 203

desperate isolation offer different types of truth and trust. ‘Love’sickness is shown as a physically virulent torment as well as an insidious emotional torture. Neither strain is caused by the pain of unrequited or fleeting love typical to complaint poetry. The wife’s complaint, rather, offers a reflective rumination on her abstract longing for companionship. The personal and provocative statement of melancholia/lovesickness that the second wife reveals to the other women is swiftly undercut when she describes how she uses the physical manifestations of her depression to manipulate her husband: Than he ful tenderly dois turne to me his twme person, And with a ȝoldin ȝerd dois ȝolk me in armys, And sais, ‘My souerane sueit thing, quhy sleip ȝe no betir? Me think ther haldis ȝow a hete, as ȝe sum harme alyt.’ Quod I, ‘My hony, hald abak and handill me nought sair. A hache is happinnit hastely at my hert rut.’ With that I seme for to swoune, thought I na swerf tak, And thus beswik I that swane with my sueit wordis. I cast on him a crabit e quhen cleir day is cummyn, And lettis it is a luf blenk quhen he about glemys. I turne it in a tender luke that I in tene warit, And him behaldis hamely with hertly smyling. (219–30) [Then he tenderly turns his empty body towards me, and with an exhausted penis takes me in his arms, and says, ‘my sweet sovereign, why don’t you sleep better? I think you have a fever, it seems as if you are a little ill.’ I reply, ‘my honey, hold back and don’t handle me roughly. A pang is gripping me in my heart.’ With that I seem to swoon, though I don’t faint, and thus I beguile that man with my sweet words. I cast a crabby eye on him when the clear day arrives, and pretend it’s a loving glance when he looks over at me. I turn it into a tender look that which I wear in scorn. And he gazes at me intimately with warm smiles.]

Melancholia and its symptoms are subverted to serve the second wife’s agenda against her husband. Toohey collates multiple medieval medical views of lovesickness, among them those expressed by Galen, Aretaeus, and Caelius Aurelianus.14 Across these sources melancholia and lovesickness appear in nearly identical forms, which Toohey catalogues: ‘lovesickness, according to the major ­surviving medical

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

204

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

view, was a condition typified by sadness, insomnia, despondency, dejection, physical debility, and blinking’.15 The wife’s insomnia, despondency, and dejection are established at lines 211–16 (quoted above). When her husband notices her insomnia he tries to ‘treat’ this condition by taking her in his arms and rubbing his ȝoldin ȝerd (exhausted penis) against her; she pleads infirmity to put physical distance between them. Her husband construes her resentful glare as a luf blenk, which, in turn, provokes him to give her a warm smile. And, all the while, she attributes the success of her disingenuous and deceptive behaviour to her husband’s readiness to accept sueit wordis and to interpret her looks and behaviour as evidence of her love for him. The entangling of melancholia with lovesickness creates conflicting realities by layering personal truth with public performance and veracity with falsity, thus radiating cracks in the courtly conventions at hand. The wife’s performance of lovesickness is the most definitive strike against the trope of the (female) courtly lover, but its efficacy comes as a direct result of the preceding exploration of the wife’s interiority and her husband’s vain and empty behaviour.

Bonds that bind: allusion and conclusion In the final lines of her speech she weaves together the extensive network of themes and forms engaged in the narrative. The second wife wishes that she and her husband had more appropriate lovers: ‘I wald a tender peronall that myght na put thole, / That hatit men with hard geir for hurting of flesch, / Had my gud man to hir gest’ (231–3) (I wish [for] an attentive harlot that might not tolerate those hated men with harsh equipment for hurting flesh had my husband to her play).16 She, on the other hand, would prefer her bed was graced with a ‘berne that me likit’ (237) (man that she liked). She reasserts the demande by reusing the terms of the widow’s sarcastic query that frames her response: And syne I wald that ilk band that ȝe so blist call Had bund him so to that bryght quhill his bak werkit, And I wer in a beid broght with berne that me likit. I trow that bird of my blis suld a bourd want.’ (235–8)



Lovesick or sick of love? 205

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[And since I wish that same bond that you call so blessed had bound him to that bright woman while his back worked, and I were brought to a bed with a man that I liked. I promise that bird of my bliss should want a game.]

She imbues her response with a sarcastic tone that mimics that used by the widow when posing the demande and punctuates her remark with crude language. Structurally, the responses of the two wives occupy the first half of the narrative,17 while the widow’s response is considerably longer at 260 lines. As this discussion has established, the responses of the wives are deeply connected and use many of the same lexical and rhetorical strategies. Fittingly, there is a neat symmetry which encapsulates the two contributions. The first wife opens with an immediate dismissal of any sort of marital bliss – ‘Is that ȝe call the blist band that bindis so fast / Is bair of blis and bailfull, and greit barrat wirkis’ (50–1). These tormenting and binding bonds of marriage are thus reimagined as restrictive and destructive instruments to hold the second wife’s husband to a more fitting partner. Werkit functions as a pun with the dual meaning of ‘to cause harm’ and ‘to perform a deed’; however, it also picks up the first wife’s use of the word as a sexual innuendo at line 84. The play between berne and bird meanwhile weaves together the martial and avian themes: berne is a poetic and alliterative term for warrior and bird takes advantage of the double meaning of literal bird and slang term for young woman. This complex weave epitomises the humour pervading the text as a whole – it is intellectual, linguistic, and bawdy. Lewd content, consequently, is largely transformed into intelligent commentary by the subtle manipulation of language and form. By collapsing expectations of structure and form the wife is able to expose the reality of marital relations and cultural values. What is the point of playing make-believe love games when young women are liable to end up with impotent lechers? Her closing remark – ‘I trow that bird of my blis suld a bourd want’ (238) – is a final, definitive play against the conventions peppering the wife’s speech. The use of the word blis, meaning bliss or joy, is significant when set against the Continental tradition of troubadour poetry and fin’amor. Moshe Lazar considers the term joy as it is used in troubadour poetry: ‘it is thus clear that, except in

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

206

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

some cases where joy expresses a general feeling of happiness, the term typically connotes sensual, erotic, and sexual g­ ratification’.18 Preceding this remark Lazar outlines the various contexts in which the word appears in troubadour poetry: it may reference springtime and birds, the lady as the supreme source of joy, the joy emanating from the lady’s gaze, as a ‘sensual and erotic pleasure experienced through the long-awaited kiss’,19 and, lastly, the joy of kissing as a prelude to consummation. In the wife’s speech she seems to call upon a variety of these contexts as she wishes a suitable lover to her bed. This sense is further enhanced by the use of the flexible pun on bird. Moreover, her description of their meeting as a bourd is reminiscent of the joc d’amour (game of love), which is ‘so central to the mode of fin’amour’,20 and is often associated with the term joy. Fin’amor is naturally called to mind by these topoi, but this allusion is complicated by its appearance in the wife’s speech, since the essential element of this mode is the troubadour’s love for a married woman. Encapsulated in this final line is a microcosm of the mosaic characterising her speech: a Scottish lexicon suggests, albeit nebulously, several courtly topoi and modes, but complicates these opaque allusions by voicing them through the figure of a married woman who imagines a strapping lad to warm her bed for the night instead of someone to act as a permanent fixture and love object. The wife’s response concludes when the narrator interjects from his quasi-omnipotent perspective. He amplifies the sense of disjunction between the conversation, women, and audience by setting the women’s appearances and estate in juxtaposition to their words. This is significant: the narrative prompts its audience to laugh with (and not at) the second wife, owing to the clever rhetorical acrobatics in her speech. But the narrator disrupts this sense of connection with his commentary: Onone quhen this amyable had endit hir speche, Loud lauchand, the laif allowit her mekle. Thir gay wiffis maid gam amang the grene leiffis, Thai drank and did away dule vnder derne bewis, Thai swapit of the sueit wyne, thai swan quhit of hewis, Bot all the pertlyar, in plane, thai put out ther vocis. (239–44)



Lovesick or sick of love? 207

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[Directly after this lovely woman had ended her discourse, loudly laughing, the others made her great allowance. The joyful wives made game among the green leaves, they drank and did away with distress of mind under the dark boughs, they swigged the sweet wine, those ladies as white as swans,21 all the more audaciously, frankly, they raised their voices.]

The wives are called amyable, gay, and ‘thai swan quhit of hewis’, all terms which insinuate a certain level of grace and refinement and call on a courtly lexicon. Notably, the women appreciate and even commend the honest and unvarnished speech of the wife, as indicated by the narrator’s observation that ‘Loud lauchand, the laif allowit her mekle’. They join the wife by playing in the garden and swigging more wine. The narrator ascribes all three women loud, pert voices. However, to some extent, their presence outwith a structured, courtly milieu counteracts their conversation and behaviour. These ambivalent circumstances seem to be attested as mitigating factors for this obscene behaviour: the locus amoenus is reiterated (green leaves and dark boughs) and is explicitly linked with their games and festivity – both elements which Bawcutt describes in relation to green(ery). The mood of this interjection is elusive at the most granular level. Line 243 provides an indicative example of incongruity: ‘Thai swapit of the sueit wyne, thai swan quhit of hewis’. The two half lines create a surprising juxtaposition by alliterating swapit, sueit, and swan, thereby pointedly contrasting the coarse description of unrestrained drinking with the oral-poetic description of their beauty.22 Dunbar creates an elegant instance of the grotesque in this moment in rupturing the line with contrasting images and sensibilities, while using the formal qualities of the alliterative line to link them together. This passage somewhat remarkably serves as the basis for Spearing’s assessment of the passivity of the narrator. When considering the context of the narrator’s interjection this seems to be a misreading. The physical body of the narrator may be passive in the sense that he is hiding in a bush, but structurally his commentary comes on the heels of a moment of affective connectivity. By reasserting the impropriety of such behaviour, although it has been obscured only momentarily, he reasserts the rift between a­ udience

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

208

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

and speaker. The word pertlyar especially carries a negative connotation by suggesting a tone of audacious, haughty disdain in their raised voices. Perfetti makes much of the jarring between standards of courtly etiquette and artistic, literary representations of womanhood. Her observations clarify the unease incited by the narrator’s comment: he reminds his audience of decorous standards of conduct, and thus their transgression by the women, while maintaining a delicate balance between outright anti-feminist discourse and the monde renversé aesthetic, both of which threaten to overtake the narrative. It is in this grey area between genres and topoi that the narrative grotesque comes most clearly into focus. Only when all of these pieces are knit together precisely is the text able to achieve such provocative forms of discourse. Though for the most part marginal, the concealed observer provides significant framing to the intricate array of subjectivities; at no point does the narrative become complacent. Dunbar affects his destructive project by first establishing a fundamentally unsound foundation from which the second wife’s discussion eventually implodes the courtly form. Dunbar’s subversive contention about veracity and authenticity in poetic rhetoric is made possible by his framing of the complaint as a private, personal, and psychological expression. The overarching motif of lovesickness, which the wife’s discourse skilfully tangles with the medical condition of melancholia, articulates clearly the types of suffering caused by love – especially where this suffering does not inhere within typical courtly tropes of unrequited love or love lost prematurely. The purpose of this entanglement is to question the validity and authenticity of lovesickness as a courtly love topos by substituting the empty performance of lovesickness with a deeply personal and poignant expression of melancholy. The wife mourns what she never had. Her experience has been one of isolation, and although she quips about choosing a new mate every year her lament reveals her deep longing for companionship. Courtly conventions are definitively broken when this startlingly desolate admission is manipulated to mimic courtly lovesickness. It punctuates forcefully just how fraudulent lovesickness is, while simultaneously continuing to criticise the ridiculous aping of courtly lovers, already begun in her vituperative attack against her husband’s public antics. The



Lovesick or sick of love? 209

second wife’s response forms a major fissure in the façade of courtly love poetics as they are interrogated in the Tretis more widely.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Notes  1 MS J.   2 MS C. The text of MS J is corrupted around lines 235–6 and omits several lines following. (Italics original).  3 Line references from The Maitland Folio Manuscript. Containing Poems by Sir Richard Maitland, Dunbar, Douglas, Henryson, and Others, Volume I, ed. W. A. Craigie (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1919). (Italics original).  4 J. I. Wimsatt, ‘Guillaume de Machaut and Chaucer’s Love Lyrics’, Medium Ævum 47.1 (1978), 66–87 (p. 75).  5 C. A. Rogers, ‘“Buried in an Herte”: French Poetics and the Ends of Genre in Chaucer’s Complaint unto Pity’, The Chaucer Review 51.2 (2016), 187–208, offers a nuanced reading of Chaucer’s treatment of convention in Complaint unto Pity. See G. Stillwell, ‘Convention and Individuality in Chaucer’s Complaint of Mars’, Philological Quarterly 35 (1956), 69–89 (pp. 69–70), and S. Davis, ‘Guillaume de Machaut, Chaucer’s “Book of the Duchess”, and the Chaucer Tradition’, The Chaucer Review 36.4 (2002), 391–405, on conventionality and tradition in the complaints of Machaut and Chaucer.  6 W. A. Davenport, Chaucer. Complaint and Narrative (Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer, 1988), p. 9.  7 Mars frames his complaint by validating his engagement of the form: ‘The ordre of compleynt requireth skylfully / That yf a wight shal pleyne pitously, / Ther mot be cause wherfore that men pleyne; / Or men may deme he pleyneth folily / And causeles; alas, that am not I’ (155–9). He concludes with a direct address to the ‘hardy knyghtes of renoun’ (272) and ‘my ladyes, that ben true and stable’ (281), which urges them to take seriously those that ‘compleyne’ and to pity their suffering (272–89). He is overtly concerned with the way his audience will interpret and judge his words, perhaps more so than confession itself. Le Jugement is even more typical of complaints and debates insofar as the lovers cannot agree on whose pain is more valid and debilitating and must seek an outside judge to decide the matter.  8 DSL, ‘ragman, -men(t. n.’ Judicial overtones are common in demandes d’amour. Works such as Andreas Capellanus’s The Art of Courtly Love, which poses questions of love in a judicial setting complete with

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

210

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

testimony and a judge, overlap with the demande d’amour genre. See Felberg-Levitt, ‘Introduction’ to Les demandes d’amour.  9 Line references from The Quare of Jelusy, in Chaucerian Dream Visions and Complaints, ed. Dana M. Symons (online: Middle English Texts Series, 2004). 10 See J. Radden (ed.), The Nature of Melancholy from Aristotle to Kristeva (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). 11 Line references from The Knightly Tale of Golagros and Gawane, ed. Ralph Hanna (Edinburgh: Scottish Text Society, 2008). 12 Italics original. 13 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 290; note to line 206: ‘St Valentine is first recorded as the patron of lovers and mating birds in fourteenth-century poems, such as Chaucer’s Parliament of Fowls and Complaint of Mars, and Oton de Granson’s Le Songe Saint Valentin.’ See also The Parliament of Fowls, note to line 309, in Benson (gen. ed.), The Riverside Chaucer; and Oruch, ‘St Valentine, Chaucer, and Spring in February’, Speculum 56.3 (1981), 534–65; and ‘Nature’s Limitations’. 14 P. Toohey, ‘Love, Lovesickness, and Melancholia’, Illinois Classical Studies 17.2 (1992), 265–86. 15 Toohey, ‘Love, Lovesickness, and Melancholia’, pp. 268–9. 16 Peronall is obscure, but this meaning is suggested by DSL. 17 The framing section occupies the first 50 lines and the wives’ responses extend to line 245. 18 M. Lazar, ‘Fin’amor’, in F. R. P. Akehurst and J. M. Davis (eds), A Handbook of the Troubadours (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), pp. 61–100 (p. 82). 19 Lazar, ‘Fin’amor’, p. 79. 20 Lazar, ‘Fin’amor’, p. 82. 21 Gloss to line 243 from Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2. 22 Cf. Douglas, Eneados, Book I, Chapter XI. Unlike the women’s unrestrained drinking, Dido takes a decorous sip of hippocras when she passes the wine around to confirm the friendship of the parties at her feast: ‘This beand said, the cowpe with the rich wyne / Apon the buird scho blyssit, and eftir syne / With hir lyp first tharof tuke bot a taist, / And carpand blythly gaif it Bythyus in haist’ (85–8) (This having been said, she blessed the cup with the rich wine upon the table, and after this with her lips she first thereof took but a taste, and speaking cheerfully gave it [to] Bythyus [Bitias] soon after).

7

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Bad romance: the widow as venerean preacher

Following the interlinked speeches of the two wives, the widow delivers a cutting sermon, which affects a significant shift in tone and occupies fully half of the 530-line poem. The genre trouble plaguing the poem, already evident in the surprising and unconventional weaving together of speaker, style, and form in the previous two speeches, is complicated even further by the didactic nature of the widow’s contribution. Her figure has previously come under scrutiny owing to her likeness to other famed harridans, most notably the Wife of Bath and La Vielle from Rose.1 But the widow goes beyond even these speakers, who themselves represent the complex and nuanced relationship of speaker and speech. Most evidently, she distorts the sermon form by transforming it from a mode for teaching Christian morality to a manifesto for adulterous wives. Suffice to say, the sermon that she delivers to the wives does not allude only to biblical material. Conduct literature and anti-feminist discourse are each subverted to provide the widow with material to promote ‘appropriate’ womanly behaviour. The morality that she promotes is, in fact, perhaps better described as a venerean morality. Indeed, Venus and the motifs associated with her in Scottish literature constantly lurk at the edges of her speech. Consequently, this venerean presence definitively upends any straightforward assessment of the widow’s sermon as a purely anti-feminist tirade. The unlikely confluence of attributes embodied by the widow creates a destabilised vision of gender and modes of discourse. This interlacing of a Christian didactic style with classical allegory and a romance lexicon marks the culmination of the narrative grotesque in the Tretis. The widow’s charismatic presence achieves the

212

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

c­ ompelling twinning of repulsion and attraction that finally causes the narrator to quake in awed terror at the close of the narrative. The strong emotional reactions of the women and the narrator further overlay the speech with a patina of humour that invests her discourse with a vibrant irreverence.

Preaching to the choir Rather than taking up a courtly form, the widow delivers an elaborate sermon. Following the conventions as described in the artes predicandi, Ross gives a comprehensive outline of her sermon, which he classifies as a ‘modern’ or ‘university’ type.2 The widow’s speech contains all of the elements expected from this variety of sermon: invocation, thema, prothema, divisio, declaratio, and confirmatio. Rather than rehearsing these details, already set out at length by Ross, this analysis considers some particularly emotive moments from her sermon as well as the broader characterisation of the widow as preacher. In the following section her engagement with rhetorical forms typical to the sermon will form the foundation for the subsequent analysis of venerean, anti-feminist, and romance themes and modes. Saliently, the widow’s sermon derides neither the conventional sermon form nor the priestly vocation. Instead, she takes a mercenary approach by capitalising on a widely recognisable rhetorical form in order to deliver a witty response to the convoluted demande from which the conversation develops. Her precise use of the sermon proselytises her wifely audience and leaves the concealed observer with a visceral feeling of horror. Thus, the sermon is distorted from a masculine rhetorical form used to teach the precepts of Christianity to a vehicle for delivering the widow’s immoral philosophy.3 The widow’s self-appointment as confessor and her self-proclaimed saint’s life exceed the bounds of more typical parodic sermons. Mock-sermons are not uncommon in medieval plays and other comic poetry, and they generally tread a fine line between blasphemy and humour. The widow’s speech, like other examples, relies on a carnal and worldly narrative to undermine the conventional content of the sermon. Victor Scherb, in reference to the Digby ‘Mary

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 213

Magdalene’, asserts that the play’s humour is effective only if the behaviour of the blasphemous characters is ­recognisable.4 He goes on to observe, ‘the parody […] may be humorous without satirising the contemporary priesthood destructively’.5 As preacher, the widow seemingly uses the form with genuine intent and without irony. This perspective consequently conflicts with any reading of the discourse as a parody. A true parody should self-consciously exaggerate and mock another form for explicitly comic effect. In the widow’s speech this parodic quality is achieved only when the speech is recontextualised as a response in the demande d’amour and against the commentary of the narrator; the widow herself does not overtly claim ironic or parodic intent. The widow’s engagement of this authoritative rhetorical style fits her apparently superior experience and knowledge in matters of love. However, her choice of the sermon form must be considered against the preceding speeches, since it is the culmination of a tripartite demande d’amour. The previous speakers engage more explicitly with courtly modes and topoi in order to interrogate veracity and authenticity in poetic composition. The turn to sermonising may be the most shocking generic subversion, but it is also the mode which might be argued to present the most honest form of expression. Alongside this persistent focus on narratorial reliability, veracity, and authenticity, the fracturing and fusing together of form and perspective achieves a continuous sense of disorientation; further, the play of horror and gleeful humour evident in her audiences’ reactions situates the widow’s disorienting commentary firmly in the realm of the grotesque. In order to assess more carefully the widow’s charismatic manipulation of her audiences’ expectations, it is useful to consider Chaucer’s preachers. The Pardoner, whom Susan Gallick identifies as an especially problematic participant in The Canterbury Tales’s storytelling competition, offers an interesting foil.6 Gallick attributes the source of his relative lack of success among the pilgrims to his inability to understand fully the preacher–audience relationship. She observes, ‘he [the Pardoner] did not anticipate the p ­ ossibility that a glimpse at his own twisted personality would have such an impact on the Host. Once the Pardoner exposed himself as a thoroughly evil man, he could not talk or trick the pilgrims into l­ istening

214

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

to a sermon from him without outrage and anger.’7 Gallick’s argument places a high value on the relationship between preacher and audience – something eminently important to the widow’s sermonising. She supports this assertion by citing the philosophy of Pseudo-Thomas Aquinas, which asserts the significance of a preacher’s personal morality: in short, his behavior must be a model for the lessons he teaches […] Pseudo-Thomas Aquinas comments about the personality of the preacher: ‘Jesus undertook to do and to teach, or rather, first to do and then to teach. To denote this, each faithful preacher today is held to preaching first by deed and then by sermon.’8

Pseudo-Thomas Aquinas emphasises the preacher’s morality in relation to his ability to effectively lead his parishioners. When considering this line of argument in the context of the Tretis the widow’s resounding success is logical: she represents perfectly the code of conduct she preaches. Her ability to live the life she preaches accounts, in part, for the overall success of her speech. By distorting the preacher–sermon–audience relationship to immoral ends in order to encourage adultery, deceit, and sexual gratification, the widow extends her sermon beyond mocking commentary and into the grotesque. One of the most nuanced elements of Dunbar’s exposure of this tenuous relationship is the multiple audiences to which the widow preaches, whether intentionally or not. Her primary audience consists of the two wives – her ‘disciples’ – but the narrator outwith the group of women and the narrator’s (male) audience, which he addresses in the frame, combine to create a graduated layering of audience and thus open up multiple interpretations. And, as briefly mentioned in Chapter 4, there is a possibility that the widow may be aware of the observer’s presence, owing to her overt statement of privacy and seclusion at line 161. Whether or not the latter circumstance prevails, it is clear that there is a rich layering of audiences contributing to the presentation of her story. These competing levels of understanding overlap to form the comic underpinning as all points of view come simultaneously into focus. The widow’s canny understanding of the sermon–preacher–­ audience relationship is highlighted by her re-announcement of the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 215

sermon theme after declaring her intention to teach the women in the ways of deception. After the elaborate rhetoric of the protheme she states: ‘Twa husbandis haif I had, thai held me baith deir. / Thought I dispytit thaim agane, thai spyt it na thing’ (270–1) (I have had two husbands, they both held me in high esteem. Although I despised them in return, they noticed nothing). By using her life as the sermon exemplum she firmly places herself on the moral high ground. In the divisio that follows she details her experiences in marriage. Her development of the theme across the remaining portion of the sermon (declaratio and confirmatio) orchestrates the intense reactions of the wives and the narrator. By adhering so precisely to the conventional sermon structure, but completely reinterpreting traditional moral values, the widow contributes to the pervasive narrative grotesque in the Tretis. Her sermonising is not a mere mockery but, rather, a complete distortion of the form for the purpose of encouraging the women to have euill myndis (267). The narrator’s role as the widow’s auditor and interpreter reflects the tension between forms of authority and power in the text. Specifically, the authority which the widow engages by means of her rhetorical style answers the narrator’s own claims to moral authority asserted by his editorialising interjections. She is, in a sense, the most threatening of the three speakers as she actively proselytises the other two speakers by showing the potential for fully realising the power of their deceits and schemes against their husbands. In two instances her rhetoric converges with that employed by the narrator to create a temporally dissonant chronology of cause and effect. The first wife ends her speech by disdainfully describing her husband’s disgusting, and even horrifying, sexual advances and wishes that her compatriots be spared such distasteful encounters. The narrator interjects: ‘Quhen that the semely had said hir sentence to end, / Than all thai leuch apon loft with latis full mery’ (146–7). The narrator engages oral-poetic language through his reference to the woman as a semely (a beautiful woman), which he alliterates on sentence, here with the sense of a deliberately or carefully constructed opinion. As observed in the preceding speeches, the narrator often engages this poetic lexicon to describe the women. The irony created by this refined language and its suggestion of an elevated discourse effectively

216

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

c­ ounterpoints and therefore accentuates the inappropriate content of the women’s conversation. While the narrator controls the audience’s perception of the wives’ misbehaviour through his commentary, thus asserting both his moral authority and his general authority over their narratives, the widow seems to wrest control of the narrative from the narrator. She opens her sermon by invoking God’s authority: God my spreit now inspir and my speche quykkin, And send me sentence to say substantious and noble, Sa that my preching my pers ȝour perverst hertis, And mak yow mekar to men in maneris and conditiounis. (247–50) [God, inspire my spirit and give life to my speech, and send me judgement to [make useful and noble pronouncements], so that my preaching might pierce your wicked hearts and make you meeker to men in deportment and disposition.]

The widow calls upon God for inspiration and guidance in order to invest her words with substance and nobility; her claim to sentence is thus active and conscious. The narrator’s ironic use of the term is subverted as the widow proudly and unashamedly claims authority and eloquence. However, she too employs irony. She states that her goal is to pierce the perverse (or wicked) hearts of her listeners by encouraging them to be meek; it swiftly becomes clear that she means only for them to appear ‘sober and sueit and sempill without fraud’ (255) (sober and sweet and honest without duplicity) in order to deceive their husbands more effectively. Temporal dissonance between the frame, whence the narrator recapitulates the conversation, and the women’s discourse is brought into sharper focus in the widow’s ensuing description of her experience and marital history. In the narrator’s interjection between the second wife’s and the widow’s responses he declares: ‘Bot all the pertlyar, in plane, thai put out ther vocis’ (244). The narrator’s interjection clearly carries derisive connotations and highlights the inappropriate nature of their loud conversation as bold or impertinent. Although the narrator uses this description to emphasise the shocking nature of their conversation, the widow proudly claims her ability to ‘put furtht my voce’ (302) (raise my voice) as a lesson and a reward of experience that she earned by

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 217

being ‘tuyse maryit’ (303) (twice married). She follows this with the claim that her curate knew her to be pert since her adolescence (perfit eild): ‘I wes apperand to be pert within perfit eild: / Sa sais the curat of our kirk, that knew me full ȝing’ (305–6) (I appeared to be  precocious during adolescence: so says the curate of our church that knew me [when I was] very young). Complicating this comment is the temporal inversion affecting the audience’s perception of the word pert. Temporally speaking, this remark occurs prior to the narrator’s retelling of the story with his own interjected commentaries. Yet, the audience first encounters the term in the narrator’s negative description that implies audaciousness or insolence. Conversely, the widow’s boast is meant to illustrate her precocious wisdom, albeit with a suspicious possibility of innuendo. Thus, as with the dissonance between the frame and the diegesis observed in Palyce, the narrative grotesque is evident in the fluid temporal reality of the diegesis. The widow’s instrumentalisation of her life as an exemplum conveniently echoes the anecdotal structure of the preceding speeches. In turn, this allows her to inhabit the values and qualities expected of a preacher, to reinforce the dialogic nature of the demande, and to reiterate underlying concerns with authority, authenticity, and veracity. Additionally, in restating and reformulating elements of the preceding speeches, the widow demonstrates her concerted interest in relating to her audience. This can be observed, for instance, in the motif of vomiting black bile in the second wife’s speech (162–8). In the previous chapter these lines are discussed in relation to symptoms of lovesickness and melancholia. The widow’s narration of her life in ‘sanctis liknes’ (254) uses the same imagery to develop camaraderie by reiterating the second wife’s sense of oppression, resentment, and anger. The widow claims: And ȝit hatrent I hid within my hert all, Bot quhilis it hepit so huge quhill it behud out. Ȝit tuk I neuer the wosp clene out of my wyde throat, Quhill I oucht wantit of my will or quhat I wald desir. […] My breist that wes gret beild bowdyn wes sa huge, That neir my baret out birst or the band makin. Bot quhen my billis and my bauchles wes all braid selit,

218

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

I wald na langar beir on bridill bot braid vp my heid. Thar myght na molet mak me moy na hald my mouth in. (333–6; 345–49) [And yet I hid hate in my heart, but it built so greatly that it needed to be released. Yet I never took that wasp from my vituperative throat while I lacked anything whatsoever of my will or [knowledge of] what I desired. […] The swelling built so greatly in my breast that my deception nearly burst out before the contract was drawn up. But when my contracts and denunciations were broadcast, I bore the bridle no longer but rather lifted up my head. Then no restraining bit might make me meek nor keep me quiet.]

The widow’s portrayal of her second marriage echoes the sort of building up of poisonous resentment and anger that drives the second wife to purge her own venom. In the context of instruction, the widow reflects on her own experience of repressing her desires, needs, and intellect in order to feign flattery to her husband (343). Bawcutt asserts that line 347, while difficult, apparently indicates that the widow conducts a humiliation campaign against her husband: ‘The word [bauchles] seems a legalism, parallel with billis, “formal written documents”, which refer to the band (346), a contract concerning the transfer of property or money. The word is best explained as “public reproaches, denunciations”.’9 Where the second wife has only just encountered an audience of like-minded individuals to whom she may express her inner life, the ‘exemplary’ widow has already found means by which to act out against her husband, thereby releasing her swelling anger. The emphasis on the corporeal experience of marriage via the intense physicality of the women’s portrayal of their emotions and inner lives is especially developed in these images of anger as a tangible affliction that they must conceal within their outwardly beautiful bodies and subservient behaviour. In the following assessment of the widow’s sermonising and its correspondence with venerean traits, this embodiment is of utmost importance. The widow’s skilful manipulation of her audiences is fully exposed in the protheme, in which she expands on the theme of her sermon: hiding a deceitful and scheming nature behind a beautiful façade:

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 219 Be constant in ȝour gouernance and counterfeit gud maneris, Thought ȝe be kene, inconstant and cruell of mynd. Thought ȝe as tygris be terne, be tretable in luf, And be as turtoris in your talk, thought ȝe haif talis brukill. Be dragonis baitht and dowis ay in double forme, And quhen it nedis ȝow, onone note baith ther stranthis. Be amyable with humble face, as angellis apperand, And with a terrebill tail be stangand as edderis. Be of ȝour luke like innocentis, thought ȝe haif euill myndis. (259–67) [Be steadfast in your conduct and counterfeit good behaviour, though you be savage, inconstant, and cruel of mind. Though you be as intransigent as tigers, be tractable in love, and be as turtledoves in your talk, though you have hazardous tails. Be both dragons and doves always double in form, and, when you need to, note both as a source of strength. Be amiable with humble face, appearing as angels, and with a terrible tail be venomous as adders, be of your look like innocents, thought you have wicked minds.]

Multiple images of duality represent the inherent conflict of the grotesque; the pair of lines, ‘be amyable with humble face, as angellis apperand, / And with a terrebill tail be stangand as edderis’ are particularly evocative in this regard. The curving and noxious lower body emanating from a beautiful upper body is uncannily reminiscent of Horace’s mermaid, a description of which opens this study. The theme of the widow’s sermon is, in effect, transfiguration and hybridisation. It calls for a mindful construction of illusion and disillusion and entreats the women to present one outward reality while fostering a completely different internal reality. It is significant that these similes appear in the widow’s protheme or the point at which the theme of the sermon is expounded in more detail. Here it amplifies the grotesque character of the widow’s speech. Compounding the moral code espoused by the widow is the obvious allusion to anti-feminist writing which held women to be changeable and deceptive. In this way the gendered conflict pervading the text is highlighted as the question of ventriloquisation comes to the fore. Although the widow apparently speaks with earnest intent, the retelling of her words by the male observer opens up interpretation to encompass the editorialising of female voice by male ‘reporters’. This conflict is especially provocative

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

220

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

when set against the final demande which impresses the ‘unfeminine’, indecorous, and noxious discourse of the women when seen from a male perspective. As such, moral authority in the poem is deeply affected by the perspective from which the narrative is understood. Bawcutt notes the widow’s apparent subversion of Matthew 7:15: ‘Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves’, and 10:16: ‘Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves’.10 Indeed, the widow commands the wives to inhabit these commandments bodily and, as will be discussed below, she uses her own garments to reify her commandments. The widow’s sermon therefore subverts moralistic and biblical images of duality for unconventional and even shocking ends. The confusion of forms that the widow so ardently supports offers a striking complement to the narratorial and formal instability pervading the narrative. Her focus on the physical manifestations of love and the critical importance of beauty and courtly mien exaggerates and distorts the more general application of the metaphors in a biblical context. Thus, when read against the framework of the narrative grotesque, it becomes clear that the widow’s disturbing distortions and splicing together of layered and contradictory meanings forms an anamorphic discourse. Authority and eloquence and the means by which these are measured and implemented in poetics are revealed to be essential philosophical questions underlying Dunbar’s text – questions that are left unanswered. Rather, the text opens up a labyrinth of creative possibilities for achieving both effects. Another important aspect of the widow’s multiple roles within her sermon is seen in a moment of vertigo-inducing self-reflexivity when she relates another time that she consulted her ‘cummaris’ (353) (intimates) about her experiences in marriage; that historical conversation mirrors neatly the responses of the two wives. She remembers telling her friends, ‘Se how I cabeld ȝone cout with a kene brydill. / The cappill that the crelis kest in the caf mydding / Sa curtasly the cart drawis and kennis na plungeing’ (354–6) (See how I secured that colt with a tight bridle. The horse that cast the creels into the chaff midden draws the cart courteously and does

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 221

not throw himself). Again, animal imagery, specifically equine, is engaged to demean men. Equine images are repeatedly used to liken the women’s husbands to worn-out workhorses. Cappill is normally associated with cadger (beggar) in poetic contexts: this relationship reflects the rather low status of this type of horse and its work. The wife asserts, in essence, that she has her husband so well in hand that he is an obedient packhorse. She also applies the metaphor to herself when she mentions that she can no longer be ‘bridled’ by any man in the sense that she will not be silenced: ‘I wald na langar beir on bridill bot braid vp my heid. / Thar myght na molet mak me moy na hald my mouth in’ (348–9). In effect, her exemplum transforms and amplifies metaphors employed by the two wives as she recalls previous conversations that she herself has had. By means of these multiplying and even contradictory identities the widow is cast in multiple exposures. Thus her role is the most complex across the text and most pointedly challenges narratorial and structural conventions.

Aggregating and embodying Venus Contextualising the widow’s speech within venerean mythography renews and extends the already pervasive references to this iconographic motif and it distances the widow from the archetype of sexually insatiable virago. In order to proselytise the women effectively she not only appoints herself as preacher, saint, and, retroactively, confessor, but also casts herself as the heroine of her sermon’s exemplum. This layering of identities is further complicated when set within the framing demande d’amour. The outer frame dictates the subject matter of the sermon – love and marriage – and the filtering of her sermon through a male auditor adds an additional obscuring layer as questions of ventriloquisation and antifeminist stereotyping become more immediate. Where the preceding section takes as its main concern the widow’s manipulation of the sermon form, the present section assesses the influence of medieval venerean mythography on the content of her response. Venus often appears presiding over her own court and surrounded by attendants. The widow takes on this type of role by

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

222

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

guiding the conversation and encouraging the other two women. But the widow is initially presented as nearly indistinguishable from her companions. The narrator’s introductory description casts the women as triplets rather than individuals, thus suggesting a connection with the three Graces, as discussed in Chapter 4. When the widow embarks on her response this egalitarian atmosphere is called into question, as she inhabits a more assertive and authoritative role as preacher or, rather, as convenor of their court of three. In this capacity she seeks to bring her audience to enlightenment and, in turn, is venerated for her wisdom and experience. Even more so than the other women, the widow (re)constructs herself as a discrete character in her speech. Dunbar again achieves a disconcerting sense of dissonance as the widow moves from coequal participant to transcendent preacher-allegory. Boccaccio outlines an extensive catalogue of qualities that he attributes to the ‘three Venuses’ in the Genealogy. He separates Venus into three forms: the planet (Venus magna); the allegorical exemplum (Venus secunda); and the immoral woman (Venus, daughter of Jupiter).11 Elsewhere, Venus is frequently cast as a binary figure who represents either a celestial universal harmony or wanton sexual desire, as is the case in Bernardus Silvestris’s influential twelfth-century Commentary on the ‘Aeneid’.12 Fulgentius (fl. 468–533), conversely, describes Venus as the daughter of Jupiter in his Mitologiae and applies (negative) moral symbolism to her features.13 Boccaccio’s commentary is useful here, since it broadly collates the wide variation of attributes assigned to her, he says, by astrologers and poets: They want Venus to be a woman of phlegmatic complexion and nocturnal, humble with friends and affable, keen in thought for the composition of verses, laughing at perjury, deceitful, credulous, courteous, patient and very easygoing but of honest character and mien, cheerful, delightful, and extremely charming, and a woman who despises corporeal strength and weakness of the mind. In addition Venus signifies the beauty of the face, attractiveness of the body, and an adornment of every thing, and so the use of precious unguents, fragrant aromatics, games of dice and calculation, or of bandits, and also drunkenness and feasts, wines, honeys, and whatever seems to pertain to sweetness and warmth, equally fornication of every



Bad romance 223

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

kind and wantonness and a multitude of coition, the guardianship of statues and pictures, the composition of wreaths and wearing of garments, weavings with gold and silver, the greatest amusement in song and laughter, dancing, music by stringed instruments and pipes, weddings, and many other things.14

This overwhelmingly broad compendium of attributes only begins to suggest the various associations and appearances that Venus inhabits throughout literature. Many of the listed qualities might readily be identified in the descriptions of the women and are even claimed by them outrightly: the widow derides her second husband for his ‘febilnes of knawlege’ (300) (weakness of knowledge) and her general advice promotes both the positive and negative personality traits that Boccaccio associates with the many writings on Venus. Whereas the Genealogy is a historicised account divested of ‘medieval encrustations’ (in Tinkle’s words),15 the two ‘Platonic’ Venuses were important reference points for medieval and humanist writers, although, as Tinkle emphasises, this bipolar conception is by no means a singular or prevailing reading of Venus.16 She analyses the dual Venuses in the writings of Silvestris, William of Conches, Ficino, and Pico and comes to the conclusion that ‘the point of doubling the sign is obviously to designate an opposition, a division between earth and heaven; but bipolarity can serve also to unify the two opposed elements, to express the resemblance of earth to heaven’.17 This macro view of Venus as a dividing and uniting entity can be convincingly narrowed to apply to the Tretis’s complex narrative construction and the grotesque pervading the poem: the women inhabit multiple roles and the impulse to be either repulsed or enchanted by their speeches is crucial to the text’s construction. The layering of the sermon with venerean themes is evident in the widow’s protheme (as quoted above): ‘Be amyable with humble face, as angellis apperand, / And with a terrebill tail be stangand as edderis. / Be of ȝour luke like innocentis, thought ȝe haif euill myndis’ (265–7). Biblical allusion is automatically remarked upon by critics, as is the case with this passage’s similarity to Matthew 7:15 and 10:16. Equally, anti-feminist writing that depicted women as duplicitous villains, as seen, for instance, in the extended diatribe by the jealous husband in Rose, is also forefront to any reading of

224

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

the widow’s discourse.18 When considered against the text’s recurring venerean themes, these lines are invested with new layers of meaning. A comparison between this passage and the description of Venus in The Testament highlights this aspect: Under smyling scho was dissimulait, Provocative with blenkis amorous And suddanely changit and alterait, Angrie as ony serpent vennemous, Richt pungitive with wordis odious. (225–9) [Under [her smile] she was dissembling, provocative with amorous glances and suddenly changed and altered, angry as any venomous serpent, savagely hostile with odious words.]

Echoes of this venerean image, and perhaps even an outright allusion to it, are apparent in the widow’s commandments in the protheme. This doubling of feigned affection with venomous hatred is repeatedly iterated by the widow – later she describes finally gaining enough power to flyte her second husband ‘als fers as fell dragoun’ (342) (as fiercely as [a] ruthless dragon). This layering of allusion suits the labyrinthine and delicate structuring of the poem on formal and narrative levels; the grotesque character of the text is evident as the sermon form intermingles with the sensual. Her promotion of what could be considered a venerean morality provokes horror, but the context of her speech counterbalances and mitigates this sense. Thus the command to embody biblical metaphor, as  counselled by  the widow, gains depth and clarity when considered against Venus’s corporeal manifestation of transience. This evocation of Venus is complicated by the green garments worn by the ‘present-day’ widow in the garden versus those she describes while relating ‘the legeand of my lif’ (504) (the legend of my life). In these descriptive passages a martial and romanceinflected lexicon is dominant. Perhaps the most unusual aspect of this exposition of the widow’s clothing is the fact that she uses terminology associated with masculine dress. From the outset her garments fulfil the function of protection, concealment, and enticement, much to the same effect of Venus’s portrayal in The Testament. The invocation and thema of her sermon immediately introduce this concept of duality: ‘I schaw ȝow, sister, in schrift,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 225

I wes a schrew euer, / Bot I wes schene in my schrowd and schew me innocent’ (251–2) (I’ll reveal to you, sister[s], in confession, that I was always wicked, but I was beautiful in my clothing and appeared innocent). Invoking the text’s recurrent venerean imagery, the widow revels in her deceptive, yet beautifully enticing mien and advances it as a blueprint for femininity. These lines find analogues in several other Scottish texts. The first occurs in the description of the avian pope in Howlat. The peacock is ‘constant and kirklyk vnder his cler cape, / […] Schroude in his schene weid, schand in his schap, / Sad in his sanctitud sekerly and sure’ (82, 84–5) (constant and clerical under his bright cape, […] richly dressed in his bright garments, handsome in his form, sober in his holiness, with certainty of purpose and secure). Schroude, used as a verb here, means to be dressed richly, but the noun also applies as a synonym for a bird’s plumage in addition to its primary meaning of clothing. The howlat claims that the beautiful and bright priestly ‘garments’ encasing the peacock reflect his sober and reliable judgement. The irony is immediate, since peacocks are proverbially prideful and vain creatures. Moreover, the peacock is associated with negative moral traits as reflected in preaching handbooks that commonly gathered saints’ lives and exempla pertaining to peacocks as useful representations of pride and vanity for use in sermons.19 The widow amplifies this image and slightly modifies it when she reminisces about how her husband dressed her richly: Ne him that dressit me so dink – full dotit wes his heyd! Quhen he wes heryit out of hand to hie vp my honoris, And payntit me as pako, proudest of fedderis, I him miskennyt, be Crist, and cukkald him maid. (377–80) [Than him that dressed me so finely – he was [exceedingly stupid]! When he was plundered to raise my signs of high rank, and painted me as [a] peacock, proudest of feathers, I neglected him, by Christ, and made him [a] cuckold.]

This expressly links into discourses regarding clothing as expounded by E. Jane Burns. She poses the question: ‘What happens, for example, to the hierarchy of gender politics when garments representing substantial wealth are passed from men to women?’20 Burns

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

226

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

outlines several answers to this question. It potentially provoked fears of feminine promiscuity and blurred lines between classes via acts of largesse. It also reflected clerical worries that close association with resplendently dressed women could cause men to dress with similar (feminine) opulence partially via the (re-)gifting of clothing items. The consequences of the latter worry ‘[carry] the ultimate danger that men might no longer be visually distinct from women, since clothing and adornment can obscure biological d ­ ifference’.21 Although the widow certainly embodies the very worst fears of husbands as portrayed in anti-feminist literature, her dress does not necessarily invoke the blurring of gender lines in the anticipated manner. Instead she co-opts distinctly masculine ­expressions to veer her discussion of garments in the opposite direction, as will be explored further below. Schroude has another important collocation in this connection. As a noun, it is used to describe armour or protective clothing used in combat and, as a verb, ‘to cover in order to protect’.22 Two examples demonstrate its collocation with schene. First, in Golagros, Sir Rannald is bade by Arthur to meet the knight Rigal on the field of battle: ‘Schaip the evin to the schalk in thi schroud schene’ (602) (go directly to the fellow in your bright armour). Sir Rannald’s shining armour here asserts Arthur’s great wealth, while telegraphing Arthur’s belief that his claim to hegemony is superior, owing to this wealth and martial strength; these qualities are reified in the bright and shining garb of the knight. In Stewart’s translation of Boece, Buik of the Croniclis of Scotland, he describes a battle between the Romans and Fergus, king of Scots (aided by the Picts). The Romans anticipate the arrival of the Scots and Picts and take the field of battle with ‘Thair semelie schroud likeas siluer schene’ (21,164) (Their attractive armour [shining as silver]). Three important terms in the Tretis appear here: semelie, schroud, and schene (siluer schene itself is a common collocation used in reference to armour). While Stewart’s translation is chronologically later than the Tretis, it attests the well-established heroic context of the vocabulary used by the widow. Across these examples, the use of the alliterative pair schroud and schene directs attention to the appearance of the figures, whose garments are figurative representations of their intentions,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 227

c­haracteristics, or occupations. The widow’s schrowd offers a variety of figurative possibilities, but most prominently, through the guise of feminine wiles, it is a weapon of seductive enticement. This is partly achieved by a subtle grammatical shift from schroude in his schene weid in Howlat, schroud schene in Golagros, or schroud likeas siluer schene in Croniclis. The widow observes, I wes schene. The adjectival form modifies the figure of the woman rather than her garments, thus her seemingly decorous attire both enhances her bright and shining beauty and conceals her motives. The dramatic thematic shift underpinned by the heroic lexicon and alliterative line retains the martial sense of protective armour, while investing the language with new layers of meaning, both sexual and deceitful. Yet, the metallic and materialistic motif that is ever present in the narrative complicates this apparent reclamation of power through the widow’s armour-like schrowd. She later describes her costly raiment: ‘He grathit me in a gay silk and gudly arrayis, / In gownis of engranyt claight and gret goldin chenȝeis, / In ringis ryally set with riche ruby stonis’ (365–7) (He ornamented me in splendid silk and beautiful garments, in gowns of scarlet-dyed cloth and great golden chains, in rings royally set with rich ruby stones). While an obvious response to the first wife’s assertion that she essentially monetises her sexual acquiescence, the gret goldin chenȝeis and ringis that adorn the widow also echo the first wife’s reference to being chained to her churlish husband (55). The widow’s garments thus perhaps inadvertently reflect her husband’s control over her as financial provider. Garments evidently function as an indispensable aspect of the widow’s identity. The description of her appearance and wardrobe, furthermore, concretises her association with Venus. In this respect it becomes even more certain that Dunbar alludes to Henryson’s Venus in The Testament. That Venus is described: […] cled in a nyce array, The ane half grene, the uther half sabill blak, Quhyte hair as gold kemmit and sched abak Bot in hir face semit greit variance, Quhyles perfyte treuth, and quhyles inconstance. (220–4)

228

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

[clad in an extravagant outfit, the one half green, the other half sable black, blonde hair as gold combed and pulled back, but in her face [there] seemed great variance, sometimes perfect faith and sometimes inconstancy.]

Recall that when the narrator observes the women in the frame he notes that: ‘Kemmit war thair clier hair and curiouslie sched, / Attour thair schulderis doun schyre schyning full bricht, […] Thair mantillis grein war as the gres that grew in May sessoun’ (21–2; 24) (Their bright hair was combed and curiously parted, down over their shoulders, gleaming [and] shining very brightly […] Their green cloaks were as the grass that grows in [the] season of May). The visual correspondences with The Goldyn Targe and its venerean court, as outlined in Chapter 4, are expressed in more individual and detailed form in the widow’s subsequent self-portrait. The widow creates a sense of temporal dissonance when she introduces herself as the protagonist of her sermon, which opens with an exposition of her two marriages. Her description of widowhood is of special interest here: ‘My mouth it makis murnyng and my mynd lauchis. / My clokis thai ar caerfull in colour of sabill, / Bot courtly and ryght curyus my corse is ther vndir’ (417–19) (My mouth it gives the impression of grieving and my mind laughs. My  cloaks they are solicitous in colour of sable, but my body is courtly and very elegant underneath). In her widow’s weeds she inhabits the dualistic qualities of Henryson’s Venus down to her face that conceals and embodies greit variance and the layering of her sable cloak over bright, courtly dress. This contrast is even more pointed when set against the women as the narrator discovers them – with partially unbound golden tresses and clad in green. Burns’s description of the female protagonist’s garments in Contenance des fames is illuminating in respect to the widow’s layered garments: This heroine’s courtly clothes are not a luxurious cover applied to degraded female flesh. Her body is rather made out of clothes themselves. When this sartorially fashioned woman stands at the door and opens her cloak, the admirers who look inside the doorway see not lovely skin or curving flesh but another garment […] If she doesn’t



Bad romance 229

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

have a mantle, she lifts the hem of her surcoat and one glimpses only more clothes […] This dressed-up woman takes us back to Reason’s description of Fortune’s water-clothed rock [in Roman de la Rose]: a body that constantly sheds articles of clothing without revealing a clearly discernible or solid form beneath.23

This assessment is dramatically embodied when the widow’s schrowd becomes a cloak likened to ‘cluddis of sable’ (433) (clouds of sable). The illusory and ephemeral quality evoked by this simile is expanded as she goes on to describe the multiple uses of her cloak  – it hides any number of props for her deceits, such as a ‘watter spunge’ (437) (water sponge), which she uses to wet her cheeks with fake tears: ‘Than wring I it full wylely and wetis my chekis. / With that watteris myn ene and welteris doune teris’ (438–9) (Then I wring it very cleverly and wet my cheeks. With that my eyes water and tears tumble down my face). The cloak therefore functions as both an enticing tool of seduction and a costume that facilitates her false act of mourning. Venus, frequently associated with the Moon, similarly takes on an illusory and unstable form when she reveals herself to Eneas in the Eneados.24 She appears, ‘schynyng ful cleir for al the dyrk nycht’ (II.x.57) (shining very clearly in the dark night), and after her speech, ‘scho hir hyd in the cloyß nycht’ (II.x.109) (she hid herself in the oppressive night). The image of Venus wreathed in, emerging from, and re-concealing herself in dark clouds is echoed in the widow’s use of her sable cloak: And as the new mone all pale oppressit with change Kythis quhilis her cleir face throw cluddis of sable, So keik I throw my clokis and castis kynd lukis To knychtis and to cleirkis and cortly personis. (432–5) [And as the new moon all palely oppressed with change sometimes reveals her clear face through clouds of sable, so [too] I peek through my cloaks and cast around affectionate looks to knights and to clerks and courtly persons.]

Venerean associations are thus manifold in the widow’s elaborate presentation of her garments and appearance. The combination of venerean allure and heroic armour fuses seemingly opposed traits

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

230

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

and material trappings, especially in connection with the gendered associations of these clothing items. The widow’s convoluted associations between Venus, anti-­ feminism, and romance are not limited to her exposition of appearance. Her discourse also subverts the second wife’s excoriation of the superficial and performative quality of love games and masculine preening. The first stage of this grotesque concerns the widow’s cuckolding of her husband and the deceitful measures she takes to effect her betrayal. She vividly describes the way she uses physical affection to convince her husband of her devotion while secretly making faces of disgust behind his back (274–80). And, while the first wife does not so overtly describe her disgust for or manipulation of typical love tropes, her analogy between her husband and the devil is echoed when the widow declares of her second husband: ‘And so I did him dispise, I spittit quhen I saw / That superspendit euill spreit spvlȝeit of all vertu’ (396–7) (And I so despised him that I spit when I saw that impotent evil spirit, bankrupt of morals).25 Her reiteration of the other women’s words serves to confirm their behaviour and even pushes them to be more relentless and remorseless in their campaigns against their husbands. She says explicitly that her actions cause her no ‘dule’ or ‘dises’ (281) (grief; distress), and since her story comes as a saint’s life it is implicit that the women should take her as a model of behaviour. The final section of her sermon definitively ruptures all narrative boundaries. The two wives only fantasise about the lovers they would take if the world was different. Their idyllic fantasies are presented to be so absurd that they form part of the stark contrasts that govern the grotesques of their respective speeches. The widow, on the other hand, exceeds their wildest dreams by describing the number of men she seduces at once. Notably, her depiction is presented under the guise of appropriate housewifely behaviour, namely that women should be gracious and generous hostesses. This standard of decorum is subverted when she notes the ways in which she melds service with seduction: Bot with my fair calling I comfort thaim all: For he that sittis me nixt I nip on his finger, I serf him on the tothir syde on the samin fasson,



Bad romance 231

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

And he that behind me sittis I hard on him lene, And him befor with my fut fast on his I stramp, And to the bernis far but suiet blenkis I cast. To euery man in speciall speke I sum wordis, So wisly and so womanly quhill warmys ther hertis. (489–96) [But with my friendly reception I comfort them all: for he that sits next to me I nip on his finger, I serve him on the other side in the same fashion, and he that sits behind me I lean on him hard, and him before with my foot I stamp on his firmly, and to the men far away I cast sweet glances. To every man in special I speak some words, so wisely and womanly so that [it] warms their hearts.]

The widow grotesquely multiplies herself to entertain and entice a multitude of men both physically and through gesture. She provides wise and comforting counsel to each of her male companions and divides her attention equally and generously.26 In her seductions, the widow overtly embodies Venus’s various allegorical attendants as depicted in The Goldyn Targe. The dreamer recalls the forces set against him: Dissymilance scho bad go mak persute At all powere to perse the goldyn targe; And scho that was of doubilnes the rute Askit hir choise of archeris in refute. Wenus the best bad hir go wale at large. Scho tuke Presence, plicht anker of the barge, And Fair Callyng, that wele a flayn coud schute, And Cherising for to complete hir charge. (182–9) [She bade Dissimulation to attack with full force to pierce the golden shield; and she that was the source of deception asked [Venus] her choice of archers for protection. Venus bade her to select the best freely. She took Presence [i.e. physical closeness], main anchor of the ship, and Friendly Reception, that could shoot an arrow well, and for Cherishing [i.e. affection] to complete her charge.]

Venus’s elite archers are rendered as the same allegorical qualities that the widow uses to her advantage in her conquests. Dissymilance may be the overarching theme of the sermon, but the widow makes herself a hybrid of all of these venerean qualities. And, rather than using this venerean embodiment to attack just one

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

232

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

target, the singular widow inverts this image by deploying Venus’s ‘forces’ against a whole host of men. Seeming to multiply and divide herself grotesquely, she reifies Venus’s attendant qualities, while simultaneously calling up the various anti-feminist and biblical references of the preceding discourse. Whereas violence in The Goldyn Targe is overt, violence is perpetrated by the women of the Tretis only insofar as they repeatedly return to a militaristic lexicon in order to convey their thoughts, feelings, and behaviours in various romantic situations. Interestingly, the widow does not present this seduction as an assault with the unequivocal language of violence as seen in descriptions of masculine abuse in the other speeches. Rather, she skilfully implies physical aggression through this link to Venus’s attendants and in the subtle ‘assaults’ she uses to entice men – she leans hard against one, stamps on the foot of another, and nips the fingers of a third and fourth. The widow brings allegory into reality through her embodiment of Venus and her ‘virtues’ and in so doing she ruptures all conventional boundaries as dictated by the sermon form, morality, and the precepts of feminine conduct. Crucially, the context and narrative quality of the widow’s speech demands that an important final consideration be made: the widow relates her ‘saint’s life’ as an exemplary ‘history’; she means for the sentence of her life story to be a revelatory experience for her listeners. Thus, the widow is in fact two (or three?) characters. She is the authoritative voice of ‘divine’ inspiration and moral guidance, but also the benighted wife and the seductive widow who manipulates her world for her own gain. The narrative grotesque facilitates this complex and multifaceted reading of her discourse. The widow is associated with Scottish portrayals of Venus as well as heroically clad warriors, vain birds, and evil wives of anti-feminist literature. By grafting together a dissonant and chaotic spectrum of allusions and illusions in her sermon, saint’s life, and venerean manifesto, she creates a bizarre overspilling of boundaries that results in a densely grotesque narrative.



Bad romance 233

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Laughter, loathing, and learning Along with the more horrifying deceits encouraged in the widow’s speech there is also a pervasive sense of humour. Perfetti considers the subversive nature of the widow’s speech in the wider context of female laughter.27 In the Tretis she suggests that the women’s laughter is contrived as a counter-narrative to popular good-wife treatises. Where Perfetti emphasises the comic effect achieved by a playing-off of ‘medieval husbands’ fears of their sexual inadequacy, and the damage it could do to a wife’s respect of him’,28 I would like to focus on the comic nature of the text from a more general perspective. The very fact that the widow is manipulating the sermon for a nefarious end provokes a certain type of discomfited humour. Despite the wives’ glee, the narrator forces the outside audience to remain at a distance from the conversation. This separation is crucial to the sense of discomfort inherent to the narrative  – it invites the audience to laugh at both the wives’ and the narrator’s reactions with a frisson of repulsed hilarity. It is wonderfully diabolical and absurd and the audience is in a position to appreciate the contradiction. In this respect the audience’s participation in  textual production is essential to the full development of the grotesque narrative. The end of the widow’s speech and the subsequent return to the narrative frame has the quality of awakening from a trance. In his concluding refrain the narrator observes that the women have been converted by her sermon and continue to laugh and drink: Quhen endit had hir ornat speche this eloquent wedow, Lowd thai lewch all the laif and loffit hir mekle, And said thai suld exampill tak of her souerane teching And wirk efter hir wordis, that woman wes so prudent. Than culit thai ther mouthis with confortable drinkis. (505–9) [When this eloquent widow had ended her ornamented speech, all the others laughed loudly and praised her very much, and said they should take her excellent teaching as a guide to conduct and act according to her words, that woman was so wise. Then they cooled [off] their mouths with comforting drinks.]

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

234

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

This refrain maintains links with the previous two commentaries made by the narrator, but in this case it leads to a sobered narrative comment. The widow’s sermon is met with loud laughter and both wives vow to follow the widow’s teaching. Even the narrator, though presumably calling the widow’s speech eloquent and ornat with irony, seems to share in their sense of awe. Owing to the narrative grotesque, the audience is able to appreciate the gleeful adulation of the wives at precisely the same moment that they comprehend the horror of the eavesdropping male. Veracity, sincerity, and authenticity, which have been the central focal points in the text, are shown to be part of an elaborate illusion, an artificial construction. The widow deconstructs notions of authority not by refusing it all together or by battling it, but by using the rhetoric of masculine authority and reshaping it to her own ends. Her exploitation of traditional patriarchal discourses does not stop at satirical repurposing, but distorts and contorts the sermon with perfect eloquence. And this comes after the previous wives have done their part in appropriating and distorting common forms of courtly pastime, namely the demande d’amour, the complaint, and the poetic flyting. After describing the women’s reactions to the speech in the refrain the narrator returns to the frame proper, where he highlights his own reaction to the final speech. Rather than lightly commenting on the content of the speech and moving on (as he has done for the previous two) he seems genuinely disturbed by the widow’s message. In the widow’s speech the emotive power of her distortion of form, content, and context evokes this deeply conflicted reaction. The wives laugh raucously; the narrator shudders but gives the episode a humorous turn by posing the second demande; and the audience, in their quasi-omniscient role, achieves a sense of cathartic release from the confused manipulations of the text.

Notes  1 For associations with the latter see Calin, The Lily and the Thistle, pp. 109–11.  2 Ross, William Dunbar, pp. 227–32.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bad romance 235

 3 The Pardoner’s Tale, for instance, does not cross into this grotesque sphere because he still purports to preach Christian teachings. The disconnect arises from his weak moral authority in his preaching, which creates an ironic contrast rather than a complete dislocation of form, content, and context.  4 V. I. Scherb, ‘Blasphemy and the Grotesque in the Digby “Mary Magdalene”’, Studies in Philology 96.3 (1999), 225–40 (p. 237).  5 Scherb, ‘Blasphemy and the Grotesque’, p. 237.  6 S. Gallick, ‘A Look at Chaucer and His Preachers’, Speculum 50.3 (1975), 456–76. See also C. H. Miller and R. B. Bosse, ‘Chaucer’s Pardoner and the Mass’, The Chaucer Review 6.3 (1972), 171–84, and E. Reiss, ‘The Final Irony of the Pardoner’s Tale’, College English 25.4 (1964), 160–6.  7 Gallick, ‘A Look at Chaucer and His Preachers’, p. 470.  8 Gallick, ‘A Look at Chaucer and His Preachers’, p. 459.  9 Bawcutt (ed.), William Dunbar, Volume 2, p. 346; note to line 347. 10 Bawcutt, Dunbar the Makar, pp. 335–6. 11 See Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, pp. 68–70; 92–5. 12 See Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, pp. 16–18. 13 See Windeatt, ‘Afterlives’, esp. pp. 263–4. 14 Boccaccio, Genealogy, pp. 383–4. 15 Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, p. 70. 16 See also Schreiber, ‘Venus in the Mythographic Tradition’. 17 Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, p. 17. 18 Cf. E. J. Burns, Courtly Love Undressed: Reading through Clothes in Medieval French Culture (eBook: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002), pp. 44–53. 19 Cf. J. B. Friedman, ‘Peacocks and Preachers: Analytic Technique in Marcus of Orvieto’s Liber de moralitatibus, Vatican lat. MS 5935’ in W. B. Clark and M. T. McMunn, Beasts and Birds of the Middle Ages: The Bestiary and its Legacy (eBook: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1989), pp. 179–96 (esp. pp. 187–9). 20 Burns, Courtly Love Undressed, p. 38. 21 Burns, Courtly Love Undressed, p. 41. 22 See DSL definitions for s(c)hroude, n. and s(c)hroud, v. 23 Burns, Courtly Love Undressed, p. 55. 24 See E. L. Harrison, ‘Divine Action in “Aeneid” Book Two’, Phoenix 24.4 (1970), 320–32. 25 This line carries a double entendre on spvlȝeit of all vertu: vertu (translated as ‘valour’) could equally indicate moral bankruptcy, since her husband is ‘robbed of valour’, and function as a euphemism for sexual impotency, which is referenced in the beginning of the line.

236

The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

26 Cf. Girvan (ed.), Thewis, lines 101–8. This tonally complex section of the text advises women to be unfailingly loving and gracious to their household and ‘Tyll al folk swet and debonar / with gudly wyll at hire poware’ (107–8) (To all folk [be] sweet and courteous with generous disposition to her best effort). 27 Perfetti, Women and Laughter, pp. 112–13. 28 Perfetti, Women and Laughter, p. 107.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Conclusion

Ts’ui Pên must have said once: I am withdrawing to write a book. And another time: I am withdrawing to construct a labyrinth. Every one imagined two works; to no one did it occur that the book and the maze were one and the same thing. (Jorge Luis Borges, The Garden of Forking Paths)1

This study set out with a rather unconventional mission. Its objective was to apply a new framework, which I termed the ‘narrative grotesque’, to make sense of two Older Scots poems that have confounded categorisation or any sustained, systematic analysis for that matter. The two texts under consideration do not share, broadly speaking, generic categories, nor do they appear to deal with similar subject matter. However, the narrative grotesque functions as a sort of anamorphic lens that brings into focus hitherto unremarked or unnoticed correlations. Distortion thus resolves from this specialised vantage point. This process of clarification revolves around narrative moments which reveal the intersection of ideas, affect, and form. In Gavin Douglas’s The Palyce of Honour and William Dunbar’s The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo new correspondences were discovered by means of the narrative grotesque: they share a concern with poetic making that is expressed in weird and wonderful new shapes and patterns; their self-conscious interrogations of medieval forms and perspectives create an unlikely blend of genres, voices, and structures that, in turn, materialise into uncanny, novel creations. Amid these innovative projects of poetic making, each author reveals an underlying concern with accuracy, veracity, ­authenticity,

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

238

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

and eloquence. Although Douglas and Dunbar have different methods and strategies that they apply to these concerns, there are many points on which they agree. Most prominently, they rupture poetic boundaries by grafting together opposed or discordant literary elements, such as voice, form, and theme. In the following concluding remarks I will tease out some of these intersections as well as some divergences. In so doing, I will point to other texts and venues that would benefit from this analytic strategy. These remarks are not meant to be an end point; rather, they serve as a nexus that collates some insights gained in this study in order to enable new pathways and directions to be explored. Both Palyce and the Tretis rely on illusion and disillusion to advance their interrogations of poetics. Each opens with recognisable tropes and motifs that are rapidly dismantled in increasingly shocking manners. The shock prompted by these reversals, subversions, and inversions gives way to humour as a result of the self-reflexivity of the compositions, which is played out through the voices of the figures inhabiting the texts and via the sometimes absurd antitheses that are momentarily melded. Cycles of illusion and disillusion in both Dunbar and Douglas are therefore exposed by the narrative grotesque, since the horror and humour created at points of rupture are often kindled by their authors’ poetic phantasms. Douglas achieves this illusory and unmoored sensation by engaging the dream vision form, which was one of the most well-established and identifiable genres in medieval writing. The poem, densely packed with allusions to other texts and traditions, feels nearly impenetrable. But, the self-reflexive multiplication of Douglases populating the text buoys the composition – and the genre – via their unabashed irreverence. Divesting the dream vision from its ‘medieval encrustations’,2 as Tinkle might say, not only vivifies the increasingly fossilised form, but also re-examines its presentation of poetic enlightenment. Douglas sets his dreamer on a humanist quest to discover the role of the poet and of poetics. What he finds is that the poet, inspired by divine illumination, may act as a conduit for elevating humans towards their superior intellect, thus raising them towards the contemplative life, towards the divine.3

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Conclusion 239

Dream vision poetry persisted well into the sixteenth century in Scotland. Sir David Lyndsay’s The Dreme (c. 1526) continues in the tradition of Scottish innovation by presenting an unusual frame to the dream – its dreamer falls asleep in a cave on a frosty winter beach – which overtly parallels and diverges from Scottish precedent as found in Palyce and The Testament of Cresseid. Similarly, Alexander Montgomerie’s The Cherrie and the Slae (c. 1584–85) responds to the Scottish tradition, but also offers new insights into the form by employing multiple genres within his dream vision.4 Saliently, Palyce is a key source for Lyndsay and Montgomery. Owing to this ‘grotesque’ influence, applying the framework of the narrative grotesque to a more concerted examination of sixteenthcentury Scottish dream vision poetry could lead to the identification of new continuities and evolutions in the genre. Whereas Douglas is particularly motivated by humanist philosophies pertaining to the poetic vocation and the poet as prophet (vates), Dunbar deconstructs and thus revitalises genre in order to expose poetic artificiality in new and important ways. He too is concerned with critically engaging the poetic craft; however, he is not oriented towards the divine rewards sought by humanist poets. Rather, he seeks to expose the tethers inextricably binding form, affect, and voice by fracturing rote combinations of the three. He creates illusions of conventionality only to dispel them through overspilled boundaries and unexpected salamanders of the type that lurk in van Vianen’s Lidded Ewer. Ultimately, Dunbar not only untethers or unmoors poetics from their conventional forms, but turns these very forms back on themselves and eventually collapses them, thereby revealing the brittleness of poetic artifice. The narrative grotesque thus enables critics to reconsider works that test the boundaries of genre and form. By zeroing in on moments and fractures previously glossed as simply dissonant or unaccountably absurd, it opens a space to (re-)excavate medieval writers’ perceptions of category and division in the literary craft. In regard to this overarching aspect of the narrative grotesque, as played out in the layering together of forms and genres, such as the dream vision, demande d’amour, complaint, flyting (invective), and sermon, new opportunities in medieval criticism become apparent. Late medieval and early modern complaints, especially, would

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

240

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

benefit from the framework provided by the narrative grotesque. Rebecca Marsland’s thesis, ‘Complaint in Scotland c. 1424–c.1500’, for instance, establishes a strong foundation for applying the narrative grotesque to the complaint form as it appears in Scotland; and this framework could allow scholars to draw new connections not only between Scottish texts but also across linguistic and (medieval) geopolitical borders.5 Another genre that has clear ties to the grotesque is, of course, invective poetry. Older Scots flytings of the later sixteenth century are a natural extension for grotesque analysis. While the flytings in the Tretis, Howlat, and The Flyting of Dumbar and Kennedie are clear venues for applying the narrative grotesque, Alexander Montgomerie and Sir Patrick Hume of Polwarth’s later flytings, ‘Invectiues Capitane Allexander Montgomeree and Pollvart etcetera’ (c. 1580–3), continue  to develop the genre. These flyters amplify supernatural elements and create elaborate pseudo-medical taunts, thus showcasing a changing set of sensibilities and trends in Scottish writing in the later sixteenth century. Critics, such as Jacqueline Simpson, have focused on the burlesque and supernatural elements of the flyting, yet the inventive language, the extended description of physical deformity and medical ailments, and the pervasive melding of horror and humour provide ample material for an analysis that applies the narrative grotesque.6 This type of analysis would doubly benefit by considering the flytings in the context of James VI of Scotland’s 1584 poetic treatise, ‘Ane Schort Treatise Conteining Some Reulis and Cautelis to be Observit and Eschewit in Scottis Poesie’ (‘A Short Treatise Containing Some Rules and Warnings to be Observed and Avoided in Scottish Poetry’), which uses the Montgomerie–Polwarth flyting to illustrate his arguments on several occasions. The narrative grotesque is also viable as a strategy for reading discrete episodes or narrative events. Douglas and Dunbar both create grotesque multiplications, hybridisations, and destructions in individual moments, and even in single lines of verse. Dunbar encapsulates the latter point when his narrator observes of the three women, ‘thai swapit of the sueit wyne, thai swan quhit of hewis’ (243) (they swigged the sweet wine, those ladies as white as swans). Ligatured together by the alliterative long line, oral-poetic language of beauty creates a hybrid with the colloquial description of the

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Conclusion 241

women’s behaviour. The narrative grotesque explicates this brief fusion of opposed images and the discordance between them creates a striking balance of horror and humour. Meanwhile, Douglas similarly constructs the narrative grotesque at a granular level. His narrator’s bizarre declaration upon seeing Calliope’s court is especially evocative; the narrator claims that he could not express the beatific harmony of Calliope’s court, ‘thocht I had tonges ten’ (1260) (even if I had ten tongues), and not even if ‘al my membris tongis were on raw’ (1261) (all my body parts were tongues in a row). The image of a ten-tongued mouth or a body covered in tongues is unequivocally grotesque. This effect is amplified by its placement in the diegesis: the narrator invokes the image in order to impress upon the audience the supreme and divine loveliness of the moment. In the two above examples, the narrative grotesque is distilled into a crystallised moment of rupture and fusion at the level of the body and at the level of narrative. By means of this narrative grotesque both poets present new ways of perceiving and constructing eloquence in poetry. Hybridisation is deeply connected in both narratives with transfiguration and violence. Douglas’s dreamer is continuously worried about the integrity of his body; his embodiment of his psychological fears as well as his nascent transformation into a divinely inspired poet is frequently expressed in language that fuses human and animal characteristics or distorts his body in disturbing ways. Hybridisation in this way is linked to the concept of metamorphosis or transfiguration. It is also naturally associated with the distinction (or lack thereof) between human and animal. The narrative grotesque might thus function as a useful strategy for considering anew texts that manipulate boundaries between human and animal, whether by transfiguration of the body or mind or as animals display human qualities or engage in human pastimes or activities. In this context of hybridisation and transfiguration, the narrative grotesque essentially raises to the surface questions of identity and voice and, by extension, their roles in literary works. Birds as allegories, debaters, and literary motifs have significant potential to function as focal points of analyses that mobilise the narrative grotesque as a reading strategy.7 One text that might be a productive starting point for this kind of analysis is Howlat, which

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

242

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

appeared as a point of reference multiple times throughout this study. Likewise, Sir David Lyndsay’s The Testament of the Papyngo (c. 1530) blends literary testament, bird fable, complaint, dream vision, and epistle to James V of Scotland in a poem narrated by James V’s dying parrot. The poem ingeniously combines comic and serious matters with a rich array of intertexts, prominently drawing from Palyce, The Goldyn Targe, James I of Scotland’s the Kingis Quair, and The Testament of Cresseid, in addition to Lyndsay’s other works. Glenn Burger, for example, has noted that ‘its structural indeterminacies and tonal ambiguities, should rather be understood as a deconstruction of traditional forms of satire so that they can once again accurately mirror the highest truths’.8 Since Burger’s study (published in 1989) there have been only a handful of further investigations into the poem, although Conor Leahy has recently identified a new fragment on the flyleaf of a manuscript dating to Lyndsay’s lifetime (now the earliest witness to the text).9 Lyndsay’s poem is a potentially significant extension of the types of narrative grotesque that have been investigated in the current study; the relative dearth of critical analysis surrounding the poem further impresses the import of a deeper investigation into the work not only for its role as an inheritor of earlier Scottish poetic styles and traditions, but also as a source for new and unique modes of creative expression in Scots. Other animal narratives, like the Middle English poem The Hunttyng of the Hare, a unicum found in the Heege Manuscript (c. 1480), are prime examples of the further applications of the narrative grotesque: the poem of ‘comic festivity’ features an absurd and brutal hunt involving a massacre of dogs – including disembowelments and rendered limbs – followed by a similarly violent clash among men – leading to lifelong incapacitating injuries – all in pursuit of a single hare. This poem provokingly contravenes accepted theories of festive ‘peasant brawl’ poetry, namely that it has a cheerful monde renversé aesthetic that does not result in permanent alterations to the narrative world. Considering the extensive maiming and killing in the poem, this parameter needs to be rethought. As such, the poem would benefit immensely from a sustained analysis conducted against the framework of the narrative grotesque.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Conclusion 243

The Hunttyng of the Hare introduces another contentious issue related to the narrative grotesque, namely the interplay of violence and humour. When violence appears as a humorous event or is contextualised in such a way as to arouse humour, it becomes a particularly difficult issue. Some modern critics even contend that it may negate humour in explicitly comic texts.10 Dunbar’s female speakers highlight the uncomfortable role that violence may occupy in the literary text. The first wife’s exposition of marriage contains a catalogue of her husband’s diabolic and violent sexual assaults, which she conveys as a flyting. The narrative grotesque allows for a number of salient observations to be made about this challenging and uncomfortable episode: first, it explicates the wife’s fracturing of expectations associated with the demande d’amour. She presents marriage as a terrifying and dangerous venture for women; her contention obliterates the types of discourse typically expected when aristocratic or ‘courtly’ persons gather to debate points of love. Simultaneously, she brings to bear on her discourse the darkly humorous tone of flyting, which uses hyperbolic language rife with neologisms to lambast opponents. Consequently, the implications of these flyting conventions equally, if differently, influence the perception of her narrative as ‘true’ and ‘accurate’. The grotesque makes available a productive and illuminating understanding of the purpose of the episode in the diegesis: the artifices and conventions of genre can not only impact but prevent genuine affective expression or emotional authenticity. Dunbar exposes this by twisting together stylistic preconceptions to present multiple potential subjectivities and truths. This episode from the Tretis therefore illustrates the utility of the narrative grotesque as a framework for explicating fraught episodes of violence. This overview of hybridisation, transfiguration, and violence sketches briefly the ways in which the narrative grotesque may be applied to individual lines, images, or episodes to bring nuance to broader analyses. Femininity and female behaviour as grotesque constructions in medieval texts are likewise issues raised by Dunbar’s depiction of the women in the Tretis. In these terms, the Middle English romance The Weddyng of Syr Gawen and Dame Ragnell for the Helpyng of Kyng Arthoure immediately presents itself as a likely

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

244

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

target for the narrative grotesque. In exchange for Dame Ragnell’s help in saving his life by solving a riddle, King Arthur agrees to her request to marry Sir Gawain. Problematically, Ragnell is a hideous and highly sexualised hag – an archetypical ‘Loathly Lady’. One crucial nexus of the narrative grotesque in this poem is Ragnell’s mouth, which is a site of horrified fascination for the men within the diegesis as well as the narrator, who relishes in describing it as an all-consuming, vagina-like orifice complete with tusks and bristles. Her clever repartee and the final plot twist in which she is revealed to be a bewitched maiden completely undermine the narrative, since she is portrayed as a sort of hybrid: she inhabits two distinct personas. Ragnell is both elderly hag and Gawain’s lovely young wife. The implications of her hybridity, moreover, are not explored in the poem, in the sense that many of her egregious and transgressive behaviours as a hag are elided and nearly forgotten once she becomes young and beautiful. Perhaps pointedly, she remains sexually voracious even after her transformation and her sexuality becomes an even larger threat to the court by inhibiting Gawain’s participation in male bonding activities. The romance abruptly resolves the danger she poses by killing her off before the end of the narrative. The narrative grotesque presents intriguing opportunities to centre discourse on Ragnell’s intersecting characterisation as a witty interlocutor and as a sexual (anti-)fantasy. In turn, this analysis might extend to other ‘Loathly Lady’ texts that mobilise similar strategies in the portrayal of their protagonists. The points touched upon in this summary are intended to emphasise some key applications of the narrative grotesque. Across Palyce and the Tretis the narrative grotesque proved an elastic framework that made available new readings of a range of narrative features found in the poems. Moreover, this anamorphic vantage point enabled me to incorporate comparisons with a wide spectrum of primary texts. These ranged from classical writings, including Ovid’s Tristia and Fasti and Tiberianus’s ‘The Vigil of Venus’; to verse compositions in Older Scots and Middle English, most prominently other works by Douglas and Dunbar as well as by Henryson and Chaucer; and finally to later humanist discourses on the nature of poetry and poetic making from Landino, Ficino, Pico, and Boccaccio. By reorienting our perspective on Douglas’s and



Conclusion 245

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Dunbar’s work, respectively, through the narrative grotesque, I was able to bring forward these multivalent influences and analogues. The result, I hope, was rather less grotesque than the works that I assessed. And, while these concluding remarks are by no means meant to be comprehensive, it is my intention that they raise some possibilities for extending the narrative grotesque to other texts and literatures.

Notes  1 Jorge Luis Borges, The Garden of Forking Paths, in Labyrinths. Selected Stories and Other Writings, eds Donald A. Yates and James E. Irby (Great Britain: Penguin Books, 2000), p. 50.  2 Tinkle, Medieval Venuses and Cupids, p. 70.  3 See especially Landino’s perception of divine illumination and the superior life of the intellect in McNair, Cristoforo Landino, pp. 126–30 and McNair, ‘Divine Illumination’, esp. pp. 84–8.  4 See H. M. Shire, Song, Dance and Poetry of the Court of Scotland under King James VI (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969), pp. 117–39, where she identifies Rose as an important intertext from the French tradition.  5 R. L. K. Marsland, ‘Complaint in Scotland c. 1424–c. 1500’ (PhD thesis: Oxford University, UK, 2013).  6 J. Simpson, ‘“The Weird Sisters Wandering”: Burlesque Witchery in Montgomerie’s Flyting’, Folklore 106 (1995), 9–20. For a more general overview of the cultural contexts of the flyting see S. Mapstone, ‘Invective as Poetic: The Cultural Contexts of Polwarth and Montgomerie’s Flyting’, Scottish Literary Journal 26.2 (1999), 18–40.  7 The narrative grotesque might be used in concert with other theoretical strategies for reading medieval texts. These kinds of opportunities are seen, for example, alongside studies such as M. J. Goodrich, ‘The Flyting of The Owl and the Nightingale: Animacy, Antisemitism, and Species Division’, Early Middle English 2.1 (2020), 1–31, which mobilises animacy theory and medieval race theory.  8 G. Burger, ‘Poetical Invention and Ethical Wisdom in Lindsay’s “Testament of Papyngo”’, Studies in Scottish Literature 24.1 (1989), 164–80 (p. 165).  9 C. Leahy, ‘A Newly Discovered Manuscript Fragment of Sir David Lyndsay’s The Testament of the Papyngo’, Notes and Queries (2021),

246

The narrative grotesque in medieval Scottish poetry

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

1–5. See also Calin’s chapter on Lyndsay in The Lily and the Thistle, pp. 126–56, and M. T. McMunn, ‘Parrots and Poets in Late Medieval Literature’, Anthrozoös 12.2 (1999), 68–75. 10 See, for example, L. Tracy, ‘The Uses of Torture and Violence in the Fabliaux: When Comedy Crosses the Line’, Florilegium 23.2 (2006), 143–68.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Bibliography

Primary sources Boccaccio, Giovanni, Boccaccio on Poetry, trans. and ed. Charles Osgood (New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1956). Boccaccio, Giovanni, Genealogy of the Pagan Gods, Volume I. Books I–V, trans. and ed. Jon Solomon (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011). Boece, Hector, trans. William Stewart, The Buik of the Croniclis of Scotland or a Metrical Version of the History of Hector Boece by William Stewart, 3 Volumes, ed. William Turnbull (online: Cambridge University Press, 2014), https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139162944. Borges, Jorge Luis, The Garden of Forking Paths, in Labyrinths. Selected Stories and Other Writings, ed. Donald A. Yates and James E. Irby (Great Britain: Penguin Books, 2000). Calcidius, On Plato’s Timaeus, trans. and ed. John Magee (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 2016). Catullus, Tibullus, Catullus. Tibullus. Pervigilium Veneris, trans. F.  W.  Cornish, J. P. Postgate, J. W. Mackail; rev. G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 6 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1913). Chaucer, Geoffrey, The Canterbury Tales, in The Riverside Chaucer, gen. ed. Larry D. Benson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). Chaucer, Geoffrey, The Complaint of Mars, in The Riverside Chaucer, gen. ed. Larry D. Benson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). Chaucer, Geoffrey, The House of Fame, in The Riverside Chaucer, gen. ed. Larry D. Benson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). Chaucer, Geoffrey, The Parliament of Fowls, in The Riverside Chaucer, gen. ed. Larry D. Benson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). Douglas, Gavin, The Eneados, Gavin Douglas’s Translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, Volume 2, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt with Ian Cunningham (Edinburgh: The Scottish Text Society, forthcoming 2021).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

248

Bibliography

Douglas, Gavin, The Palice of Honour, in The Shorter Poems of Gavin Douglas, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Edinburgh: The Scottish Text Society, 2003). Douglas, Gavin, The Palyce of Honour, ed. David Parkinson (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, rev. edn, 2018). Dunbar, William, The Flyting of Dumbar and Kennedie, in The Poems of William Dunbar, Volume 1, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1998). Dunbar, William, The Goldyn Targe, in The Poems of William Dunbar, Volume 1, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1998). Dunbar, William, ‘Off Februar the fyiftene nycht’, in The Poems of William Dunbar, Volume 1, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1998). Dunbar, William, The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo, in The Poems of William Dunbar, Volume 1, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1998). Ficino, Marsilio, All Things Natural: Ficino on Plato’s Timaeus, trans. Arthur Farndell (London: Shepheard-Walwyn (Publishers) Ltd, 2010). Ficino, Marsilio, Three Books on Life, trans. and ed. Carol V. Kaske and John R. Clark (Binghampton: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1989). Hay, Sir Gilbert, The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour, ed. John Cartwright (Edinburgh: The Scottish Text Society, 1986). Henryson, Robert, Robert Henryson. The Complete Works, ed. David J. Parkinson (Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 2010). Holland, Richard, The Buke of the Howlat, ed. Ralph Hanna (Edinburgh: Scottish Text Society, 2014). Homer, Iliad, Volume II: Books 13–24, trans. A. T. Murray; rev. William F. Wyatt (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1925). Horace, Satires. Epistles. The Art of Poetry, trans. H. Rushton. Fairclough Loeb Classical Library 194 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1926). James I of Scotland, The Kingis Quair, in The Kingis Quair and Other Prison Poems, L. R. Mooney and M.-J. Arn (eds) (online: Medieval Institute Publications, 2005), https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/ publication/mooney-and-arn-kingis-quair-and-other-prison-poems. The Knightly Tale of Golagros and Gawane, ed. Ralph Hanna (Edinburgh: Scottish Text Society, 2008). Lichtoun, ‘Quha doutis dremis is bot phantasye?’ in Duncane Laideus Testament and Other Comic Poems in Older Scots, ed. Janet Hadley Williams (Edinburgh: Scottish Text Society, 2016).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bibliography 249

Lydgate, John, The Floure of Curtesye, in The Chaucerian Apocrypha: A Selection, ed. Kathleen Forni (online: Medieval Institute Publications, 2005), https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/publication/forni-​c​h​a​u​c​eri​an-a​p​ o​c​r​y​pha. Lyndsay, Sir David, The Dreme, in Sir David Lyndsay, Selected Poems, ed. Janet Hadley Williams (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 2000). The Maitland Folio Manuscript. Containing Poems by Sir Richard Maitland, Dunbar, Douglas, Henryson, and Others, Volume I, ed. W. A. Craigie (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1919). Ovid, Fasti, trans. James G. Frazer; rev. G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 253 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1931). Ovid, Tristia. Ex Ponto, trans. A. L. Wheeler; rev. G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 151 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1924). Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, Oration on the Dignity of Man, trans. and ed. Francesco Borghesi, Michael Papio, and Massimo Riva (eBook: Cambridge University Press, 2003), https://doi.org/10.1017/ CBO9781139059565. Plato, Timaeus, in Timaeus. Critias. Cleitophon. Menexenus. Epistles, trans. R. G. Bury, Loeb Classical Library 234 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1929). The Quare of Jelusy, in Chaucerian Dream Visions and Complaints, ed. Dana M. Symons (online: Medieval Institute Publications, 2004), https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/publication/symons-chaucerian-dream​-​ v​isions-and-complaints. Selected Poems of Henryson and Dunbar, ed. Douglas Gray (London: Penguin, 1998). The Thewis off Gudwomen, in Ratis Raving and Other Early Scots Poems on Morals, ed. R. Girvan (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood & Sons, 1939). Wyntoun, Andrew, The Original Chronicle of Andrew of Wyntoun, Volume IV, ed. F. J. Amours (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1906). Secondary works Aitken, A. J. ‘The Language of Older Scots Poetry’, in C. Macafee (ed.) Collected Writings on the Scots Language (online: Scots Language Centre, 2015). Originally published in J. D. McClure (ed.) Scotland and the Lowland Tongue. Studies in the Language and Literature of Lowland Scotland in honour of David D. Murison (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1983).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

250

Bibliography

Amsler, M. E. ‘The Quest for the Present Tense: The Poet and the Dreamer in Douglas’ The Palice of Honour’, Studies in Scottish Literature 17.1 (1982), 186–208. Bakhtin, M. Rabelais and His World, trans. Hélène Iswolsky (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1984). Bawcutt, P. Gavin Douglas, A Critical Study (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1976). —— Dunbar the Makar (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992). —— (ed.) The Poems of William Dunbar, Volume 2 (Glasgow: The Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1998). —— (ed.) The Eneados, Gavin Douglas’s Translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, Volume 1: Introduction and Commentary, ed. Priscilla Bawcutt with Ian Cunningham (Edinburgh: The Scottish Text Society, 2020). Bennett, J. A. W. The Parlement of Foules: An Interpretation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957). Bernau, A. ‘Affecting Forms: Theorizing with the Palis of Honoure’, in G. D. Burger and H. A. Crocker (eds), Medieval Affect, Feeling, and Emotion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019), pp. 181–202. Bitterling, K. ‘The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo: Some Comments on Words, Imagery, and Genre’, in D. Strauss and H. W. Drescher (eds), Scottish Language and Literature, Medieval and Renaissance. Fourth International Conference 1984, Proceedings (Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Peter Lang, 1986), pp. 337–58. Bossy, M.-A. ‘Charles d’Orléans and the Wars of the Roses: Yorkist and Tudor Implications of British Library MS Royal 16 F ii’, in D. E. O’Sullivan and L. Shepard (eds), Shaping Courtliness in Medieval  France: Essays in Honor of Matilda Tomaryn Bruckner (Boydell and Brewer Online: D. S. Brewer, 2013), pp. 61–80. Brewer, D. S. ‘The Genre of the “Parlement of Foules”’, Modern Language Review 53.3 (1958), 321–26. Burger, G. ‘Poetical Invention and Ethical Wisdom in Lindsay’s “Testament of Papyngo”’, Studies in Scottish Literature 24.1 (1989), 164–80. Burness, E. ‘Female Language in The Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo’, in D. Strauss and H. W. Drescher (eds), Scottish Language and Literature, Medieval and Renaissance. Fourth International Conference 1984, Proceedings (Frankfurt am Main: Verlag Peter Lang, 1986), 209–20. Burns, E. J. Courtly Love Undressed: Reading through Clothes in Medieval French Culture (eBook: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002). Calin, W. ‘Medieval Intertextuality: Lyrical Inserts and Narrative in Guillaume de Machaut’, The French Review 62.1 (1988), 1–10. —— The Lily and the Thistle: the French Tradition and the Older Literature of Scotland (North York: University of Toronto Press, 2014).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bibliography 251

Celenza, C. S. The Intellectual World of the Italian Renaissance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018). Cohen, J. J. Of Giants: Sex, Monsters, and the Middle Ages (London: University of Minnesota Press, 1999). Connelly, F. Modern Art and the Grotesque (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). —— The Grotesque in Western Art and Culture: the Image at Play (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). Davenport, W. A. Chaucer. Complaint and Narrative (Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer, 1988). Davis, S. ‘Guillaume de Machaut, Chaucer’s “Book of the Duchess”, and the Chaucer Tradition’, The Chaucer Review 36.4 (2002), 391–405. Ebin, L. ‘Dunbar’s Bawdy’, The Chaucer Review 14.3 (1980), 278–86. Edwards, J. D. and R. Graulund, Grotesque (Abingdon: Routledge, 2013). Farnham, W. The Shakespearean Grotesque: Its Genesis and Transformations (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971). Felberg-Levitt, M. ‘Dialogues in Verse and Prose: The Demandes d’amour’, Le Moyen Français: revue d’études linguistiques et littéraires dirigée par Giuseppe di Stefano 29 (1991), 33–44. —— Les demandes d’amour (Montréal: Ceres, 1995). Finlayson, J. ‘The Form of the Middle English “Lay”’, The Chaucer Review 19.4 (1985), 351–68. Flynn, C. and C. Mitchell, ‘“It may be verifyit that thy wit is thin”: Interpreting Older Scots Flyting through Hip Hop Aesthetics’, Oral Tradition 29.1 (2014), 69–86. Flynn, C. ‘Mobbing (Dis)order and the Literary Pig in The Tale of Colkelbie Sow, Pars Prima’, Studies in Scottish Literature 41.1 (2016), 47–61. —— ‘Two Cailleacha in Older Scots Comic Poetry’, North American Journal of Celtic Studies 4.2 (2020), 198–214. —— ‘Fabliau Afterlives: Magic, the Grotesque, and the Fifteenth-Century Fabliau’, JEGP 120.1 (2021), 18–40. Foley, J. M. How to Read an Oral Poem (Urbana: Unversity of Illinois Press, 2002). Foucault, M. Abnormal, Lectures at the Collège de France, 1974–5, trans. G. Burchell (New York: Picador, 2004). Fradenburg, L. O. City, Marriage, Tournament: Arts of Rule in Late Medieval Scotland (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1991). Freud, S. The Interpretation of Dreams, trans. J. Strachey (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976). —— The Uncanny, trans. D. McLintock (New York: Penguin, 2003). Friedman, J. B. ‘Peacocks and Preachers: Analytic Technique in Marcus of Orvieto’s Liber de moralitatibus, Vatican lat. MS 5935’, in W. B. Clark

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

252

Bibliography

and M. T. McMunn, Beasts and Birds of the Middle Ages: The Bestiary and its Legacy (eBook: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1989), pp. 179–96. Gallick, S. ‘A Look at Chaucer and His Preachers’, Speculum 50.3 (1975), 456–76. Genette, G. Narrative Discourse, trans. J. E. Lewin (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1979). Godden, R. H. and Mittman, A. S. (eds) Monstrosity, Disability, and the Posthuman in the Medieval and Early Modern World (eBook: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019). Goodrich, M. J. ‘The Flyting of The Owl and the Nightingale: Animacy, Antisemitism, and Species Division’, Early Middle English 2.1 (2020), 1–31. Greenfield, C. C. Humanist and Scholastic Poetics, 1250–1500 (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, 1981). Gullace, G. ‘Medieval and Humanistic Perspectives in Boccaccio’s Concept and Defense of Poetry’, Mediaevalia 12 (1989), 225–48. Gurevich, A. Medieval Popular Culture: Problems of Belief and Perception (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). Harpham, G. G. On the Grotesque: Strategies of Contradiction in Art and Literature (Colorado: The Davies Group, 2006). Harrison, E. L. ‘Divine Action in “Aeneid” Book Two’, Phoenix 24.4 (1970), 320–32. Hasler, A. J. Court Poetry in Late Medieval England and Scotland: Allegories of Authority (eBook: Cambridge University Press, 2011). Hepburn, W. ‘William Dunbar and the Courtmen: Poetry as a Source for the Court of James IV’, Innes Review 65.2 (2014), 95–112. Hinnie, L. ‘William Dunbar and the Querelle des Femmes: A Response to the Roman de la Rose’, Études Épistémè 34 (2018), eJournal. Hollander, J. The Untuning of the Sky: Ideas of Music in English Poetry, 1500–1700 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961). Jack, R. D. S. The Italian Influence on Scottish Literature (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1972). Johnson, I. ‘Vernacular Self-Commentary during Medieval Early Modernity: Reginald Pecock and Gavin Douglas’, in F. Venturi (ed.), Self-Commentary in Early Modern European Literature, 1400–1700 (eBook: Brill, 2019), pp. 71–98. Kallendorf, C. ‘Cristoforo Landino’s Aeneid and the Humanist Critical Tradition’, Renaissance Quarterly 36.4 (1983), 519–46. Kayser, W. Das Groteske: Seine Gestaltung in Malerei und Dichtung (Hamburg: Gerhard Stalling Verlag, 1957). Knox, P. E. ‘Commenting on Ovid’, in P. E. Knox (ed.), A Companion to Ovid (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013), pp. 327–40.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bibliography 253

Kruger, S. F. Dreaming in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992). Lazar, M. ‘Fin’amor’, in F. R. P. Akehurst and J. M. Davis (eds), A Handbook of the Troubadours (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), pp. 61–100. Leahy, C. ‘Dreamscape into Landscape in Gavin Douglas’, Essays in Criticism 66.2 (2016), 149–67. —— ‘A Newly Discovered Manuscript Fragment of Sir David Lyndsay’s The Testament of the Papyngo’, Notes and Queries (2021), 1–5. Lorenzini, S. ‘Con le Muse in Parnaso: Classical and Medieval Mythography on the Pierides and a Possible Source for Giovanni Boccaccio’, Medievalia et humanistica 39 (2014), 63–86. Lyall, R. J. ‘The Stylistic Relationship between Dunbar and Douglas’, in S. Mapstone (ed.), William Dunbar, ‘The Nobill Poyet’ (East Linton: Tuckwell Press, 2001), pp. 69–84. Lynch, K. ‘Henryson’s “Doolie Dreame” and the Late Medieval Dream Vision Tradition’, JEGP 109.2 (2010), 177–97. MacQueen, J. ‘Neoplatonism and Orphism in Fifteenth-Century Scotland: The Evidence for Henryson’s “New Orpheus”’, Scottish Studies 20 (1976), 69–89. —— Complete and Full with Numbers: The Narrative Poetry of Robert Henryson (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006). Mapstone, S. ‘Invective as Poetic: The Cultural Contexts of Polwarth and  Montgomerie’s Flyting’, Scottish Literary Journal 26.2 (1999), 18–40. —— ‘The Transmission of Older Scots Literature’, in N. Royan (ed.), The International Companion to Scottish Literature, 1400–1650 (Glasgow: Scottish Literature International, 2018), pp. 38–59. Marsland, R. L. K. ‘Complaint in Scotland c. 1424–c. 1500’ (PhD thesis: Oxford University, UK, 2014). McClure, J. D. ‘Prosody of the Middle Scots Alliterative Poems’, Florilegium 25 (2008), 193–216. —— ‘The Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo: Final Fling of the Heroic Line’, in J. H. Williams and J. D. McClure (eds), Fresche Fontanis:  Studies in the Culture of Medieval and Early Modern Scotland (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2013), pp. 127–42. McKenna, S. ‘Robert Henryson, Pico della Mirandola, and Late FifteenthCentury Heroic Humanism’, in G. Caie, R. J. Lyall, S. Mapstone, and K. Simpson (eds), The European Sun: Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Medieval and Renaissance Scottish Language and Literature (East Linton: Tuckwell Press, 2001), pp. 232–41. McMunn, M. T. ‘Parrots and Poets in Late Medieval Literature’, Anthrozoös 12.2 (1999), 68–75.

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

254

Bibliography

McNair, B. ‘Cristoforo Landino, Poetry, and Divine Illumination’, Fides et Historia 31.1 (1999), 82–93. —— Cristoforo Landino. His Works and Thought (eBook: Brill, 2018). Miller, C. H. and Bosse, R. B. ‘Chaucer’s Pardoner and the Mass’, The Chaucer Review 6.3 (1972), 171–84. Muscatine, C. ‘Courtly Literature and Vulgar Language’, in G. Burgess (ed.), Court and Poet (Liverpool: International Courtly Literature Society Congress, 1981), pp. 1–19. Newlyn, E. ‘Luve, Lichery, and Evill Women: The Satiric Tradition in the Bannatyne Manuscript’, Studies in Scottish Literature 26 (1991), 283–93. Nitecki, A. K., ‘Gavin Douglas’s Yelling Fish: The Palice of Honour, Lines 146–8’, Notes and Queries 28.2 (1981), 118–19. Oruch, J. B. ‘St Valentine, Chaucer, and Spring in February’, Speculum 56.3 (1981), 534–65. —— ‘Nature’s Limitations and the “Demande d’Amour” of Chaucer’s Parlement’, The Chaucer Review 18.1 (1983), 23–37. Paden, W. D. ‘Aesthetic Distance in Petrarch’s Response to the Pastourelle: “Rime” LII’, Romance Notes 16.3 (1975). Parkinson, D. J. ‘Mobbing Scenes in Middle Scots Verse: Holland, Douglas, Dunbar’, JEGP 85.4 (1986), 494–509. Pearcy, R. J. ‘The Genre of William Dunbar’s Tretis of the Tua Mariit Wemen and the Wedo’, Speculum 55.1 (1980), 58–74. Perfetti, L. Women and Laughter in Medieval Comic Literature (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2003). Radden, J. (ed.), The Nature of Melancholy From Aristotle to Kristeva (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). Rasmussen, A. M. ‘Gendered Knowledge and Eavesdropping in the LateMedieval Minnerede’, Speculum 77.4 (2002), 1168–94. Reiss, E. ‘The Final Irony of the Pardoner’s Tale’, College English 25.4 (1964), 160–66. Reydams-Schils, G. Calcidius on Plato’s Timaeus: Greek Philosophy, Latin Reception and Christian Contexts (eBook: Cambridge University Press, 2020). Rhodes, N. Elizabethan Grotesque (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1980). Robertson, D. W. A Preface to Chaucer: Studies in Medieval Perspectives (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962). Rogers, C. A. ‘“Buried in an Herte”: French Poetics and the Ends of Genre in Chaucer’s Complaint unto Pity’, The Chaucer Review 51.2 (2016), 187–208. Ross, I. S. William Dunbar (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Bibliography 255

Royan, N. ‘The Scottish Identity of Gavin Douglas’, in K. Terrell and M.  P.  Bruce (eds), The Anglo-Scottish Border and the Shaping of Identity, 1300–1600 (eBook: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), pp. 195–209. —— ‘Gavin Douglas’s Eneados’, in R. Copeland (ed.), Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature. Volume 1: 800–1558 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), pp. 561–82. —— ‘Gavin Douglas’s Humanist Identity’, Medievalia et Humanistica, Special Issue: Writing Identity in Medieval and Early Modern Scotland, 41 (2016), 119–36. —— ‘Introduction: Literatures of the Stewart Kingdom’, in N. Royan (ed.), The International Companion to Scottish Literature, 1400–1650 (Glasgow: Scottish Literature International, 2018), pp. 1–18. Ruskin, J. The Stones of Venice, 3 vols (online: National Library Association, Project Gutenberg, 1851–53), Volume 2: www.gutenberg. org/ebooks/30755, Volume 3: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30756. Scherb, V. I. ‘Blasphemy and the Grotesque in the Digby “Mary Magdalene”’, Studies in Philology 96.3 (1999), 225–40. Schreiber, E. J. ‘Venus in the Medieval Mythographic Tradition’, The Journal of English and Germanic Philology 74.4 (1975), 519–35. Shire, H. M. Song, Dance and Poetry of the Court of Scotland under King James VI (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969). Sidhu, N. N. Indecent Exposure: Gender, Politics, and Obscene Comedy in Middle English Literature (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016). Simpson, J. ‘“The Weird Sisters Wandering”: Burlesque Witchery in Montgomerie’s Flyting’, Folklore 106 (1995), 9–20. Spearing, A. C. The Medieval Poet as Voyeur: Looking and Listening in Medieval Love- Narratives (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993). Stephens, W. Demon Lovers: Witchcraft, Sex, and the Crisis of Belief (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003). Stevenson, J. and P. Davidson, ‘Ficino in Aberdeen: The Continuing Problem of the Scottish Renaissance’, Journal of the Northern Renaissance 1 (2009), eJournal. Stillwell, G. ‘Convention and Individuality in Chaucer’s Complaint of Mars’, Philological Quarterly 35 (1956), 69–89. Terrell, K. Scripting the Nation: Court Poetry and the Authority of History  in Late Medieval Scotland (Ohio: Ohio State University Press, 2021). Thomsen, C. W. Das Groteske und die englische Literatur (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1977). Tinkle, T. Medieval Venuses and Cupids: Sexuality, Hermeneutics, and English Poetry (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

256

Bibliography

Toohey, P. ‘Some Ancient Histories of Literary Melancholia’, Illinois Classical Studies 15.1 (1990), 143–61. —— ‘Love, Lovesickness, and Melancholia’, Illinois Classical Studies 17.2 (1992), 265–86. Tracy, L. ‘The Uses of Torture and Violence in the Fabliaux: When Comedy Crosses the Line’, Florilegium 23.2 (2006), 143–68. —— Torture and Brutality in Medieval Literature: Negotiations of National Identity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). Verweij, S. The Literary Culture of Early Modern Scotland: Manuscript Production and Transmission, 1560–1625 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016). Walker, D. P. Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to Campanella (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1975). Williams, D. Deformed Discourse: The Function of the Monster in Mediaeval Thought and Literature (Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1996). Wimsatt, J. I. ‘Guillaume de Machaut and Chaucer’s Love Lyrics’, Medium Ævum 47.1 (1978), 66–87. Windeatt, B. ‘Afterlives: The Fabulous History of Venus’, in C. Brewer and B. A. Windeatt (eds), Traditions and Innovations in the Study of Medieval English Literature: The Influence of Derek Brewer (eBook: D. S. Brewer, 2013), 262–78. Wingfield, E. ‘The Thewis off Gudwomen: Female Advice in Lancelot of the Laik and The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour’, in J. H. Williams and J. D. McClure (eds), Fresche Fontanis: Studies in the Culture of Medieval and Early Modern Scotland (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2013), pp. 85–96. Wingfield, E. The Trojan Legend in Medieval Scottish Literature (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2014). Wright, T. A History of Caricature and Grotesque in Literature and Art (New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., 1968). Ziolkowski, J. Obscenity: Social Control and Artistic Creation in the European Middle Ages (Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV, 1998).

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

Index

absurd 51, 63, 75–7, 201, 230, 233 Actaeon 48–9, 67, 91–2 see also Diana Aeneas see Eneas affect 15, 74, 76, 79–80, 92, 190, 207 experience 8, 44, 95, 113 Ahithophel 74–5, 89–90, 92, 107, 116 allegory 20, 43, 70, 91, 110, 119, 211, 222 classical 48–9, 103, 109, 115 passim personification 68, 103–5, passim, 136, 145–50, 193, 222, 231–2 animal 48, 67, 72, 74, 111–12, 171–2, 221 see also beast astrology 40–3, 57, 103–9, 111, 123, 222  see also cosmology beast 48–9, 67, 73, 75, 92, 96, 128n21, 172  see also animal bird 45–6, 55–6, 69–70, 84, 112, 144–5, 150, 172–3, 201, 204–6, 225, 242

Boccaccio, Giovanni 64, 74, 104–7, 125 Ameto 48–9, 67  Genealogy 38, 60n12, 80, 104, 222–3 Boece, Hector see Stewart, William Calcidius Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus 33–4, 54 Calliope 53–4, 93–4, 103, 109, 112, 115–20 passim catalogue 52, 74, 79, 137, 172, 174, 195, 222 cavalcade see procession clothing 162, 198, 224–6 see also garments complaint 73, 82–8, 96, 110, 121, 133, 134 cosmology 42–3, 52, 56–9, 78–9, 104–5, 107  see also astrology courtly love 186, 192, 194, 204, 208 craft (poetic) 58, 88, 93, 124, 239 see also making (poetic) Cupid 42, 70, 89, 110, 185n24 curage 55, 71–2, 81–2, 85, 89, 92, 119, 197 see also vitality

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

258

Index

debate 91, 209n7 courtly 135, 187–8, 191 love 84, 156, 192, 197 decorum 137, 147, 152, 162, 183, 188 demon 125, 162, 170, 174–6, 179–80 destiny 54, 58, 63–4, 71–2, 87–8  see also fate; fortune devil see demon Diana 47–9, 91, 106 see also Actaeon Dido 38, 185n24, 210n22 see also Aeneid divine 67, 73, 87, 92–3, 97, 109 inspiration 63–5 passim, 68–9, 85, 93, 103–10 passim, 117, 125, 216, 232 guidance 39, 54, 68, 85, 93, 97–8, 108, 117–18, 125, 216 Douglas, Gavin  Eneados 6, 37–8, 45, 59n7, 60n12, 100n17, 106, 108, 185n24, 210n22, 229 dreamscape 43–6 passim, 58, 65, 72–3, 89, 92, 95, 103, 110, 117 see also environment; landscape Dunbar, William  The Goldyn Targe 112, 145–7, 231–2 embodiment 16–18, 43, 46, 59, 66, 70, 86, 95, 148, 218, 221, 228–9, 231–2 Eneas 60n12, 106–8, 229 environment 46–7, 51, 65–6, 69, 72, 89–90, 99n6, 144, 147, 161 see also dreamscape; landscape exemplum 169, 215, 217, 221–2

fate 47, 63–4, 73, 87, 90–1, 116–17, 119, 178, 186 see also destiny, fortune Ficino, Marsilio 64, 92–3, 115  All Things Natural 54–5 Three Books on Life 42, 81, 109–10 fish 45–6, 50, 53, 77, 80, 95–6 flowers 39, 117–18, 145–7, 149, 159n38  see also rose flyting 93, 161, 167–77 passim, 178, 181, 183, 194, 197, 199–202, 239–40 fortune 88, 90–1, 115 Fortune 47, 73, 112, 117, 229 see also destiny; fate furor (poetic creation) 64, 80, 92, 102, 123–4 garments 146–7, 150, 220, 223–9 see also clothing guide (dream vision) 18, 58, 69–70, 76–8, 98, 103, 109–10, 127 harmony 67, 79–80, 82–4, 89, 93–4, 108, 222 see also music Hay, Gilbert (Sir) The Buik of King Alexander the Conquerour 135–8, 156 Henryson, Robert 40 Fables 17, 171–2 The Testament of Cresseid 40–2, 88, 227 Holland, Richard  The Buke of the Howlat 84, 101n34, 111–12, 165, 201, 225, 227

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document



Index 259

horror 15, 19, 22, 44, 52–3, 88, 113, 162, 170, 172–81 passim, 202, 213, 224 humanism 6, 16, 40, 42, 63–5 passim, 78, 92 as aesthetic quality 34, 36–42 passim, 52, 54, 76, 78–81 passim, 104–5, 116, 124–5 hybridisation 6, 18, 219, 231, 240–1, 244 illusion 72, 139, 143, 146, 162, 219, 234 innuendo 161, 164, 167, 173, 195–6, 217 see also pun judge 113–14, 119, 136, 142 Jupiter (deity) 41–2, 57, 70, 82, 105, 193, 222 The Knightly Tale of Golagros and Gawane 165, 195, 226–7 Landino, Cristoforo 20, 60n14, 64, 74, 87, 128n21, 244, 245n3 landscape 33–4, 39, 46–51 passim, 58, 67–9, 72, 86, 88, 113 see also dreamscape; environment light 43, 47, 50, 56, 71, 105, 108 list see catalogue locus amoenus 33, 39, 40, 43, 134, 141, 144, 152, 156, 165, 207 lovesickness 194, 199, 202–4, 208, 217 Machaut, Guillaume de Remede de Fortune 83–4 Le Jugement dou Roy de Behaingne 190–2, 209n7

Maitland, Richard Solace in Age 189–90, 198 making (poetic) 23, 103, 133, 155, 181, 237 see also craft (poetic) melancholia 81, 86, 193–4, 199, 202–4, 217 Meun, Jean de  Roman de la Rose 143, 229 Minerva 47, 49, 67, 73–82 passim, 89, 94, 103, 112, 116, 125 Muses 53, 64, 70, 92–3, 102, 107, 116, 125–7 music 45, 50–7 passim, 76, 78–9, 92–3 see also harmony mythography 110, 149, 221 Nature 39, 43, 49, 68–9, 72–3, 84, 107, 112, 118, 125, 149, 201 Ovid 57, 65  Fasti 128n11 Metamorphoses 48–9, 123 Tristia 86, 91, 102, 108  Petrarch, Francesco 64, 78–9 Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni Oration on the Dignity of Man 64, 67, 72, 128n21 poetic vocation 6, 63, 88, 117, 119, 239 preacher 212–14, 217, 221–2 see also sermon procession 55, 73–5 passim, 82, 91–2, 94, 111, 115–16 prophet 16, 33, 63–4, 74 pun 162–3, 167, 194 birds and mating 145, 180, 196, 205–6  see also innuendo

260

Index

The Quare of Jelusy 192–3, 201

Downloaded from manchesterhive © Copyright protected It is illegal to copy or distribute this document

river 45, 50, 55, 95–6, 101n38 rose 118, 149–50, 159n38, 165 see also flowers Satan see demon; devil senses 36, 44–6, 54, 72, 85, 108 sermon 133–4, 211–34 passim, 239 see also preacher Silvestris, Bernard 56  Commentary on the ‘Aeneid’ 222–3 Sinon see Ahithophel speaker 79, 86, 111, 138–9, 140–1, 153–6 passim, 163, 173, 182, 187, 208, 215 female 139, 144, 146–7, 153, 158n29 Stewart, William Buik of the Croniclis of Scotland 166, 226 temporality 73–9 passim, 120, 133 temporal dissonance 35, 63, 216–17, 228 terror 17, 44, 58, 69, 75–6, 114, 124, 128n11 The Thewis off Gudwomen 137, 157n8, 168, 178, 183, 188, 236n26

transfiguration 63, 67, 69, 73, 86, 92, 96, 114 transformation 46–7, 49, 57, 59, 69, 89, 92–3, 95, 113–18 passim, 122–5 trial 53, 89–96 passim, 115–16, 120, 124 vates see prophet Venus (deity) 7, 41–3, 52, 59n7, 72–3, 89–96 passim, 103–15 passim, 119–21, 147–50 passim, 211, 221–32 passim violence 111, 167, 172, 241–3 sexual 167, 172, 175, 177, 196, 232, 243 Virgil 37, 59n7, 123  Aeneid see Douglas, Gavin, Eneados vitality 71, 104, 171 see also curage voice 34, 36, 44, 70, 88, 110, 120, 150, 152 female 111, 141, 152, 169, 179, 193, 219 wilderness 33, 47, 49, 50–1, 74, 91, 174 wisdom 73, 77, 90, 107, 116, 217, 222 Wyntoun, Andrew  The Original Chronicle 176–7