E410102A. The Poems of Geoffrey Chaucer, Modernized.
The English Journal: A Miscellany of Literature, Science, and the Fine Arts, 2 January 1841, pp. 7–9.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 5, 385–387.
If this work succeed, as it ought, and as we see every reason to think it must, it will most probably bring about a new era of poetry. We shall find that the immense advantages we have latterly derived from science and the steam engine have not been purchased by the sacrifice of our ideal life and all its finest enjoyments. Should such an era supervene, it is sure to be one of health and strength, and kind feelings and genuine impulses; all of which are found, even to overflowing, at the fountain head of English poetry—the primitive verses of Dan Chaucer.
The design of this publication, originating with Mr. Wordsworth, and carried into operation by Mr. R.H. Horne, with the able assistance of Mr. Leigh Hunt, Richard Monckton Milnes, Robert Bell, Thomas Powell, Miss E.B. Barrett, Barry Cornwall, &c., is of an entirely novel kind. If it has not been generally felt by the many, it has certainly been long known to the few, as a desideratum in English literature. To confess the truth, we know very little of Chaucer in this country, though his own. Whatever we may believe of the richness of his soul—his sweetness at heart—his obsolete dialect has always been felt as a wild crab apple, and one taste of its pungent roughness has usually proved sufficient to settle all further desires. Mr. Horne, in his Introduction, following and developing the argument of the old commentator, Speght, would have us believe that all the fault rests with us, and that Chaucer is in reality, and when properly understood, as easy and harmonious to be read as we are fastidious and indolent. It may be so. But all these black-letter gentlemen and poets should remember that it is not every one who can devote the requisite time to the study, even if it had great charms for them, and suited their taste. It is not a fair ground of complaint against us, which Mr. Horne makes, with sundry indirect but trenchant reproaches, that we have studied glossaries in order to read Burns and the Scotch novels, while we have refused to do as much for so great a poet as Chaucer. The cases are not parallel. There was a whole country ready at once to understand the former, and assist other countries. Again, Chaucer is more difficult at all times than the most difficult passages which are here and there found in Burns and Scott: [p. 8→] besides this, we have continually observed, that both the latter, and Scott in particular, “so contrive it” that when they use words not at all known to the general readers of the English public, you may still know pretty well, from the context, what the meaning of them is most likely to be. You find nothing of this kind in Chaucer’s “hand words.” In fine, the class that reads Chaucer in the original is for the most part identical with the readers of Anglo-Saxon, the Norman romances, and old French fabliaux. It may be easily seen how small in numbers this class must be, from the obsolete character of the languages, and from the scarcity of the books; for even the Canterbury Tales are at this time nearly out of print, while to obtain a good black-letter copy of all Chaucer’s known works is a matter of no small difficulty. Mr. Horne thus opens his Introduction:—
“The present publication does not result from an antiquarian feeling about Chaucer as the Father of English Poetry, highly interesting as he must always be in that character alone; but from the extraordinary fact, to which there is no parallel in the history of the literature of nations, that although he is one of the great poets for all time, his works are comparatively unknown to the world. Even in his own country, only a very small class of his countrymen ever read his poems. Had Chaucer’s poems been written in Greek or Hebrew they would have been a thousand times better known;—they would have been translated. Hitherto they have had almost everything done for them that a nation could desire, in so far as the most careful collation of texts, the most elaborate essays, the most ample and erudite notes and glossaries, the most elaborate and classical (as well as the most trite and vulgar) paraphrases, the most eloquent and sincere admiration and comments of genuine poets, fine prose writers, and scholars—everything, in short, has been done, except to make them intelligible to the general reader.”
Objecting only to the assertion, that “almost everything has been done” for Chaucer’s poems, in the way of “the most careful collation of texts,” (for this can only apply to Tyrwhitt’s edition of the Canterbury Tales,) we think the above passage is full of very striking truth, and not the less forcible from its being stated for the first time. To put an end to this national reproach, the above-named gentlemen, acting, we believe, under the patriarchal guidance of Mr. Wordsworth, have united in the very praiseworthy attempt, not of paraphrasing Chaucer’s poems, but of translating or rendering them into modern English, retaining as much as possible of the original. Nor has Mr. Wordsworth only given his sympathy and advice in the undertaking. He has laboured in the vineyard with his own hands—weeding, clearing, and transplanting, but very rarely pruning away any of the antique luxuriance. Fruit, flower, and leaf, and boughs and “tendrils fine,” all are left by his careful and reverent hand—well knowing what is due to a great author who has been subject to the neglect of ages.
The following verses are taken from Mr. Wordsworth’s modernisation of Chaucer’s beautiful poem of “The Cuckoo and the Nightingale:”—
The God of Love—ah, benedicite!
How mighty and how great a lord is he!
For he of low hearts can make high; of high
He can make low, and unto death bring nigh;
And hard hearts he can make them kind and free.
Within a little time, as hath been found,
He can make sick folk whole, and fresh, and sound;
Them who are whole in body and in mind,
He can make sick; bind can he, and unbind,
All that he will have bound, or have unbound.
To tell his might my wit may not suffice;
Foolish men he can make them out of wise;—
For he may do all that he will devise;
Loose livers he can make abate their vice,
And proud hearts can make tremble in a trice.
In brief, the whole of what he will, he may;
Against him dare not any wight say nay;
To humble or afflict whome’er he will,
To gladden or to grieve, he hath like skill;
But most his might he sheds on the eve of May.
For every true heart, gentle heart and free,
That with him is, or thinketh so to be,
Now against May shall have some stirring—whether
To joy, or be it to some mourning; never
At other time, methinks, in like degree.
For now when they may hear the small birds’ song,
And see the budding leaves the branches throng,
This unto their rememberance doth bring
All kinds of pleasure mixed with sorrowing,
And longing of sweet thoughts that ever long.
And of that longing, heaviness doth come,
Whence oft great sickness grows of heart and home;
Sick are they all for lack of their desire;
And thus in May their hearts are set on fire,
So that they burn forth in great martyrdom.
In sooth, I speak from feeling: what though now
Old am I, and to genial pleasure slow,
Yet have I felt of sickness through the May
Both hot and cold, and heart-aches every day,—
How hard, alas! to bear, I only know.
Such shaking doth the fever in me keep
Through all this May, that I have little sleep;
And also ’tis not likely unto me,
That any living heart should sleepy be,
In which Love’s dart its fiery point doth steep.
But tossing lately on a sleepless bed,
I of a token thought which Lovers heed;
How among them it was a common tale,
That it was good to hear the Nightingale
Ere the vile Cuckoo’s note be uttered.
The whole poem is rendered with the same poetical faithfulness to the original. Of a similar kind of excellence are Mr. Wordsworth’s extract from “Troilus and Cressida,” Miss E. B. Barrett’s version of the pathetic poem of “Queen Annelida and False Arcite,” and the “Squire’s Tale” by Leigh Hunt. Mr. R. H. Horne’s version of the “Franklin’s Tale” is close to Chaucer. Mr. Bell’s “Mars and Venus,” so far as we have at present examined it, is very faithful to the original, and reads flowingly. The “Flower and the Leaf,” by Thomas Powell, is highly commendable on the former grounds: it is one of Chaucer’s most picturesque and beautiful poems, and great credit is due to the care with which it has been rendered by Mr. Powell. “The Manciple’s Tale,” rendered by Leigh Hunt, is excellent for its vivid and graceful execution. We have not, however, compared it with the original throughout, but were we to venture any criticisms on so admirable and accomplished an author as Leigh Hunt, they could only be offered as the result of more time than we can at present devote to the examination. With the closeness of the following passage, however, we have been almost as much attracted, as by its excellence in poetry, quaint humour, and homely philosophy:—
Take any bird, and put it in a cage,
And do thy best and utmost to engage
The bird to love it; give it meat and drink,
And every dainty housewives can bethink,
And keep the cage as cleanly as you may,
And let it be with gilt never so gay,—
Yet had this bird, by twenty-thousand fold,
Rather be in a forest wild and cold,
And feed on worms and such like wretchedness;
Yea, ever will he tax his whole address
To get out of the cage, when that he may:—
His liberty the bird desireth aye.
So, take a cat, and foster her with milk,
And tender meat, and make her bed of silk,
Yet let her see a mouse go by the wall,
The devil may take, for her, silk, milk, and all,
And every dainty that is in the house;
Such appetite hath she to eat the mouse. [p. 9→]
Lo, here hath Nature plainly domination,
And appetite renounceth education!
Of the graphic powers of Chaucer in painting character, the following, as rendered by Mr. R. H. Horne, is a rich specimen:—
A Monk there was, of skill and mastery proved,
A bold hand at a leap, who hunting loved:
A manly man, to be an abbot able.
Full many a dainty horse had he in stable;
And when he rode, men might his bridle hear,
Jingling in a whistling wind as clear,
And eke as loud, as doth the chapel bell
Where reigned he lord o’er many a holy cell.
The rules of Saint Maure and Saint Benedict,
Because that they were old and something strict,
This sturdy monk let old things backward pace,
And of the new world followed close the trace.
He rated not the text at a plucked hen,
Which saith that hunting fits not holy men,
Or that a monk beyond his bricks and mortar
Is like a fish without a drop of water—
That is to say, a monk out of his cloister:—
Now this same text he held not worth an oyster!
And I say his opinion was not bad:
Why should he study and make himself half mad,
Upon a book in cloister ever to pore,
Or labour with his hands, and dig and bore
As Austin bids? How shall the world be served?
Let the world’s work for Austin be reserved.
Therefore our monk spurred on, a jolly wight.
Greyhounds he kept, as swift as bird of flight:
In riding hard and hunting for the hare,
Was all his joy; for no cost would he spare.
I saw his large sleeves trimmed above the hand
With fur, and that the finest of the land;
And for to keep his hood beneath his chin,
He had of beaten gold a curious pin,—
A love-knot at the greater end there was:
His head was bald, and shone like any glass;
And eke his face, as it had been anoint:
He was a lord full fat, and in good point.
His eyes were deep and rolling in his head,
Which steamed as doth a furnace melting lead.
His boots were supple, his hose right proud to see;
Now certainly a prelate fair was he;
He was not pale as a poor pining ghost
A fat swan loved he best of any roast.
His palfrey was as brown as is a berry.
That the two foregoing extracts will bear comparing line for line with the original, may be cheerfully conceded; but as Mr. Horne seems almost to challenge this comparison throughout his translations, we shall perhaps avail ourselves of a future opportunity, and endeavour to point out several instances in which we think, if he has not misunderstood, he cannot be said to have accurately rendered his author. Of Mr. Horne’s Introduction we have not left ourselves sufficient room to speak. It is, however, a bold undertaking in several respects, and not unlikely to prove a well-armed pioneer in various new marches which seem about to be made through the present weak condition of the realms of English poetry. The “Life of Chaucer ” is evidently written with great care, and is well condensed. On the whole, however, and speaking generally, all these versions are faithful copies as well as transcriptions from the original. Nothing like them in fidelity and poetry has ever before appeared in a collective form. They are a boon which we shall be much deceived if the public do not accept with gratitude, and even avidity. They are all creditable to the authors, and some of them bespeak the possession of the highest faculty for producing and appreciating the finest and loftiest poetry. There is not one of these modernisers that old Dan Chaucer would not heartily shake by the hand, could he rise again in his “gipon of dark velvet.”
Reviewed:
The Poems of Geoffrey Chaucer Modernized, ed. R.H. Horne, London: 1841.
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