Tag: alliteration

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Undergrad Wednesdays – Missing the “Spot”: Borroff’s Oversights in the First Stanza in Pearl

[This post, part of an effort to merge our undergraduate and graduate blogs, was written in response to an essay prompt for Kathryn Kerby-Fulton's undergraduate course on "Chaucer's Biggest Rivals: The Alliterative Poets." It comes from the former "Medieval Undergraduate Research" website.]

Original:

Perle plesaunte, to prynces paye
To clanly clos in golde so clere:
Out of oryent, I hardyly saye,
Ne proued I neuer her precios pere.
So rounde, so reken in vche araye,
So smal, so smoþe her sydez were;
Queresoeuer I jugged gemmez gaye
I sette her singeley in synglure.
Allas! I leste hyr in on erbere;
Þurȝ gresse to ground hit fro me yot.
I dewyne, fordolked of luf-daungere
Of þat pryuy perle withouten spot.

Translation:

A pearl lovely and pleasing to a prince
To purely enclose in gold so clear:
Out of Orient, I hardily say
Proved I never her precious pair.
So round, so noble in each setting,
So slender, so smooth her sides were;
Wherever I judged splendid jewels
I set her singly in uniqueness.
Alas! I lost her in one garden;
Through the grass to the ground it slipped from me.
I pined, grievously wounded of distance from my beloved
Of that privy pearl without spot.

The first stanza of any poem functions as the foundation for the key themes that a poet then explores and expands upon throughout the remainder of the text. In the case of Pearl, within twelve lines, the poet alludes to Catholicism, creates layered language with literal and figurative meaning, and establishes an active first person narrator. All three topics serve as the basis of understanding the poem, and the reader can only comprehend their importance because the poet emphasizes them at the beginning. However, in Marie Borroff’s translation, her word choice removes the most important aspects of the opening stanza, and so one cannot trace these overarching themes.

Borroff actively eliminates the first person narrator in the opening section of the poem, and by doing so she removes the individualized nature of the Dreamer’s journey. In lines three and four, the original poet wrote, “Out of orient, I hardyly saye,/ Ne proued I neuer her precious pere.” Instead, Boroff translates the line as, “Boldly I say, all Orient/ Brought forth none precious like to her.” She places the motivation of the action behind the personified “Orient.” The original stated that the “I” never “proued” or proved a match as precious as his pearl. In the translated version, the reader does not understand the narrator, but in the original the Dreamer clearly performs the action.

The individual Dreamer falls asleep by the river. From Cotton Nero A.x.

Borroff continues to diminish the important individualized nature of the Dreamer when she says, “Ever my mind was bound and bent/To set her apart without a peer.” (7-8). The original poet says, “Queresoeuer I jugged gemmez gaye/I sette her singeley in synglure.” The “I” executes the actions, as he is the one who “jugged” and “sette.” On the other hand, Boroff does not include the word “I.” Remvoing the power of the first person narrator shifts the power dynamic of the poem. Even when Boroff maintains the “I,” she structures the sentence in order to stress the direct object instead. For example “I dewyne, fordolked of luf-daugenere” (11), or what could be translated as I pined, grievously wounded of distance from my beloved, becomes “Now, lovesick, the heavy loss I bear” (11). The “heavy loss” acts the focus of the line, and the reader fails to notice the “I” between the powerful words of “loss” and “bear. Since the poem focuses on one man’s individual religious journey, to diminish his role is to lessen the impact of the poem.

At the opening of the Pearl, the speaker does not immediately declare who or what this pearl may be. It functions both literally as an object and also as a representation of someone. The reader understands the metaphoric meaning of the pearl because of the poet’s use of courtly language. He describes it as “So rounde, so reken in vche araye,/So small, so smoþe her sydez were” (5-6). The Dreamer characterizes the literal pearl as “round” and “smooth,” but allegorically these descriptions draw upon what Andrew and Waldron call “stock epithets used in courtly literature to describe beautiful women” (53). The poet continues to use this literal and figurative language up until he explicitly labels the maiden with the pearl: “Oh perle,” quoþ I, “in perlez pyȝt,/Art þou my perle þat I haf playned,/Regretted by myn one on nyȝte? (241-243). Even though the reader easily figures out that the pearl functions as a metaphor of some unidentified character, the poet specifically uses images that keep the reader guessing about whether or not this pearl is literal as the poet also describes an actual object.

An image of Courtly Love

Borroff translates some of the first stanza lines as “So comely in every ornament,/So slender her sides, so smooth they were” (5-6). She removes the mystery of the pearl by translating “round” and “reken” as “comely.” The word comely typically describes a woman, not a pearl and so Borroff eliminates the layer of allegory of the metaphorical depiction of the maiden. Her translation forces us to understand the pearl as a woman, not as a literal object. However, the reader must also understand the pearl literally, as it functions religiously. The poet alludes to the “pearl of great price” in the Gospel of Matthew. By focusing only on the courtly description of the Pearl, Borroff fails to convey the multiple allegorical meanings of its presence.

Throughout Pearl, the poet alludes to Christianity and to the Bible, especially once the Maiden enters the story. Eventually, the Maiden brings the Dreamer to see the heavenly Jerusalem and explains salvation to her father. Yet, the poet stresses the importance of religion with the very first stanza. The poet states,“Allas! I leste hyr in on erbere” (9), meaning that he lost her in a garden. While gardens could function as a symbol for love and romance, medieval authors also associated them with the sacred. The image of the garden harkens back to the story of creation and the earthly paradise. Therefore, “erbere” represents a literal garden, a place of romance, but most importantly the Garden of Eden. Borroff translates that line as, “In a garden of herbs I lost my dear” (9), which is a correct paraphrase. However, by choosing a translation with the phrase “of herbs,” Borroff implies that this garden is literal and so she fails to convey the religious allegorical level of the garden.

The Dreamer sees the Maiden, his daughter, in heavenly Jerusalem. From Cotton Nero A.x.

The poet continues to allude to Christianity with the line, “I dewyne, fordolked of luf-daungere” (11). Andrew and Waldon state, “The whole line is perhaps reminiscent of the phrase quia amore langueo (‘for I am sick for love’). The Song of Songs, from which this phrase comes (2:5, 5:7-8) was interpreted spiritually as the soul’s longing for Christ” (54). While the poet created the phrase “luf-daungere,” he connects the connotation of his idiom with words in the Bible. On the other hand, Borroff fails to express the religious connotation with her translation: “Now, lovesick, the heavy loss I bear” (11). While the Dreamer does bear his loss, Borroff’s translation focuses too heavily on the loss itself, rather than on the emotion of longing. “Lovesick” does not effectively signify the spiritual importance of his deep desire to be reunited with the pearl.

Marie Borroff attempts to balance creating a translation, maintaining alliteration, and conveying meaning throughout her translation of Pearl. While I believe her work efficiently communicates the literal text, levels of deeper understand and allegory become lost in translation. A reader can only understand these important themes by returning to the original text, and placing the poem in its context.

Elizabeth Miggins
University of Notre Dame

Works Cited

Andrew, Malcolm, and Ronald Waldron. The Poems of the Pearl Manuscript: Pearl, Cleanness, Patience, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Exeter: U of Exeter, 2007. Print.

Borroff, Marie. The Gawain Poet: Complete Works: Patience, Cleanness, Pearl, Saint Erkenwald, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. New York: W.W. Norton, 2011. Print.

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Undergrad Wednesdays – Lost in Translation: The Thrill of the Hunt

[This post, part of an effort to merge our undergraduate and graduate blogs, was written in response to an essay prompt for Kathryn Kerby-Fulton's undergraduate course on "Chaucer's Biggest Rivals: The Alliterative Poets." It comes from the former "Medieval Undergraduate Research" website.]
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The original text of lines 1330-1358 of “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” beside my translation of those lines.

The medieval epic poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Gawain) offers a number of plots and subplots designed to garner the interest of the poet’s 14th century English audience. Yet, while such medieval happenings may have kept Gawain’s original audiences on the edge of their seats, the average 21st century student of literature is likely far less familiar with or interested in the ritual demands of courtly life. One such example of this disconnect can be found in lines 1330-1358 of Gawain, where the poet provides a thoroughly descriptive account of the ritualistic butchering of slaughtered deer, an important symbol of sophistication and skill for a medieval audience. In an attempt to appeal to modern readers, Marie Borroff’s translation of this passage focuses less on its original physicality and detail and fixates more singularly on recreating a medieval poetic style.

The Gawain-poet employs alliteration, an essential element of medieval English poetry, frequently throughout this passage, but Borroff’s attempts to insert it into her translation often sacrifice the detailed imagery of the original poem. The first line of this passage (line 1330), reads “Syþen þay slyt þe slot,” which translates literally to “Then they slit the hollow at the base of the throat.” Borroff translates the line as “Then they slit the slot open.” Borroff’s word choice maintains the “sl” and hard “t” sounds, the slit/slot word play, and the “s” alliteration of the original poem, all important elements of the line. However, her translation also ignores the more accurate details of the poet’s account. “Slot,” unlike “throat,” is ambiguous in this context, giving the reader no real, concrete notion of the first step in the flaying ritual. Borroff makes a similar decision in line 1331, where she translates “Schaued wyth a scharp knife, and þe schyre knitten” (“Scraped with a sharp knife, and tied the white flesh”) as “Trimmed it with trencher-knives and tied it up tight.” Like the original, the translation alliterates in this line. However, Borroff’s alliteration seems forced and makes the line sound more like a nursery rhyme than an exhibition of skilled butchery.

A medieval deer hunt from the 14th century manuscript “Livre de la chasse” by Gaston Phoebus.

Borroff’s translation of line 1331 is significant for another reason as well. She opts not to translate “schyre,” or “white flesh,” so as to allow her to more easily maintain alliteration in the line. This word, however, hearkens back to an important passage earlier in the poem, in which Gawain beheads the Green Knight. In this earlier passage, the word “schyire” (an alternative form of “schyre,” line 425) describes the bare neck of the Green Knight into which Gawain drives the axe. This word repetition draws a key parallel between Bertilak (the lead figure of this hunt) and the Green Knight, important foreshadowing for the later revelation that the two are the same person. “Schyre” appears once more in line 2313 of the poem in order to describe the “white flesh” of Gawain’s neck as it is struck by the Green Knight’s axe. The use of this word in all three of these contexts highlights the gaming nature of the three situations, drawing a near-comedic link between the entertainment purposes of the beheading scenes and the hunt. It also links all three events to the great test of Gawain’s character that frames the poem. By neglecting “schyre” entirely, Borroff excludes these important connections in the poem. However, her translation does faithfully carry over some of the other words shared by the three scenes, such as “sharp” (“scharp”), dividing or cutting (“schyndered,” “sunder,” “seuered”), head (“hede”), neck (“halce”), and others.

A depiction of the ritual flaying of captured deer from the 14th century manuscript “Livre de la chasse” by Gaston Phoebus.

Borroff also attempts to convey the medieval background of the poem by employing intentionally archaic language. In the passage, she translates the word “wesaunt” (which means “gullet”) as “weasand” (1336), “chyne” (“backbone”) as “chine” (1354), and “corbeles fee” (“raven’s fee”) as “Corbie’s bone” (1355). The choice of “chine” is especially questionable, as Borroff could have selected “spine” and both expanded her chosen alliteration and conveyed the line’s meaning more clearly. To Borroff’s credit, however, the poem’s original terminology in these cases may have been rather archaic for medieval audiences as well. Both “chyne” and “corbeles fee” come from Old French, and while “wesaunt” comes from Old English, it exhibits a notable French influence. After the Norman Conquest in 1066, French became the language of the English aristocracy, and the use of archaic French terms in this passage hints at the elite standing and high education of the poet’s intended audience. Thus, this passage raises important questions regarding the role of the translator. Should Borroff have chosen clear, more easily understandable synonyms in her translation? Or was she correct in maintaining the original, elitist vocabulary of the original passage, entirely understandable only to those intimately familiar with hunting culture?

One area in which Borroff’s translation of this passage succeeds is in her treatment of the bob and wheel in lines 1348-1352. In Gawain, the bob and wheel form the final five lines of each stanza, obey a strict ababa rhyme scheme, and often relay the major events of the poem. These lines in the original poem are masterfully lyrical through a successful combination of end rhyme, internal rhyme, alliteration, and rhythm. Although her translation does not fully capture this lyricism, Borroff provides a relatively faithful translation of these lines and captures the rhyme scheme very well. Furthermore, she abandons the strict attention to alliteration that she displays in the rest of the passage, focusing more intently on the imagery and rhyme of the lines. This shift in focus from strictly medieval styles and language to a faithful depiction of minute details allows Borroff to accurately portray the lyrical impact of these lines in the original poem.

Although Borroff’s translation seems to make only minor alterations to the original Gawain poem, her choices reflect a difference in focus between a medieval audience and the modern reader. In particular, her translation of lines 1330-1358 attempts to convey the “feel” of medieval poetry by fixating on alliteration and archaic language. However, this sacrifices the detailed imagery of the flaying scene, an important and entertaining ritual in medieval courts. By excising these details, Borroff’s translation removes some of the thrill of the hunt for modern audiences.

Casey O’Donnell
University of Notre Dame

References

Borroff, Marie. The Gawain Poet : Complete Works : Patience, Cleanness, Pearl, Saint Erkenwald, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. 1st ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2011. Print.

Hunting the Roebuck, Gaston Phoebus, Le Livre de la chasse, in French, France, Paris, ca. 1407, The Morgan Library & Museum; MS M.1044 (fol. 64). Bequest of Clara S. Peck, 1983. Image courtesy of Faksimile Verlag Luzern.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Eds. J.R.R. Tolkien and E.V. Gordon. Oxford University Press, 1968. Print.

The Poems of the Pearl Manuscript. Eds. Malcolm Andrew and Ronald Waldron. Liverpool University Press, 2007. Print.

Undoing and Breaking Up a Hart, Gaston Phoebus, Le Livre de la chasse, in French, France, Paris, ca. 1407, The Morgan Library & Museum; MS M.1044 (fol. 64). Bequest of Clara S. Peck, 1983. Image courtesy of Faksimile Verlag Luzern.

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Undergrad Wednesdays – Analysis of original and translated Pearl lines 121-144

[This post, part of an effort to merge our undergraduate and graduate blogs, was written in response to an essay prompt for Kathryn Kerby-Fulton's undergraduate course on "Chaucer's Biggest Rivals: The Alliterative Poets." It comes from the former "Medieval Undergraduate Research" website.]

Marie Borroff is widely considered to be the best American poetic translator of Middle English. I was skeptical of her translation abilities when I first read her modern English versions of Pearl and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight because she did not maintain the rhyme scheme as perfectly as the original, nor the alliteration. However, having attempted my own “modern English” poetic translation of Pearl, I now recognize Borroff’s tremendous skill. I attempted to translate the first two stanzas of section III (lines 121-144) of Pearl. I began by reading over the original text, provided on pages 60-61 of The Poems of the Pearl Manuscript, and translated word by word – with help from the glossary in the back of the book. When the glossary failed to illuminate the meaning of the verses, I consulted Andrew and Waldron’s prose translation. I chose to keep the twelve line stanzas and the grammar of the original, but lost the rhyme, alliteration and rhythm. Here is my translation:

In the beloved splendor of hill and valleys,
Of wood and water and fine plains,
Where I dwelled in bliss, my sorrow abated,
My stress quelled, my pains destroyed.
Down along a stream that continually flows
I went blissfully, my heart brimming with joy*;
The farther I followed those stream-filled valleys,
The greater my joy strained my heart.
As Fortune goes where she tests a person,
Whether she sends someone solace or sorrow,
The person who receives Fortune’s will
Always seeks to have more and more of the same.

There was more of prosperity in that scene
Than I could describe even if I had the time,
For a mortal’s heart could not handle
Rejoicing in just one-tenth of such joys.
Therefore I thought that paradise
Was there over the wide bank nearby;
I believed the water was a divide
Between the joy beyond the boundary and myself✙;
Beyond the brook, somewhere or other,
I believed that paradise was situated.
But the water was deep, I dared not wade across it,
And I longed more and more than ever.

*The Andrew and Waldron prose translation writes this as “my brains brimful [with joy]” (3), but I feel the sentiment is better demonstrated by the narrator’s “heart brimming,” rather than his brain.

✙The Andrew and Waldron prose translation writes this as “I supposed that the water was a division between pleasure-gardens laid out beside pools” (4), but I simply cannot find evidence for the word “pleasure-gardens” and therefore stick to my own version.

Here is the original version of the poem, edited by Andrew and Waldron:

The dubbement dere of doun and dalez,
Of wod and water and wlonk playnez,
Bylde in me blys, abated my balez,
Fordidden my stresse, dystryed my paynez.
Doun after a strem that dryʒly halez
I bowed in blys, bredful my braynez;
þe fyrre I folʒed þose floty valez,
þhe more strenghþe of joye myn herte straynez.
As fortune fares þeras ho fraynes,
Wheþer solace ho sende oþer ellez sore,
þe wyʒ to wham her wylle ho waynez
Hyttez to haue ay more and more.

More of wele watz in þat wyse
þen I cowþe telle þaʒ I tom hade,
For vrþely herte myʒt not suffyse
To þe tenthe dole of þo gladnez glade.
Forþy I þoʒt þat paradyse
Was þer over gayn þo bonkez brade;
I hoped þe water were a deuyse
Bytwene myrþez by merez made;
Byʒonde þe broke, by slente oþer slade,
I hoped þat mote merked wore.
Bot þe water watz depe, I dorst not wade,
And euer me longed ay more and more.

British Library MS Cotton Nero A.x; f. 38v. The dreamer admiring the maiden in paradise.

I chose to study these two stanzas largely because of the beauty of line 128: “Þe more strenghþe of joye muyn herte straynez.” The dreamer, in these stanzas, experiences his first sense of relief from the overwhelming grief following his daughter’s passing. He writes of the splendid hills and valleys that “bylde in me blys, abated my balez” (line 123), yet the reader never forgets the underlying tragedy of the loss of the dreamer’s daughter. The paradoxical statement that his heart strains with joy captures the narrator’s conflicting emotions – how his heart is torn between joy at the sight of paradise and sadness for his daughter’s death. Describing his heart as “straining” rather than “full” or even “bursting” adds an element of distress to the stanza, and reveals the depth of emotions portrayed. Marie Borroff, however, does not preserve the imagery of the strained heart in her translation. Instead, she writes: “The greater strength did gladness gain” (128). Her version lacks the distress of the original, and fails to present the dreamer’s mixed emotions. Borroff’s diction otherwise maintains the richness and sentiment of the original manuscript – though she translates “bredful my braynez” (line 126) to “with busy brain” for the sake of continuing the rhyme scheme, whereas I think “heart brimming with joy” better captures the essence of the verse. Other than these two instances, however, I believe that Borroff translates the Middle English to modern English quite well in these two stanzas.

Borroff preserves the linking words as well as the layout of the original poem, with twelve verse stanzas. She mostly maintains the same rhyme scheme as well. Every stanza in the original Pearl rhymes according to the pattern ababababbcbc; Borroff’s translation of the first stanza of part III maintains this pattern brilliantly. Her translation of the second stanza, however, breaks with the rhyme scheme twice, on lines 133 “prize” and 136 “joy”. The rupture of the rhyme scheme is somewhat disorienting, but given the difficulty of updating the language and keeping the rhyme, I understand that Borroff could not make it impeccable. Many scholars argue that the original poem maintains such a tight rhyme scheme because the author used this meticulousness to cope with his grief; perhaps Borroff could not achieve the same level of perfection because of a lack of drama in her personal life.

I argue, however, that Borroff’s sudden break from the rhyme scheme actually preserves the tone of the original poem. Though the poet of the original Pearl keeps the rhyme scheme throughout, there is a dramatic shift in alliteration between the first and second stanzas of part III: the first stanza contains several instances of three and even four alliterative stresses within a verse, whereas the second stanza contains only four verses with three alliterative stresses. This establishes a disconcerting effect to the rhythm: the first stanza skips along pleasantly, with verses like “The dubbement dere of doun and dalez” (121) and “I bowed in blys, bredful my braynez” (126). In the second stanza this quick, lighthearted rhythm halts, becomes disjointed, with lines like “þen I cowþe telle þaz I tom hade” (134) and “I hoped þe water were a deuyse” (139). Though I found four verses with three alliterative stresses (133, 137, 140, and 143), these serve as a reminder of the poet’s ability to alliterate, and reinforce the lack of alliteration within the other lines of the stanza. The alliteration – or lack thereof – reflects the tone of the stanzas. In the first stanza of part III, the poet describes the alleviation of his grief, and hence the alliteration mirrors the joyful scene. In the second stanza, the alliteration reduces significantly, in correspondence with the change in tone: the narrator realizes that he cannot explain paradise, because the mortal heart cannot handle the joy he saw. Furthermore, the narrator wants desperately – “more and more” (144) – to cross the brook and enter paradise, but he cannot. The second stanza, therefore, discusses the narrator’s dashed dreams and awareness of his incapacities – to enter paradise or even describe it – and the reduction of alliteration reflects this gloomy turn. Therefore, when Borroff misses two rhymes in her translation of the second stanza of part III, the rupture coincides with the tone of the original poem: it expresses the idea that something has gone wrong for the narrator, that he is no longer skipping along full of hope and optimism.

Since the original Pearl contains such dramatic four-stress lines, with three or four alliterative stressed syllables, I also decided to analyze Borroff’s treatment of these alliterations in her translation. Like the original version, Borroff provides more alliteration in the first stanza than in the second. Sometimes Borroff maintains the same alliterative sound as the original – such as updating “Of wod and water and wlonk playnez” (122) to “Were wood and water and shining plain” – therefore preserving the alliterative “w” stress. In other instances, she changes the sound but maintains the strong alliteration – for instance, she takes “Bylde in me blys, abated my balez” (123) and transforms it into “My pleasures multiplied apace” with the alliterative “p” stress instead of “b”. Though Borroff provides a decent amount of alliterative stresses, she does not achieve the same amount of skillful alliteration as does the original poet. I’m forced to conclude that, although Borroff’s translation is indeed an accomplishment, her work still falls short of the original version; not because of Marie Borroff’s own shortcomings, but rather because of the mastery exemplified by the original poet in Middle English. The original version of Pearl simply cannot be beat.

Elizabeth Orem
University of Notre Dame