Robert de Boron and the Prose Merlin
There are so many wonderful things about the internet: there was a time when a scholar had to order through ILL and wait for weeks or months before he or she could set eyes on such works as Geoffrey of Monmouth's Vita Merlini or Robert de Boron's Prose Merlin . No more. from Prose Merlin Robert de Boron Full wrothe and angry was the Devell, whan that oure Lorde hadde ben in helle and had take oute Adam and Eve and other at his plesier. And whan the fendes sien that, they hadden right grete feer and gret merveile. Thei assembleden togedir and seiden: "What is he this thus us supprisith and distroyeth, in so moche that oure strengthes ne nought ellis that we have may nought withholde hym, nor again hym stonde in no diffence but that he doth all that hym lyketh? We ne trowed not that eny man myght be bore of woman but that he sholde ben oures; and he that thus us distroyeth, how is he born in whom we knewe non erthely delyte?" Than ansuerde anothir fende and seide
Steven,
ReplyDeleteI suspect that too many writers don't understand that it isn't the plot that makes an Austen novel. It's the intelligence and wit in the author, which appears in the narrative, that makes her works so great and that demands rereading.
Dear Fred,
ReplyDeleteAnd a sense of a place, a time, and a way of being. A modern comedy of manners would necessarily NOT imitate Austen because modern deportment is quite different and modern expectations different. And while it is a time-honored tradition to "lift" plots, Austen's are particularly intractable because the plots are driven by the characters and the expectations they have of one another--expectations that could not possibly make it into the modern world in anything that we would recognize as Austen.
You make several good points here.
shalom,
Steven