Below please find the particular passages and pages that we will be focusing on for discussion:
Book 1: 61-182 special attention to the following pages: 61-79, 129-40; 148-57; 174-82
Book 2: chapter 3, 227-34; chapter 7, 258-75; 284-95; 311-12; 327-332; 350-51; 365-70; 376-97
Book 3: 441-448; 457-65; 483-93; 531-34; 545-75; 579-95
1. In the revised opening to the Arcadia, Sidney makes much of Urania and the role of memory. Do a little digging on the figure of Urania. Why is she significant and why does memory feature so prominently?
2. How does Sidney’s world and landscape compare to that of his Spanish predecessor as translated by Margaret Tyler?
3. Andrew King argues that Sidney's dialogue with romance engages "an aspiration toward an Edenic condition of perfect constancy, virtuous achievement, and the containment of mutability" (140). Do you buy his argument in your reading of Sidney? How does this reading compare to the critique of polemicists who accuse romance of encouraging error in multiple forms?
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According to J.E. Zimmerman’s Dictionary of Classical Mythology Urania is one of the nine muses. While traditionally the muse of astronomy, during the Renaissance authors often referred to her as the muse of poetry. What establishes her connection to memory is her parentage as the daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyne (or memory).
ReplyDeleteIn using the figure of Urania in the opening to the Arcadia, recasting her as a lovely shepherdess, Sidney creates a nostalgic evocation connecting themes of memory, providence, and the inspiration of artistic creation. Claius and Strephon’s reflections upon her beauty are interrupted by the discovery of Musidorus. From here, the first book focuses primarily upon the story of Musidorus and Pyrocles. Thus, she does not figure as an actual character in the romance, but rather, like the muse that she is, inspires love and contemplation in the men that gaze upon her. Later, the picture of Urania depicting her removing a thorn from a lamb’s foot is presented to Basilius by Phalantus (157-58). Not surprisingly, Urania functions as more of an object than a subject. In contrast to her passivity, the first exchanges between Claius and Strephon are particularly focused on the issue of active remembrance: “over-busy remembrance, remembrance, restless remembrance, which claims not only this duty of us but for it will have us forget ourselves” (61). The act of remembering is not only passively obtained but also infused with a curious physicality as something that is both “over-busy” and “restless.”
Rather than finding Urania acts as an invocation for the book, I found her presence disruptive and did not realize that Arcadia was not about Claius and Strephon for the first couple of chapters. While Urania acts as an object, appearing only tangentially in Arcadia, her picture and her presence in the ecologues to Book 1 bring her outside the role of a muse merely invoked at the start of an artistic creation, presenting her as an actual character, interacting with the story.
ReplyDeleteA note under the OED definition of Muse reads, “Urania (lit. ‘the heavenly’, in formal lists the Muse of astronomy) is invoked by Milton (Paradise Lost VII), who explains that he means not the pagan goddess of mythology but a Christian celestial source of inspiration.” Urania’s inspiration during the Renaissance was still connected to the celestial, although in Christian terms. Two associations accompany this. First, the celestial is heavenly, closer to God (an easy shift) and thus pure and good. Second, the stars are associated with ideas of time and the future. Stars can be signs from heaven, either in astrological terms or such as the star that led the Wise Men. There is, then, an idea of great knowledge, insight, foresight as well as inspiration.
Although the note in the OED states that “The other names Erato, Polyhymnia, Urania, and Calliope, appear less frequently in English literature,” Urania’s presence at the time we are considering is apparent in the references of Sidney, and consequently Mary Wroth, as well as in other works. I have tracked down a few other references to Urania at about the same time as Sidney’s Arcadia.
In _The zodiake of life written by the godly and zealous poet Marcellus Pallingenius stellatus, wherein are conteyned twelue bookes disclosing the haynous crymes [and] wicked vices of our corrupt nature: and plainlye declaring the pleasaunt and perfit pathway vnto eternall lyfe, besides a numbre of digressions both pleasaunt [and] profitable, newly translated into Englishe verse by Barnabae Googe_ (1565), these lines appear:
But fyrst we must Vrania call
my verses here vnto,
That she may ayde and succour sende
such secrets to vndo.
Vrania, thou that knowest the things
aloft that hydden lye,
That walkest oft by seates of Gods,
and starry temples hye:
Vrania beautiful draw nere,
and open vnto me,
The secrete seates of Gods aboue,
and things that hidden be,
And helpe thy Poet, that in song
thy Scepters seekes to shewe,
And graunt the whirling Skies aboue
in minde that I may knowe.
William Bullein refers to Urania in his 1562 work, _Bulleins bulwarke of defence against all sicknesse, soarenesse, and vvoundes that doe dayly assaulte mankind_, while John Case refers to Urania in his 1586 work, _The praise of musicke wherein besides the antiquitie, dignitie, delectation, & vse thereof in ciuill matters, is also declared the sober and lawfull vse of the same in the congregation and church of God_.
The last instance I will give is Johnson Richard’s _Musarum plangores vpon the death of the right honourable, Sir Christopher Hatton, Knight, &c._ (1591), which calls on the Muses to mourn in the opening poem. Subsequent poems are named after Muses, and the volume concludes with “Urania”:
Giue me (at last fayre Sisters) leaue to speake,
Me thinkes you should not wilfully repine,
Or with extremities your dueties breake,
When as the glorie and the gayne is mine:
It grieues not me, when ought accords your will,
Your ouerflowing mirth, my ioyes doth fill.
Draw in your teares and let your sighes surcease,
Exile exclaymings from your drouping harts:
For with his death his Honours doth increase.
And though the earth contaynes his humane parts,
Yet shall his soule made pure with heauenly ayre,
Receiue the guerdon of his vertuous care.
The starres bright eye shall guide his happie feete,
The sunne of gladnes shine vpon his face,
The glorious Planets where so ere they meete,
Within their shining armes his soule embrace.
So that although his mortall dayes doo wayne,
Dispayre not Sisters greater is his gayne.
As an aside, Wikipedia assures me, “Urania is also the name of a popular female-fronted rock band in Honduras.”
It is certainly appropriate to begin by invoking Urania, who in Greco-Roman mythology was the muse of astronomy as well as astrology. The OED notes that when the name appears “In titles, [it announces] a book or poem dealing with celestial or astronomical themes.” Beyond the trope of the invocation of a muse that indicates being part of a poetic tradition, there is the paratextual consideration that Urania inspires the title for Sidney’s niece the Lady Mary Wroth’s later work. In terms of the opening to The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia, however, it is clear that questions around foretelling the future will play a major role in the events to come, with the prophecy that Basilius receives from the Oracle of Delphos playing a key role in the incitement of the narrative’s progression. Further, it seems that the figure of Urania signifies to the shepherds the impetus to knowledge of the world. The esteem in which the shepherds Strephon and Claius hold her has raised them from baser appreciations of the phenomena they encounter daily, as Claius asks rhetorically, “Hath not the desire to seem worthy in her eyes made us, when others were sleeping, to sit viewing the course of the heavens; when others were running at Base, to run over learned writings; when others mark their sheep, we to mark ourselves?” If this desire for deeper appreciation is extant in the shepherds of Arcadia, by extension its nobility must be that much greater (see for this Kalander’s exegesis on how “all the people of this country, from high to low, is given to those sports of wit”), but this is the origin of Kalander’s complaint against Basilius appointing a man so lacking in wit in Dametas as chief nobleman in his absence. The issue of forgetting identity is additionally crucial, as this is part of the charge levelled at Pyrocles by Musidorus upon discovering his friend disguised as a woman, having neglected his duties as a gentleman to Kalander, as well as to Musidorus himself. Finally, memory seems important because of the seemingly endless deployment of frame narratives throughout Sidney’s larger narrative – the ability to recollect important elements of stories previously told (like that of Philanax’s letter as remembered by Pyrocles) – is key to the successful advancement of characters’ goals. Another example of the importance of memory is Musidorus' success in attacking the Helots because of his ability to remember the lessons of history with his Trojan-horse like strategy - this instance recalls our previous discussion in class of the dynamic whereby romance guides the actions of historical actors while at the same time history informs the development of romance.
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ReplyDeleteProbably enough has been said about Urania. I will only add that in addition to being one of the Muses, there is also Urania Venus (per Robert Graves). If she is echoed in Arcadia's Urania, then ironically the text is giving us a Venus, not born of the sea, but returning to it.
ReplyDeleteWith respect to Andrew King's comment about Sidney's "aspiration toward an Edenic condition of perfect constancy ... " etc. I will comment only upon the Basilius sub-plot. There is a sense of timelessness and immutability about the scenes in Basilius' forest camp, but I wouldn't call it 'Edenic'. There is something unhealthy about it. The world outside (for which Basilius is responsible) goes on in his absence and suffers because he has abdicated his kingly responsibilities. A 'virtuous' monarch is a selfless monarch; but Basilius is selfish, caring only for his own pleasure, and naively assuming he can thwart the will of the gods (as given at Delphi) by hiding. He and his queen are certainly poor specimens of 'perfect constancy' -- given their lustful proclivities. The only person who seems to exhibit the characteristics of that "perfect constancy, virtuous achievement, and the containment of mutability" to which Andrew King alludes is poor old Phalantus. He takes on all comers to prove his love and worthiness for Artesia, but even he, when defeated, weakens and vows "that neither heart nor mouth-love should ever more entangle him." King speaks of Romance as being "a moral condition" -- so far, in Arcadia, it borders on the amoral and would certainly justify the criticism heaped upon Romance by the polemicists. I am particularly troubled that the 'heroes' continually misrepresent themselves. I have an expectation that 'mistaken identity' and 'clouded vision' are common Romance conventions, but outright lying is hardly honorable or virtuous and is jarring to my preconceptions of the genre.