WILLIAM CHAMBERLAYNEのPharonnidaについて
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概要
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William Chamberlayne, one of the minor poets of the Caroline period, does not seem to be much read in England and America, still less here in Japan. But his major work, Pharonnida deserves, to the writer's mind, more attention of the students of English literature. He is anything but a craftsman in poetry, but his poetic imagination has been given free play, perhaps too free, in Pharonnida. The work is called an epic poem and in structure some resemblance to The Aeneid may be found, but it is only superficial. More remarkable is that it has certain characteristics of the Elizabethan dramas. Some scenes in Pharonnida might have been written as a tragedy-a kind of tragedy which depends not so much on the development or psychology of the characters as on the plot and action. It is significant that Pharonnida was composed of five books, each book containing five cantos, corresponding to the five acts of a tragedy, instead of twelve books of an epic. The worst fault of the poem is the lack of ordonnance. If we read the poem for the narrative we may be disappointed before we have reached the second book. This is not to say, however, that there are no scenes which can absorb readers' whole attention for a while. What interests us, readers of the 17th century poetry, is the abundance of brilliant passages which have attained the height of the best of the metaphysical poetry. Prosodically considered, his poetry might be interesting, representing an extreme case of the heroic couplet in enjambement. Chamberlayne was a poet who looked back to the past, the Elizabethan dramatic literature, and never turned his eyes to the future, the new tendency in the poetry of the Restoration period and the following generations of Dryden and Pope. We discover, however, affinity between him and the poets of the period of the Romantic Revival. In the present article, those points above mentioned are cursorily treated, with several illustrative passages, as well as a somewhat lengthy outline of the whole story. The article will, I hope, serve as an introduction to Pharonnida for Japanese readers who are interested in the poetry of the 17th century.
- 財団法人日本英文学会の論文
- 1958-11-30
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関連論文
- 4. 説教文学(第三室,日本英文学会第36回大会報告)
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