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2. Antecedent Paradigms of Invention: Literary Paradigm
- University of Wisconsin Press
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2 Antecedent Paradigms of Invention: Literary Paradigm Ut enim faber, volens aliquid fabricare, prius illud in mente disponit, postea, quesita materia, iuxta mentem suam operatur. -Glosae ยง32 [Just as the artist who wishes to fashion something first sets it out in his mind, then, having looked for material, fashions it to fit his mental conception.] The art of romance did not spring full-blown from the head of Chretien de Troyes and his peers. They had a frame of reference, a paradigm for invention . That paradigm may be reconstructed from the medieval arts of poetry and prose and related documents. The fact that these works are not well understood by most students of romance requires an inquiry into their instruction on invention in order to anticipate its application to the art of romance. Art of Invention The medieval arts of poetry and prose draw on learned and scholastic traditions of ancient, especially Roman, origin.1 These traditions linked poetics to one or more of the liberal arts, especially grammar and rhetoric.2 Grammar and rhetoric occupied a place on the tree of knowledge that rose from humble techniques and crafts like poetry upward through the seven liberal arts and the sciences to, ultimately, philosophy and theology. The hierarchy of arts and sciences was based on distinctions among the different branches 32 Copyrighted Material Literary Paradigm 33 of the tree of knowledge, and"on attention to the right and wrong uses of learning.3 The best writing was supposed to illustrate the Ciceronian ideal of sapientia and eloquentia. The ideal, which became traditional in Christianity after Augustine, was given special emphasis by medieval writers.4 But there was no universal agreement on the value of the art of poetry.5 Hugh of Saint Victor's dismissal of poetry as an unnecessary, even dangerous appendage to the liberal arts, Alain de Lille's distinction between the "poet" and the "philosopher," as well as Bernardus Silvestris' defense of poetry as a mode suitable to the expression of truth illustrate the problematic status of the art in medieval thought at the time romance began to emerge and blossom.6 The twelfth- and thirteenth-century arts of poetry and prose teach "Chartrain " or Platonic poetics, as set forth or practiced by figures like Bernard of Chartres, Bernardus Silvestris, John of Salisbury, Alain de Lille, Jean de Hauville, Gautier de Chatillon, and Joseph of Exeter.7 The poets were the authorities and examples from whom Matthew of Vend6me, Geoffrey of Vinsauf, and others distilled the poetic art as it was taught and practiced in medieval schools.8 The teaching contained in their treatises figured prominently in the emergence of romance in the twelfth century.9 Although romance tended to form its own tradition as time passed, the influence of medieval Latin poetics on the genre while it was emerging obliges us to identify the salient features of the medieval treatises on poetry and prose. Grammar traditionally gave instruction on correct writing in prose and verse, and included the study of "good literature." Analysis of the parts of speech, close textual commentary, and practice in correct writing were its principal assignments. The immediate fruits of this training may be seen in accessus ad auctores, commentaries, florilegia, and classroom exercises in composition (praeexercitamina, progymnasmata). In these exercises pupils treated set themes narrow in scope and specific in the devices illustrated or recommended.Io They show grammar as the ars recte dicendi - the art of correct speech. Rhetoric "assumes many forms and uses in the twelfth century"ll and after as an ars bene dicendi. It teaches how to move an audience. The means to achieve this end are set forth within a traditional scheme from which the arts of poetry and prose borrow their own arrangement and emphasesY invention , disposition, ornamentation, memory, and delivery. The accessus ad auctores introduce some of the main concerns in invention: materia, intentia , utilitas, titulus, arda, etc.13 They provide insight into how these subjects were understood and applied in the arts of poetry and prose and in contemporary writings. There were three prerequisites to the mastery of the art: ingenium, ars, Copyrighted Material [44.200.74.73] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 23:33 GMT) 34 Literary Paradigm and exercitatio. Ingenium was inborn or natural talent, the capacity, intelligence , and insight necessary to invent a work; it governed the cognitive faculty called imagination, or the invention of identifiable images.14 Ars was systematic instruction on all or part of the techniques whereby...