Andreas and the ambiguity of courtly love (review)

Reviews 235 Given his focus on patronage, there is an emphasis on court politics in his discussions of Andr6 and particularly Carmeliano. Strangely, however, the more striking political aspects of More's Epigrammata are overlooked. Moreover, Carlson seems to equivocate about More's reasons for the ultimate form of the 1518 edition of his work, a publishing decision in which More had limited say. W a s it issued to magnify the reputation of its author? Undoubtedly! But this was not the book of a nobody at this stage of More's career, so we need more information about how the enhancement of reputation lay behind the appearance of the Epigrammata and of the part of Erasmus in its publication. This point should not be taken as adverse criticism. Carlson's study of minor texts helpsfillthe interstices in the story of Tudor humanism and one often wishes that he was more expansive. There is an interlocking of writers, promoters, patrons, and printers to form a publishing culture which is fascinating, but for all that, somewhat abstracted from social context. All in all, this is a readable and informative study which will be of value to any student of English humanism. The work contains several useful black and white illustrations of the texts discussed, and is free of typographical errors. Damian Grace School of Social Work University of N e w South Wales Cberchi, Paolo, Andreas and the ambiguity of courtly love, Toronto/Buffalo/London, University of Toronto Press, 1994; cloth; pp. xv, 194; R.R.P. CAN$50.00. This powerfully argued volume provides a new reading of the De amore of Andreas Capellanus. In the process it affirms the views of various critics of the last thirty years, such as D. W . Robertson, E. T. Donaldson, and F. L. Uttley, all of w h o m felt that the traditional notion, that Andreas was mocking married love, was too simple and in need of exposition as to the inherent ambiguity of his model of courtly love. As Cherchi stresses, the style used by he himself, a 'somewhat scholastic modus tractandi' (p. x), has come from his own teaching experiences. Of course, this is the nature of the original exposition and therefore is no bad thing, either historically or as a mode of clearer presentation of the present concepts. 236 Reviews In essence, then, the core of the contemporary argument is that there is, and always has been, a central spiritual/carnal paradox in troubadour poems and in the Latin treatise, the former fed or fuelled by the latter. Cherchi contends that Andreas's deepest purpose was the apparent condemnation of courdy love because of its notion that extramarital passion could ever generate any form of virtue. The m o d e m scholar accords to Andreas the fullest credit for identifying and illuminating the eternal conflict between passion and ethics. In 1944 Leo Spitzer had seen this general human dilemma or 'paradoxe amoureux' as: 'a balance between the opposite elements of eros and moral perfection, an immobile tension between natural desires and social expectations'. After analysing these m o d e m questionings, Cherchi then proceeds to expound on the deeper ambiguity, both for the troubadour and the moral man of later generations and cultures, that 'eros and moral perfection [can] ... become consubstantial' (p. xiii). Their relation is both symbiotic and mutually essential, rather than mutually exclusive. Through reference to various texts from the several troubadour countries, Cherchi argues from this notion that erotic love, whether consummated or not, results in a particularly significant form of mythopoeia, that of the lover w h o is totally, and not necessarily blasphemously, dedicated to another, aware of his unworthiness, and yet ever in hope of some form of ultimate union with the beloved. One of Cherchi's most telling points is his notion that the troubadour poet 'publicizes' his own love to help him retain his idealism rather than remain furtive, silent and so the more lustful as the cult would have enjoined. The long first chapter re-examines Courtly Love as presented in the model presented by Andreas and agrees that the simpler dichotomies therein are valid as an initial...