tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51801457138973406612024-03-13T23:10:02.219-07:00MedievalandiaRick Goddenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04109263756022001400noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5180145713897340661.post-40213132306281157102011-12-29T10:49:00.000-08:002011-12-29T10:52:26.148-08:00Arthur and the Giant, or the Ruins of History<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
I'm starting to work on an article on <i>The Alliterative Morte Arthure</i>. What follows is a bit, emphasis on bit, of new material intercut with a conference paper. So, there might be some incoherence, and of course, this all needs to be fleshed out much, much more. As such, I haven't yet put in notes and references, etc. I take the Eric Auerbach defense--most of my books are packed away or at least out of reach because of boxes. I'm also still trying to figure out the blog medium, where pieces aren't quite finished products and can be informal. It is difficult to put unfinished work out there. The short piece below might be considered, then, more as notes working toward a larger idea. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
Ok, enough preemptive apologetics.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
Lately, I've been reading <i>Moses and Monotheism</i> by Freud. On a literal level, it is difficult to take Freud's exegesis of Jewish history seriously, but his reading of originary and primal trauma into the books of Moses is fascinating nonetheless. For some reason that I haven't fully articulated yet, Freud's meditations on Moses make me think of Arthur. Arthur is a bit Moses-like in the way that he is such a foundational figure for a nation (though Brutus might be a better candidate here). But, what attracts me most to Arthur is how, like Moses, his story presents the core of a people and its history, but also conceals darker truths. For Freud, hidden away inside the stories of Moses is the forging of a people in the wake of a murder. With Arthur, the many conflicting stories and traditions about him seem, to me at least, to perfectly capture the deeply anxious currents of British history. As many have noted, there are several main representations of Arthur: for example, there is the French Arthur of medieval romance, and there is the more martial Arthur of the chronicle tradition. But beyond that, there is the messianic version of Arthur, the once and future king. Against this, though much of the time they seem to coexist, is the Arthur of <i>translatio imperii</i>. Either Arthur will return and bring a sort of New Jerusalem for England with him, or he is but one more cast off in the relentless march of history. History is either a story of return and triumph, or it's a story of endless replacement, and displacement. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
All this brings me to the giant in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Alliterative Morte Arthure</i>. I want to consider how the giant represents a past that has been
displaced, yet it does not appear to lose any of its vitality, or its ability
to haunt the present with thoughts of the future. <o:p></o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px;">The giant, I might suggest, conjures the specter as Derrida defines it—a haunting presence, a remnant of the past, which conjures the untimely, where the present moment is alien to itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
In the longer piece I'm working on, I want to reflect some on the romance episodes in the
text. I should, however, briefly sketch
how I’m using the term “medieval romance.”
I am not aiming to work toward a firm definition of the genre, especially
considering how fluid the genre is in its many examples. Rather, I am interested in exploring the
function of certain elements of medieval romance, namely its temporal
qualities. John Finlayson writes in his
“Definitions of Medieval Romance,” “The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">romance</i>
is contemporaneous in its manners, dress, and architecture, but totally outside
of time and place in its actions.”
Working outside of time is not to suggest a general sense of
atemporality. Rather, I would argue that
the tendency of medieval romance to be unmoored from a rigid sense of
temporality opens a space to reflect more deeply on historical questions. Frederic Jameson, in the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Political Unconscious</i>, refers to romance as a “place of narrative
heterogeneity”, a genre that offers “the possibility of sensing other
historical rhythms.” It is these other
“historical rhythms” that I am after in the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alliterative
Morte Arthure</i>. It might be more
appropriate, though, to replace “historical rhythm” with “temporal spasm”. Episodes such as Gawain’s encounter with
Priamus, or Arthur’s dream of Fortune’s wheel, suggest moments where
temporalities clash, and in this clash might be evidence of historical trauma. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
Like many of the episodes in the poem, the encounter between Arthur and
the giant is soaked in history. Arthur’s
tangling with the giant occurs in the first quarter of the poem, and happens
almost immediately after landing in Normandy.
In a significant difference from the chronicle sources, Arthur seeks out
the giant completely on his own, without any reconnaissance by his
knights. At almost every turn, the poet
augments the importance of this encounter.
Not only is the giant given one of the most vivid and gruesome portraits
of medieval literature, but elsewhere in the poem other giants are reduced by
omission or humor to make it clear that the “Saint” of the Mount, as Arthur
jokingly calls him, is a different beast altogether. This nameless creature is a conflation of
Retho from the chronicles and another giant of St. Michel’s Mount, expanding
the role of this single giant. In this
episode, Arthur reenacts an originary moment of conquest. When his ancestors first settled the Island,
it was populated by giants that needed to be destroyed so that the British
could settle. But again, Arthur is already
a great King and does not need to prove himself as a hero. More than just replaying past conquests,
however, this episode foreshadows Arthur’s fall. The giant is always anachronistic--he exists to be displaced. His pastness, then, is not in question. But, I want to begin to think through how this pastness must always come with a sense of a troubled futurity.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
At first, though, the episode appears to occupy an atemporal space, being
a titanic battle between Good and Evil.
John Finlayson, in his "Arthur and the Giant of St. Michael's Mount," describes the giant as a “Grendel-like combination of
arch-fiend and human reprobate, for what is stressed most in the monster is …
his anti-Christian conduct, the eating of the baptized children, and the
general disorder he creates among Arthur’s people.” Finlayson demonstrates how
the poet highlights the giant’s feast of “crysmede childyre” (1051) beyond his
sources, thus emphasizing the giant’s status as an enemy of Christendom. Nothing redeems the monster, and the only
answer to his fiendish suppression of the people is his death at the hands of
the King. For Finlayson, Arthur’s
championing the side of Good is not a mere convention, but instead heightens
the ultimate trajectory of the poem, “the Fall of a great and Christian conqueror
due to his desertion of that championship of justice and right which originally
made him great.” Arthur’s heroic defeat
of the giant certainly does establish him as a great and Christian conqueror
who will fall from a great height, but the aftermath of the encounter raises
troubling questions. After defeating the
giant, Arthur generously distributes the fiend’s horde of treasure—more than
was in Troy when it fell we are told—but he lays claim to two specific items:
“‘Haue I the kyrtyll and Þe clubb, I coueite noghte ells’” (1191). The club stands in stark contrast to the
“anlace” that Arthur finally kills his adversary with. Finlayson reads the use of this small dagger
as a trust in God, thus emphasizing Arthur’s role here. Metaphorically, however, Arthur uses the club
more than the anlace later in his Continental campaign. He ceases to deliver just retribution to a
tyrant, but instead becomes a tyrant himself and beats other nations into
submission. The symbol of Arthur as a
tyrant or unjust ruler is the “kyrtill” that he keeps for himself. As tribute, the giant demanded the shaven
beards of those he subjugated: “It es hydede all with hare hally al ouere / And
bordyrde with the berdez of burlyche kyngez” (1001-02). He then constructed a garment out of
them. By taking these items, Arthur
appropriates their symbolic meaning for himself. When the Roman Senators approach him in
supplication after their defeat, Arthur orders that they shave their beards
(2331-35). Victorious, Arthur exacts further
revenge by humiliating his opponents. He
emasculates them, and takes his own tribute—a fitting reversal considering that
it was the demand of tribute that began the whole affair. Arthur, then, continues the pattern. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
Not only does the king appropriate the symbolic weight of the giant
through his taking of the girdle and the club, he begins to resemble the giant
in action. At the end of the poem,
Arthur orders the death of Mordred’s children:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; text-indent: .5in;">
‘And sythen merke
manly to Mordrede children,<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; text-indent: .5in;">
That they bee
sleyghely slayne and slongen in watyrs—<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; text-indent: .5in;">
Latt no wykkyde
wede waxen ne wrythe one this erthe!’ (4320-22)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of all the ways that the poet alters his sources, perhaps
this detail causes the most discomfort.
In the chronicle sources, Mordred’s two sons rise up against Constantine
and are slain. The alliterative poet,
however, has Mordred’s offspring be children.
Both the giant’s cannibalism of “crysmede childyre” (1051) and Arthur’s
order to slay children are innovations and additions by the poet. Given the emphasis placed upon the fate of
children in this poem, a relationship between these two events clearly exist on
a thematic level. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
Arthur is not necessarily acting monstrous here, but rather can be seen
as acting like a good King. Arthur’s last order as commander-in-chief of the
Britons will help to insure against further uprisings, which the following
sections of the chronicles bear out.
Therefore, Arthur is being the good king in his actions, and can die
penitent. Whereas the giant killed
children pitilessly, Arthur performs an act, albeit unseemly, to protect his
people in virtually the same breath as he utters a prayer. But his action also reinforces
the violent and persistent way that history moves, as a narrative punctuated by
rise and fall. The giant, a destroyer of
children, is displaced by Arthur, who then commits the same sin. It is as if Arthur begins the story as
Jupiter, rising up against his child-eating father. But in the end he too becomes a figure of
Saturn, conquered and cast aside. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
Alongside the familiar rise and fall of conquerors here, however, is also a frustrated desire. Arthur's command to kill Mordred's children is not just a repetition of his predecessor, nor is it only an act to protect him and his people, but rather it is an attempt to arrest history's movement. To kill the next generation, as it were, is to stop the march of the translation of empire, and hold it in place. The messianic version of Arthur, where he will return to his people, seems to express a similar wish--to halt the ruinous movement of history.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: .5in;">
The anxieties implicit in this episode becomes explicit in Arthur's dream of Fortune's wheel. The dream serves to foreshadow
his death, providing a warning to Arthur that he should begin to prepare
himself for the next life. It also
introduces a note of futurity: his dream
vision looks beyond his own imminent demise and pictures his successors
climbing the Wheel. When Priamus
declared Arthur heir to Alexander, he was marking a moment of historical
transition, where he himself recedes into the past as Arthur takes his position
at the top of the wheel. Here, however,
Arthur relinquishes his spot, though not as willingly as Priamus, to the other
two Christian Worthies. Alarmingly,
perhaps for a medieval English audience, the two rising Worthies are luminaries
of French history—Charlemagne and Godfrey.
Some critics have argued that the poem and its portrait of Arthur may be
a comment on Edward III and his continental campaigns. Whereas the historical meditations on Arthur,
on his pastness and the imminent demise of his realm are benefited by temporal
hindsight for a fourteenth or fifteenth century audience, this moment here
opens up a different sense of futurity.
The present of the reader is perhaps at stake. I am not suggesting that the poem serves as
an alarmist warning to an English present.
Rather, I suggest that this is a subtle reminder that the historical
movement that sweeps away Arthur is always in motion. To celebrate Arthur, even in tragic form, is also to recognize that your historical moment will also be swept away. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="left" class="MsoTitle" style="text-align: left; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;">The untimely encounters in
the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Alliterative Morte Arthure</i> open a
space to explore the discontinuities of British History. More specifically, it restores to the poem
what the Gawain-poet would call the “blysse and blunder” of history, the
ongoing movement of rise and fall that marks not only British and English
history, but also universal history as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">imperium</i>
continues to migrate West, from Greece, to Rome, to medieval Europe. </span><span style="font-weight: normal;">The romance episodes in the poem create a space where e</span><span style="font-weight: normal;">ndings are considered
uncomfortably alongside beginnings, stressing the shape of history as one of
discontinuity. </span><span style="font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="left" class="MsoTitle" style="line-height: normal; text-align: left; text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Rick Goddenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04109263756022001400noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5180145713897340661.post-68196021240582962472011-12-14T21:12:00.001-08:002011-12-15T17:31:18.450-08:00Packing my books, unpacking the pastOk, so I have made an important discovery: Starting a blog at the end of a semester is a terrible idea. Starting a blog when I am in the middle of preparing a major move is an even worse one. I had intended to put up something related to my (admittedly sporadic of late) research for my second post, but that is clearly not going to happen for a little while. <br />
<br />
Since I'm consumed with packing and coordinating my move, I can't seem to think about much else. And, as I start to pack my books in earnest, I've become fascinated with the small story that each book tells. Looking over my books, I see so many false dissertation paths, so many half-formed ideas, and so many half-finished books (will I ever finish <i>Ulysses</i>?). With this on my mind, I've decided to post an essay I wrote a few years ago. It is about my small, but meaningful to me, collection of signed books. <br />
<br />
I wrote this while a graduate student, and a few of the sentences and some of the academicese make me cringe, but I offer it below with little editing.<br />
<br />
_______________<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoTitle">
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
Letters to Past Selves</div>
<div class="MsoTitle">
<br /></div>
<div align="left" class="MsoTitle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: 11pt; font-weight: normal;">“Every
passion borders on the chaotic, but the collector’s passion borders on the
chaos of memories. More than that: the chance, the fate, that suffuse the past
before my eyes are conspicuously present in the accustomed confusion of these
books.”</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 15px;">–Walter Benjamin, “Unpacking My Library”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-size: 11pt;">“the better part of our
memories exists outside us” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-size: 11pt;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">–</b>Marcel Proust, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">In Search of
Lost Time</i></span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoTitle">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Each book sitting on my shelf carries
the memory of former selves and of earlier times. A set of books in my collection that is
particularly loaded with memories for me include those signed by another
person, either the author or a previous owner.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The most recent book that
has been signed is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Snow</i> by Orhan
Pamuk. I bought it right before departing
on a cruise to the Caribbean with my wife’s family. I must admit that my decision making process
for selecting this did rest greatly on the juxtaposition of Pamuk’s snowy Kars
with the sunny Caribbean. And so now,
whenever I consider this book, I experience a Wordsworth-like “spot of time”—a
memory of long days unfolding upon the deck of a ship, in the open air, as I
would occasionally glance away from my book to contemplate the blue-green
clarity of the water. But when this book
found its way into the hands of its author, it gained a new temporality. I had the great fortune of meeting Pamuk, and
as one often does in such a situation, I asked him to sign his book. Beneath his signature he placed the date,
inscribing both himself and that moment upon my book. His signature functions as a trace, and as
such, gives voice to heterogeneous temporalities. It is a mark of the past, recalling a
particular moment in time. And yet, it
is present to me. I can run my fingers
over the ink. Paul Ricoeur would call this
the inscription of lived time upon calendar time. </div>
<div class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="line-height: normal;">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The twin to this book is my signed
copy of Salman Rushdie’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Satanic
Verses</i>. Both books are by
international authors, and both writers are concerned with the meeting of East
and West. But an important difference
between them is that Rushdie signed my copy of his book in my absence. While I sat in Graham Chapel at Washington University, listening to
Rushdie talk about his work and his life, my grandfather was in the hospital
gravely ill. The time of the
intellectual, marked by books and lectures, was interrupted by the time of
loss, and ultimately, of mourning. When
Rushdie was signing my book at the behest of a friend the next day, I was on
the road, traveling home to attend the funeral of my grandfather. Having recently read Jacques Derrida’s
writings on the deaths of friends, collected in a volume called <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Work of Mourning</i>, I wish that I had
made a copy of my eulogy rather than delivering it from memory. I cannot now recall much about it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
The memory of my grandfather,
linked forever with the signing of Rushdie’s book, leads me to make a
connection between one signed book and another, between <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Satanic Verses</i> and a book that my grandfather owned. On the fourth of July in 1997—it was the
summer before my Junior year of college—my grandfather loaned me a book by John
B. Noss titled <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Man’s Religions</i>. I can only dimly remember the conversation
that led to his loaning me the book. In
a moment of humor appropriate to my grandfather, he signed his name, date, and
address (apparently to remind me where he lived), along with a note that it was
being lent to me, on the inside cover.
His inscription was a teasing reminder that I had occasionally
“forgotten” to return books to him. I
never did return it to him, and now, I consider it part of my collection. Although it is a good book on comparative
religions, I keep it mostly for the inscription left by my grandfather. But the book may conceal further
temporalities. Why did my grandfather
buy the book? Originally published in
1949, this particular copy is the third edition of 1957, when he would have
been in his late twenties. Sometime in
the 1980’s, he privately had a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">bar
mitzvah</i>, which he should have had decades before. There is a story there that is not available
to me, and perhaps this book plays a part, but I cannot ask him now.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
Memories of my grandfather conjure
a third book, bringing me further back in time.
When I was very young, I went to visit him in the hospital—an option not
open to me when he passed way. He was
recuperating from bypass surgery, and during that time my ever-garrulous
grandfather had gotten to know a fellow patient. As grandparents often do, he told her about
me at great length. And for some reason,
she felt compelled to give me a gift during one of my visits, and this gift was
the first <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">novel</i> that I remember
owning. It was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Hobbit</i> by J.R.R. Tolkien.
Here I experience a double loss.
Not only is this book missing, but also my memory of receiving it lies
at the vanishing point of recollection.
Only with great effort can I recall anything more than the fact that
this event happened. With some sadness,
I do remember that I did not read <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
Hobbit</i> until many years later. At
that time, I was not much of a reader.
My career as a reader did, however, begin with the genre which Tolkien
inspired—fantasy. And though I rarely
read fantasy fiction now, the memory of this book still looms as a curious
happenstance because I am currently training to be a medievalist, Tolkien’s own
academic field. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
My memories link back along the
chain of the signature, and I think about another pair of signed books that I
own, by two fantasy authors: Terry Brooks and Robert Jordan. These books recall the larger series of books
that the authors wrote many years ago.
Looking at them now, I am arrested by a certain set of memories. They
are almost like Proust’s madeleine, overwhelming me with memories, sensations,
smells. They bring me to a period of my
life when reading acted as a life preserver in the face of one of time’s
truths: illness. As an adolescent, I
spent a significant amount of time in the hospital. During my stays, I spent all of my free time
reading, particularly the fantasy novels of Terry Brooks. (I cannot think of one of his books now with
out smelling the singular odor of the hospital—disinfectant.) I am also reminded of Ricoeur’s reading of
Virginia Woolf’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Mrs. Dalloway</i> in volume 2 of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Time and Narrative</i>,
where monumental time (manifested as official time, or clock time) intersected
with the private times of the characters Clarissa and Septimus. My stay in the hospital was marked by a
similar dual apprehension of time.
Hospital time is regular, and largely impersonal. Have your vitals checked at this time;
receive your breathing treatment at this time; and take your medication at
another. The days would roll on, marked
by the periodic and regular reminder of mortality and sickness. The rest of the time, however, was one long
unfolding of solitude. During that
private time, reading these fantasy books gave me a sense of “transport” in the
way that Longinus defined it. My love of
books, which has ultimately led me to seek a doctorate, is anchored in that
experience. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;">
While these books harbor memories
of many people and places, my collection also testifies to a Proustian
succession of different selves. The
person that bought and experienced them is, to varying degrees, a stranger to
me now. And even though I have only
recently developed a vocabulary for discussing time, all of those previous
selves have always been keenly aware of both its passing and the problems
created in its wake. But in trying to
organize my collection under the aegis of time I must echo a sentiment of
Walter Benjamin’s in “Unpacking My Library,” and acknowledge that “[t]his or
any other procedure is merely a dam against the spring tide of memories which
surges toward any collector as he contemplates his possessions.” <o:p></o:p></div>
</div>Rick Goddenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04109263756022001400noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5180145713897340661.post-86917910388054121422011-12-10T10:14:00.001-08:002011-12-10T13:42:50.057-08:00Prologues, Pewter Dragons, and Packing<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ok, so here it goes. My first blog post. I must have started a blog a half-dozen times, and I've never gotten to the posting stage. I always end up futzing around with the name and the layout, and then I ignore it or delete it. I still don't know--at the time of writing this--if this blog will suffer the same fate or not.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Several events have come together to inspire me to try this again. Most of them I won't talk about yet (tantalizing, eh?), but perhaps the most significant influencing factor is my impending move. I am about to leave the institution where I received my PhD to take a postdoc position, and so I feel at a crossroads of sorts--what will this mean for my career? My personal life? Am I taking that first step towards a career (at last) or will I be treading water? Amidst all this fairly boring angst, I am also packing, sorting, eliminating, and reacquainting myself with belongings that I have kept hidden in closets for about a decade. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">During my archeological work, I discovered an old collection of pewter dragons and pseudo-medieval fantasy pieces. You know the sort. I know you do. I used to collect them, especially in high school, college, and even during the first part of grad school. I was attracted to these hyperreal examples of popular medievalism long before I knew what a medievalist was. I am hard put to explain my collection of these objects. I once even had a full pewter, medievalesque chess set (I managed to sell it on eBay). With the move ahead of me, I have decided to get rid of all of them (well most). It is not because I have decided to put away childish things, but because (I think) I am not quite in touch with that former version of myself anymore. And, I am disinclined to just pack them and then pack them away again. But, I did hold on to one piece for sentiment's sake. One of the pieces was given to me by a dear friend who passed away while we were both Seniors in college. I find I am unwilling to part with objects that invoke his memory. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yet here is the troubling part...I am not sure if I selected the right piece. Because these pewter pieces are all so derivative and interchangeable, and perhaps because of my own shoddy memory, I could not with decisiveness remember which of the many pewter dragons passed through his hands. I made a choice, and I am fairly sure I am right, but I'll never quite know. I picked an object to rescue from the dustbin of my personal history and imbued it with sentiment and memory, but it may be a pure invention. And, you know what? I think I am ok with that. The memory is the most important thing, and the object is but a pointer to it. In the twelve years since my friend's death I have revisited the memories of our friendship and those final days many times. I am also becoming aware of how the more joyful of those memories are taking prominence, and how the once tremendously painful recollection of my adolescent idiocies, which caused some hard feelings, are starting to seem less important. Even though he was my oldest friend, and passed away when we were in our early twenties, I prefer to still think of him as my contemporary, and not some inert memory of my past. My memory of him persists, even if some of it is of my own shaping. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is an overly personal prologue to this blog, and I don't intend (at the moment) for this blog to always be so personal. To be truthful, I don't know yet what shape this blog will take. I'm going to let it happen as it will. In my reflections on packing, purging, and the past (I need to stop resorting to alliteration...and parentheticals), however, I hit on my main focus for this blog: the ways that the past lives on in the present, despite of and perhaps thanks to its fabrication. I'm hoping, in the weeks and months ahead, to blog about the modern uses of the medieval, and the medieval engagement with its own pasts. I'll be traveling ground already covered by many others, so time will tell whether I have anything to add to the many wonderful and fascinating blogs, articles, and books that take the interaction and exchange between past and present as their subject. I do know that I have set starting a blog as a personal goal for a long time, and until now I have done little to realize it. The real challenge will be to write entry #2. Hopefully the next one will be more cogent, and more interesting to others. I'm awfully aware that I really only wrote this piece for myself.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And, reading back over what I've written, I really do wish I remembered which pewter dragon he gave me. </span></span>Rick Goddenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04109263756022001400noreply@blogger.com3