Miranda: Revue Pluridisciplinaire du Monde Anglophone (Sep 2015)
Que signifient les corps et gestes des personnages qui peuplent les lais bretons moyen-anglais ?
Abstract
The Middle English Breton Lays edited by Anne Laskaya and Eve Salisbury (1995) were written between the late 13th and the 15th century. They form a miscellaneous body of poems grafted onto a pre-existing literary form, the lai, best illustrated by Marie de France. Let us note in passing that the poet, whose name only appeared in the 16th century, claims that her sources originate in the duchy of Brittany, where actually no lay whatsoever was ever produced. In other words, it is a purely undocumented contention on Marie’s part. England became the new scene of the continental genre. This organic form grew out of the lai tradition in a modified shape, in different array. The brevity of this type of mini-romance and the brisk pace of its narration are reflected in the very mobility of the animated bodies that are pictured crying, praying, repenting, serving, hunting, fighting, or dancing and revelling. The English lays provide precious clues about medieval life, whether actual or idealised. This article attempts to scrutinize the references to body language, gestures and even gesticulations, especially what connotations they take on depending on the context—from the royal court to fairyland, from the jousting lists to the town. Actions and postures in the poems under study betray heightened emotion, sometimes blinding passion, deep grief, irreparable distraction, or unrequited love. Whether keeping their self-control or yielding to irrepressible desires, the protagonists’ bodies almost seem real. Yet a 21st-century reader is sure to be intrigued by the meanings of some physical attitudes, which invite interpretation in an approach both literary and anthropological. The gesture is the habit(us) of the voice, as the deeds and body movements are supposed to match the words. Middle English lays move away from the motionless portrait or the frozen scene to highlight the human being in action, moving to the full, simply living.
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