Conceptions of place in Old English poetry
<p>Previous studies of place and space in Anglo-Saxon literature and culture have tended to focus on the engagement with these phenomena as a means of understanding the world and of imposing order on it. The analysis offered here scrutinises instead the literary representation and function of...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English, Old (ca. 450-1100) English |
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2022
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| Summary: | <p>Previous studies of place and space in Anglo-Saxon literature and culture have tended to focus on the engagement with these phenomena as a means of understanding the world and of imposing order on it. The analysis offered here scrutinises instead the literary representation and function of place in the vernacular poetic tradition, as well as its symbolic significance. In its examination of conceptions of place in Old English poetry, this thesis contends that place is fundamentally fleeting and symbolic of the transience of all earthly things. </p>
<p>The present study first assesses the role of the hall as the chief location for aristocratic human society, especially as manifested in the hall of Heorot. The attributes of this structure are closely linked to the features of homosocial life in the comitatus. However, the hall and life in the comitatus are, like the city and society depicted in The Ruin, revealed to be fleeting. Whilst this is an inescapable reality for human society, the transitory experience of place is also common to individuals exiled from human company, as exemplified in a number of more overtly elegiac poems. Yet this characteristic aspect of place is not always necessarily a negative thing, since, in certain verse saints’ lives, places initially inhabited by demons and heathens are converted into Christian sites. Additionally, these locations take on particular salvific and narrative significations, demonstrating further the varied literary significance of place. Finally, the analysis examines the diverse manifestations of place in Beowulf. The dwelling of Grendel’s mother inverts the familiar place of the hall, unsettling notions of human social space; the dragon’s barrow evokes architectural features of Britain’s Roman past to convey the passage of time; and despite memorialising the poem’s hero, Beowulf’s own burial mound stands as a monument to impermanence. Ultimately, in contrast to the eternal place of Heaven, earthly places are shown to be emblematic of the transience of all earthly things. </p> |
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