Читать книгу Gesammelte Aufsätze zur romanischen Philologie – Studienausgabe. Herausgegeben und ergänzt um Aufsätze, Primärbibliographie und Nachwort von Matthias Bormuth und Martin Vialon онлайн

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There appears in the Middle Ages another type of address to the reader, less casual and more urgent: the religious appeal. It is, obviously, nearer to DanteDante’s style than anything we have hitherto encountered. For if DanteDante’s sublimity is VergilianVergil, his urgency is AugustianAugustinus.12 Most of the medieval examples are not addressedMittelalterAnrede im MA to the reader as such; but to mankind in general, or to the hearers of a sermon. They are very numerous, typical specimens are Bernard of Morlaix’sBernhard v. Morlaix De contemptu mundi or Alexander Neckham’sAlexander Neckham De vita monachorum. Similar forms occur also in the vernaculars. One may recall the beginning of Marcabru’sMarcabru crusade-song, basically nothing but the usual call for attention; however, the subject confers upon it much greater intensity:

Pax in nomine Domini !

Fetz Marcabrus lo vers e’l so.

Auiatz que di !

Before ending this rapid inventory, let me say a few words regarding ancient and medieval theories of rhetoricRhetorik. The theorists have never described or listed the addressMittelalterAnrede im MA to the reader as a special figure of speech. That is quite understandable. Since the ancient orator always addresses a definite public – either a political body or the judges in a trial – the problem arises only in certain special cases, if, with an extraordinary rhetorical movement, he should address someone else, a persona iudicis aversus, as QuintilianQuintilian says. He may, in such a moment, call on somebody who is present, e. g. on his opponent, as did DemosthenesDemosthenes with AeschinesAeschines, or CiceroCicero with CatilineCatilina – or on someone absent, e. g. the gods, or any person, living or dead – or even an object, an allegorical personification – anything suitable to create an emotional effect. This rhetorical figure is called apostropheApostrophe,13 and it very often has the character of a solemn and dramatic invocation,14 which interrupts a comparatively calmer exposition of the facts. The classical apostrophe no doubt exercised a deep influence on DanteDante’s style; it was in his mind and in his ears. But it is not identical with the address to the reader; this address constitutes a special and independent development of the apostrophe.