Читать книгу The Beginnings of Poetry онлайн

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Nothing, however, is harder than to carry out this simple plan; from a work on poetry take away both theory and criticism, and what is left? It is true that since F. Schlegel, a hundred years ago, said^[9] of art in general that its science is its history, historical and comparative treatment of poetry has come speedily to the fore; but that mystery which rightly enough clings to a poetic process, the traditions of sanctity which belong to genius, and the formidable literature of æsthetics, have all worked together to keep the study of poetry out of line with the study of other human institutions, and to give it an unchartered freedom from the control of facts which has done more harm than good. Consider that touch of futility which vexes the mind when it sets about discussion of a topic so far from the daily business of life; consider the great cloud of witnesses who can be summoned from any library to prove that of all printed silliness nothing reaches quite so silly a pitch as twaddle about the bards; add, too, that no process is so difficult to observe and analyze as the making of a poem; and it is easy to see why writers on poetry are always flying to cover in psychology and æsthetics or in criticism.^[10] Facing the facts of poetry, a scholar can treat the poetic impulse and keep the facts at arm’s length, or even quite out of his range. Treating the poetic product, whether genetically or historically or comparatively, tracing the evolution of poetry as a whole, for its own laws of growth and decay, or regarding its place as an institution in human society, he must hold unbroken commerce with a bewildering mass of material. Hence the delight which animates to their task the numberless writers of “thoughts about poetry,” and the dismay with which the historian looks upon his rough and unwieldy subject. Books beyond the power of any modern reader to compass have been written on the poetic impulse; while all the books which treat the poetic product as an element of public life could be carried in one’s pocket,^[11]—and one need be no Schaunard for the task. Yet the facts of poetry ought to precede the theory,—facts, moreover, that should be brought into true relations with the development of social man. A record of actual poetry; then a history of its beginnings and progress as an achievement of human society; then an account of it with regard to its origin and exercise as a function of the individual mind,—such is the process by which there could have been built up a clear and rational science of poetry, the true poetics. Dis aliter visum. There is a fairly good record of poetry, with gaps due to chance and neglect, many of which chance and energy may yet combine to fill. As an achievement of human society, poetry has had scant attention; and the present work is intended, in however modest and imperfect performance, to supply material and make an outline for such a study.