Читать книгу The Beginnings of Poetry онлайн

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With such an object in view, and in such a spirit, what is the method by which one is to come at the beginnings of poetry, and what material is one to employ? Literature itself, and the comparative, historical method, are indicated by the very terms of the quest; but what of other aids? There is no doubt that science has opened mines of research unknown to a former generation of scholars in poetics; what have zoology, physiology, psychology, ethnology, anthropology, sociology, to say to the beginnings of rhythmic utterance? From the study of those animals which stand nearest to man in intelligence and social instincts there should come in course of time a better knowledge of the physical conditions under which primitive folk essayed their earliest poetry; but it is conceded that the present state of these studies, even in obvious cases like the singing of birds and the social dances and amusements of sundry animals, offers scant help to the student of poetry, and often leads him into absurdities. Darwin’s suggestion that the lyric poem might in some way go back to the call of the male homo to the female at mating time, induced Scherer to put the origins of poetry in general upon this purely biological basis;^[12] but Scherer’s enthusiasm has met no hearty response and seems to fly in the face of certain important facts. The book of Groos, to which further reference will be made, gives a better series of analogies with the subject in hand, but is not to be used in any positive or conclusive way.