El Cantar del Mio Cid - Essay Example

El Cantar del Mio Cid has a single intentional hip. El Cantar del Mio Cid is the oldest preserved Spanish song of heroic deeds. It dated way back before 1142 but there were no formal records of its original date of compositions as it was recited verbally and passed down in this oral manner. Per Abbat ( or Per Abad) wrote his version of the poem in 1142. Ramn Menndez Pidal was responsible for naming this traditional lyrical poem as El Cantar del Mio Cid but it is a misleading title as there are actually three cantares. Some people prefer to call it by another name, El Poema del Cid, to refer to it as a poem. The English equivalent name was translated as The Lay of the Cid, or The Song of the Cid. We believe that the poem was the product of a single, intentional authorship and will proceed to discuss this argument in this essay. El Cantar del Mio Cid started off as a poem that was retold via oral communication. It was un-mediated by external bodies and this is an argument that favors the single authorship hypothesis. Recitation enabled the poet to have direct interaction with his audience. There is a lack of stage directions or setting descriptions or expository writing as the poet was supposed to exercise his full control when he enlisted the use of his speech and drama skills. He could improvise and make impromptu changes. Since the vocal reader of the poem was his own director, actor and scriptwriter, he had the advantage of freedom in the execution of the reading. Since the poet depended upon his memory to recall the vast amount of verse, he may not remember or distort some portions of verse. This might explain why there was some deviance from the historical facts. Roy Diaz's son was not mentioned We do not know the reason behind this omission. Diaz's daughters were not named correctly or their names were changed to protect their identities. (Wikipedia). If there were more than one author, the poet would have had help in preserving the originality of the poem and there might not have been any mistakes or omissions. Due to these slight distortions or improvisations, the poem is then transient and authorship might be questioned. As the poem depends entirely on reading, it is called a 'sound poem'. The poet has no concrete tools and medium to express. He cannot use italics or any other form of spatial arrangement to highlight anything. (Sherman). El Cantar del Mio Cid is based on a true historical figure named Rodrigo (also referred to as Roy or Ruy) Daz de Vivar who lived during the time that Spain was being reverted back to independent rule from the Moors. The poem had changed some of the names of the figures in history but most of the historical background is true. It was not known why the hero's name has been changed to El Cid. Perhaps it was to protect and mask the true identity of Rodrigo or to bestow a generic name so that the poem would be passed down traditionally as an everlasting cultural icon that would not be dated with time. As the poem was chiefly about the life and times of a single person, El Cid, it is likely that it was penned by a writer from the same generation and time frame as El Cid. It contained accurate accounts of historical events that were consistent from one narrator's point of view. In Canta I, which was also called Cantar del Destierro, we read that Roy Diaz has been alienated because of King Alfonso's orders. We follow the narrator from the point of time Roy Diaz appeared in the poem, right up to the end. I would speculate that the poem was written by Roy himself because he was privy to all the events that happened around him. The poet could also have been someone within the close circle of Roy and traveled with him in order to have written such detailed accounts of the events in the chronology. I noticed that although the bystanders in the poem had painted Roy as a bad hat disgraced by King Alfonso, there was nothing defamatory that directly suggested Roy was worthy of disfavor from the King. On the contrary, the people apologized to Roy for not helping him because they were under the strict orders of the King. Certainly, this poet was a pro- Roy supporter. An innocent young girl explained to Roy; 'But a maiden of nine summers came unto him at last: "Campeador in happy hour thou girdedst on the sword. 'This the King's will. Yestereven came tile mandate of our lord. With utmost care they brought it, and it was sealed with care: None to ope to you or greet you for any cause shall dare. And if we do, we forfeit houses and lands instead. Nay we shall lose, moreover, the eyes within the head And, Cid, with our misfortune, naught whatever cost thou gain. But may God with all his power support thee in thy pain. "' (Cantar I, Verse 2, The Lay Of The Cid). We might ask the question that how did the poet know for sure that the girl was nine years old Maybe he just mentioned an arbitrary number based on his own estimate. Or he could have actually met the girl and asked her for her age. That would mean the poet was Roy or someone in his traveling party of men. There are many other instances where details were supplied and these were too confidential to have just been the work of hearsay or by different authors who had no access to the information of the actual events. On the other hand, we know that scholars in the Middle Age were trained in rhetoric and logic and they were capable of writing epic poems to construct a whole series of events and pretending that they happened. The El Cantar del Mio Cid consists of approximately 3700 verses. Each line of each verse has about 14 to 16 syllables. Each line is further characterized by having a caesura, which is a punctuation that caused a breaking pause in the speech. This was intentionally written to accommodate the reader, who had to get the short break to breathe. The structure of the poem was beautifully uniform and suggested it belonged to a single writer. The pattern of poetic penmanship is so uniform that it might have been the work of a single, great poet. It has been written that that; 'The author has been called the "Homer of Spain" but his name has not been preserved.' (Long 161). Burke said that 'the text was produced in a manner typical for the Middle Ages by a writer who followed procedures very specific to the period.' (Burke preface). He later explained that there are very complex structures called 'imaginative, poetic syllogisms' in the poem. These are sophisticated arguments that can only be solved with deductive reasoning. These are usually carefully planned and written by the one same author as they need to be very carefully organized for all the parts to fit in together well. Too many writers would spoil the continuity and flow of the poem. Colin Smith, a literature research scholar, had taken the position that the Cid poet was Per Abad, since he was the first known scribe who recorded the poem into a fixed form for reading. However, Burke has questioned this claim since there was no real hard evidence to support this claim and it had been assumed all along that Per Abad was only the scribe. As the Cid was written during the Middle Ages, it was also typical of the fashion in which it was composed. The writers of that era took pre-existing known material and altered them to suit their own purposes. (Burke 6).That was why there was distortion of actual historical facts. The writer could have wanted to fictionalize the poem to make it more entertaining. In the Middle Ages, the audience interacted with the poem by assimilating it and mixing it with their personal memories to recreate new meanings and interpretations. Then they retold their versions and thus this was how the poem got rewritten. This might explain why the poem had discrepancies in some historical facts. The people who retold the original poem changed it and this gave rise to the impression that the poem had been written by several people. (Burke 7). As the Cid poem was traditionally inherited over a passage of time before it was transcribed by Per Abad, the Spanish culture to which it belonged and remained in circulation could have evolved through time and modified some secondary products of language. (Burke 13). This could explain why the poem seemed to be the product of the collective work of a group of writers. There exists many logical structures that were elaborately established within the poem and these must have been the work of a scholar and unlikely to have been made possible by ad-hoc groups of authors. Cantar II or Cantar de las Bodas, was about Cid using the marriages of his two daughters to unify Spain. The poet had written about Cid receiving much wealth from his guests; 'To Roy Diaz in good hour born their last devoirs they pay, And likewise to the ladies, and his men of high descent. My lord Cid and his vassals they left in high content.' (Cantar II, Verse 79). Wealth had been a prevalent theme in Cantar I too, when Roy had to borrow money to fund his expedition. The continuance of the same theme is an indication that the poem probably had a single author. The two literary scholars, Smith and Burke, agree that the Cid poem 'belongs far more to the learned culture of its period than it does to the folk ambience that has been suggested as its matrix.' (Burke 5). The medieval predominant trend insisted that its poetry should be grounded in ethics. Thus, the Cid poem also qualified, as it contained many illustrations of human behavior. The trend was superimposed on the writers because they were educated in it so they tend to use these structures naturally in their works. This in turn lent the air of legitimacy and authenticity. (Burke 5). Thus we can say that structures found in the Cid poem were intentional and reflected the fashion of its era. Some of these structures are the rhetoric, logic and language. The scribe who wrote down the poem must have used these structures because they were accepted models. I think that the authorship was intentional to promote and evangelize the Roman Catholic faith as there were many references that propagate the worship of the Catholic faith. For example, Cantar II ended with an invocation; 'Saint Mary and our Father, may it please them to consent That the Cid and he who wrought it with the bridal be content. Of this Cantar the couplets come now unto their end. The Saints and the Creator preserve you and defend.' (Cantar II. Verse 79). The poem closed with a short thanksgiving in Cantar III, verse 130; '"Thanks to the King of Heaven, well are avenged my daughters twain...' This was in accordance to the Catholic tradition of giving thanks. This adherence to acceptable social Christian conventions showed that the author of the poem had his intentions clear at the point of writing. The formal structures in the Cid poem were intentional. Scholars have pointed out that the Medieval Age schooled students in the method of paraphrasing. Students studied good models of writing and then imitated them to demonstrate the grasp of grammar, rhetoric and dialectic. (Burke 15). In Cantar I, several battle scenes imitated the writer Sallust's work. (Burke 30). There is some use of legal knowledge so the poet must have had some legal training. He must have been from the higher cultural class. (Burke 31). Burke speculated that the real poet could have been an educated scribe, with legal knowledge and experience, and had been schooled in the system of rewriting material as we had discussed earlier. This poet could have used material from the quickly disappearing oral poem tradition, while capturing the political and aesthetic aspects of his predecessors, as well as injecting his assimilated experiences into his current composition. Due to the legal expertise stored in the poem, it could also have been used as a mediator or advisor regarding law in the twelfth and thirteenth century. (Burke 33). The example below showed the basic ground rules / laws for competition: 'Now with the King the judges have marked the boundaries out. They have cleared all the meadow of people roundabout. And unto the six champions the boundaries have they shown Whoever went beyond them should be held for overthrown. The folk that round were gathered now all the space left clear; To approach they were forbiddden within six lengths of a spear. 'Gainst the sun no man they stationed, but by lot gave each his place.' (Cantar III. Verse 126). The poet who tore apart old literature and reconstructed a new and yet old poem called Poema de Mio Cid did it intentionally. He was schooled in the tradition of writing poetry by using certain structures and he practiced his skills and knowledge with intention. He had to consciously improve upon old material as well as to add his own new material. It was a very tough job to strike a good balance on all aspects. This work is similar to an editor's job. We do not have the original material from which the poet used to deconstruct and refurbish. Burke is of the opinion that the poet could have rewritten the old material without using the anticipated cultural traits. I think that the fact that the poet so recognizably did reuse medieval material was testament to the fact that his authorship was intentional. The rewriting was done by using the method of defining and dividing the source material that was practiced in writing drills in medieval schools. The poet used literal bookmarks to insert his own expansion of the prevailing topic. He would use the dialectical or rhetorical structures. He then filled these structures with content. (Burke 46). The poem also used syllogism logic principles that were subtle but yet sophisticated and required the reader's deductive reasoning to derive at the hidden conclusion. After reviewing the research material, I am of the opinion that the poem, El Cantar del Mio Cid or The Lay of the Cid, was written as a very well planned, organized and conscious intentional act, done by a single authorship. The end. Works Cited. Burke, James. Structures from the Trivium in the Cantar De Mio Cid. Canada: University of Toronto Press, 1991. Cantar de Mio Cid. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Wikipedia Foundation. 21 Feb. 2007. < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantar_de_Mio_Cid Long, G. The penny cyclopdia. By Society for the diffusion of useful knowledge, Penny cyclopaedia. UK: Oxford University, 2006. Rose, R.S. The Lay of the Cid translated by R. Selden Rose and Leonard Bacon. USA: University of California Press, 1919. Sherman, Anita. Interactions between Poetry and Technology. University of Maryland. 21 February 2007. < http://www.wam.umd.edu/flores/poetry/interactions.html >. Smith, Colin.The Making of the Poema de Mio Cid. USA: Cambridge University Press, 1983. THE LAY OF THE CID. Online Medieval and Classical Library Release #30. 4 May 1997. OMACL. 21 Feb. 2007. < http://omacl.org/Cid/ >. Read More