Robert Henryson

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Lothians
(south). Dunfermline is close to the principal crossing point on the Fife side.

Robert Henryson (

state language. His writing consists mainly of narrative works
. His surviving body of work amounts to almost 5000 lines.

The west door of Dunfermline Abbey.
Morall Fabillis
Dunfermline Abbey from a 17th-century engraving which gives a more complete impression of the original building complex than survives today.

Works

Henryson's surviving canon consists of three

conceit of "completing" Criseyde's story-arc from Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde. Emily Wingfield has explored its significance in relation to the deployment of the Trojan Legend in political discourse between England and Scotland.[1]

The range of Henryson's shorter works includes

Marian devotion, some allegorical works, some philosophical meditations, and a prayer against the pest. As with his longer works, his outward themes often carry important subtexts.[citation needed
]

Constructing a sure chronology for Henryson's writings is not possible, but his Orpheus story may have been written earlier in his career, during his time in Glasgow, since one of its principal sources was contained in the university library. Internal evidence has been used to suggest that the Morall Fabillis were composed during the 1480s.[citation needed]

Biographical inferences

Leuven's University Library in 1915, illustrating just one of the ways in which historical records can be lost.

There is no record of when or where Henryson was born or educated. The earliest found unconfirmed reference to him occurs on 10 September 1462, when a man of his name with license to teach is on record as having taken a post in the recently founded

arts and canon law.[2]

Almost all early references to Henryson firmly associate his name with Dunfermline.

notary for the abbey, an institution which possessed and managed a vast portfolio of territory across Scotland.[5]

The almost universal references to Henryson as schoolmaster are usually taken to mean that he taught in and had some duty to run the

priest" (as master of grammar) and "scholars" in Dunfermline, including "poor scholars being taught free of charge".[7]

Abbot House Window, Dunfermline, depicting Henryson's Lion and the Mouse.

Dunfermline, as a royal burgh with capital status, was routinely visited by the court with residences directly linked to the abbey complex. There is no record of Henryson as a court poet, but the close proximity makes acquaintance with the royal household likely.[citation needed] He was active during the reigns of James III and James IV, both of whom had strong interests in literature.

According to the poet

terminus ad quem in a couplet (usually considered to have been composed c.
1505) which simply states that Death in Dunfermelyne

...hes done roune (has whispered in private)
with Maister Robert Henrysoun.

(William Dunbar, Lament for the Makaris, lines 81–2)[10]

Almost nothing else is known of Henryson outside of his surviving writing. It is not known if he originated from Dunfermline and a suggestion that he may have been linked to the

of that ilk
.

General style

Henryson generally wrote in a

beliefs.[citation needed] The writing stays rooted in daily life and continues to feel grounded even when the themes are metaphysical or elements are fantastic. His language is a supple, flowing and concise Scots that clearly shows he knew Latin,[citation needed] while scenes are usually given a deftly evocative Scottish setting which can only have come from close connection and observation.[12] This detailed, intimate and realistic approach, at times, strongly suggests matters of personal experience and attitudes to actual contemporary events, yet the specifics remain elusive in ways that tantalise readers and critics. Some of this sense of intrigue may be in part accidental, but it is also heightened by his cannily controlled application of a philosophy of fiction, a frequently self-proclaimed feature of the work.[13]

No concrete details of his life can be directly inferred from his works, but there are some passages of

self-reflection that appear to contain autobiographical implications, particularly in the opening stanzas of his Testament of Cresseid.[citation needed
]

Henryson's Scots

Henryson wrote using the Scots language of the 15th century. This was in an age when the use of vernacular languages for literature in many parts of Europe was increasingly taking the place of Latin, the long-established lingua franca across the continent.[citation needed]

Extant poems

All known and extant writings attributed to Robert Henryson are listed here. In addition, the scholar Matthew P McDiarmid identified from an index a lost poem by Henryson which began: On fut by Forth as I couth found (not listed below).[14]

Long works

Short works

Individual fables

Seven of the stories in Henryson's cycle are Aesopian fables derived from

Reynardian
in genre. The three titles given with bold numbers provide evidence for the integral unity of the overall structure.

Bibliography

  • Gray, Douglas (1979), Robert Henryson, E.J. Brill,
    ISBN 9789004059177
  • Barron, W.R.J. (ed.) (1981), Robert Henryson: Selected Poems, Carcanet New Press
    ISBN 9780856353017
  • McDiarmid, Matthew P. (1981), Robert Henryson,
    ISBN 0-7073-0306-0
  • Fox, Denton (ed.) (1981), The Poems of Robert Henryson, Clarendon Press,
    ISBN 9780198127031
  • David Murison (ed.) (1989), Selected Poems by Robert Henryson, The Saltire Society,
    ISBN 9780854110100
  • Fleming, Morna (ed.) (2003), The Flouer o Makarheid, The Robert Henryson Society, Dunfermline
  • Wingfield, Emily (2014), The Trojan Legend in Medieval Scottish Literature, D.S. Brewer,
    ISBN 978-1-84384-364-1

See also

Notes and references

  1. ISBN 978-1-84384-364-1
    , pp. 121 - 149.
  2. licenciate in Arts and bachelor
    of Decreits (Canon Law), as a member of the University. It is considered strongly likely, from secondary evidence, that this was the poet.
  3. ^ These are all posthumous references, such as on the title pages of the early printed editions of his work that started to appear after his lifetime.
  4. ^ The dates are 18 and 19 March and 6 July 1478 and the signature is Magistro Roberto Henrison publico notario. See McDiarmid, M.P. 1981: Robert Henryson, Scottish Academic Press, p.3.
  5. MacQueen, J.
    2006: Complete and Full with Numbers: the Narrative Poetry of Robert Henryson, Rodopi, Amsterdam, pp.10 and 12.
  6. ^ The title page of the 1570 edition of Henryson's Fables, for instance, refers to the poet as "scholemaister of Dunfermeling".
  7. ^ Confirmatio, dated 26 November 1468. Published in Kirk, J. ed. 1997: Calendar of Scottish Supplications to Rome: 1447–1471, Scottish Academic Press. p.396.
  8. ^ See Robert L Kindrick, Introduction which quotes Kynaston's general thoughts on Henryson and the "merry, though somewhat unsauory tale".
  9. ^ See McDiarmid, M.P. 1981: Robert Henryson, Scottish Academic Press, p.12
  10. ^ The title maister is a further indication that the poet was indeed the university-educated Henryson associated with Glasgow University.
  11. ^ Laing, David (1865) The Poems and Fables of Robert Henryson pp. x-xii.
  12. ^ See Wittig, K. 1958: The Scottish Tradition in Literature, Oliver and Boyd, chapter 2, for appraisals of Henryson's descriptive technique.
  13. ^ "Certainly the present writer would like to know more about Robert Henryson as he lived outside his verse than about any other Scots poet." (McDiarmid, M.P. 1981: Robert Henryson, Scottish Academic Press, p.1.) McDiarmid's first chapter goes on to develop a surprisingly full speculative picture of the poet's life gleaned from evidence in his poetry, secondary historical evidence for the period and the surviving citations of his name in an extremely broken record.
  14. ^ McDiarmid, M.P. 1981: Robert Henryson, Scottish Academic Press, p.4

External links

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