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UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK
Summer Examinations 2012
Medieval to Renaissance English Literature
First Year / Level One students: Time allowed: 3 hours plus 15 minutes reading
time during which notes may be made on the question paper but NO ANSWER MAY
BE BEGUN.
Answer questions 1-4.
Honours-level students, and whole-year visiting students taking the module at
Honours level: Time allowed: 1 ½ hours plus 15 minutes reading time during which
notes may be made on the question paper but NO ANSWER MAY BE BEGUN.
Answer questions 1 and 2.
For all students taking the exam: Read carefully the instructions on the answer
book and make sure that the particulars required are entered on each answer book
used.
Do not substantially repeat material from assessed essays (honours level) or between
sections on the exam.
1. Translate the following passage into Modern English Prose (12 marks).
(approx. 20 mins)
Then was Gryngolet grayth, that grete was and huge,
And had bene sojourned saverly and in a siker wyse;
Him lyst prik for poynt, that proud horse then.
The wye wynnes him to and wytes on his lyre,
And sayd soberly himself and by his soth sweres:
‘Here is a meyny in this mote that on mensk thenkes.
The mon hem maynteines, joy mot he have!
The lef lady on live, luf hir bityde!
If thay for charyty cherysen a gest
And holden honour in her hande, the hathel hem yelde
That holdes the heven upon high, and also yow all!
And if I myght lif upon londe lede any whyle,
I schulde reche yow sum rewarde redily if I myght.’
Then steppes he into stirop and strydes aloft.
From Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
grayth: ready
saverly: pleasantly
prik for poynt: gallop because of his fine condition
meyny: household
lef: dear
on live: alive
yelde: give back
lede: man (servant)
Continued
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Continued
2. Write a critical commentary on ONE of the following passages (24 marks).
(approx. 40 mins)
a)
But al to litel, weylaway the whyle,
Lasteth swich joie, ythonked be Fortune,
That semeth trewest whan she wol bygyle
And kan to fooles so hire song entune
That she hem hent and blent, traitour comune!
And whan a wight is from hire whiel ythrowe,
Than laugheth she, and maketh hym the mowe.
From Troilus she gan hire brighte face
Awey to writhe, and tok of hym non heede,
But caste hym clene out of his lady grace,
And on hire whiel she sette up Diomede;
For which myn herte right now gynneth blede,
And now my penne, allas, with which I write,
Quaketh for drede of that I moste endite.
For how Criseyde Troilus forsook –
Or at the leeste, how that she was unkynde –
Moot hennesforth ben matere of my book,
As writen folk thorugh which it is in mynde.
Allas, that they sholde evere cause fynde
To speke hire harm! And if they on hire lye,
Iwis, hemself sholde han the vilanye.
O ye Herynes, Nyghtes doughtren thre,
That endeles compleignen evere in pyne,
Megera, Alete, and ek Thesiphone,
Thow cruel Mars ek, fader to Quyryne,
This ilke ferthe book me helpeth fyne,
So that the losse of lyf and love yfeere
Of Troilus be fully shewed heere.
From Chaucer, Troilus and Criseyde, Book 4
entune: sing
blent: blinds
mowe: moue, grimace
writhe: turn
thorugh which it is in mynde: by whom it is made known, recorded
Herynes: Erinyes, the three Furies
Quyryne: Quirinus, a name of Romulus
fyne: finish
b)
‘But as a matter of fact, my dear More, to tell you what I really think, as long
as you have private property, and as long as money is the measure of all
things, it is really not possible for a nation to be governed justly or happily.
For justice cannot exist where all the best things in life are held by the worst
citizens; nor can anyone be happy where property is limited to a few, since
those few are always uneasy and the many are utterly wretched.
Continued
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Continued
‘So I reflect on the wonderfully wise and sacred institutions of the Utopians,
who are so well governed with so few laws. Among them virtue has its
reward, yet everything is shared equally, and everyone lives in plenty. I
contrast them with the many other nations which are constantly passing new
ordinances and yet can never order their affairs satisfactorily. In these other
nations, whatever a man can get he calls his own private property; but all the
mass of laws old and new don’t enable him to secure his own, or defend it, or
even distinguish it from someone else’s property; and thus arise innumerable
and interminable lawsuits – fresh ones every day. When I consider all these
things, I become more sympathetic to Plato and do not wonder that he
declined to make laws for any people who refused to share their goods
equally. Wisest of men, he easily perceived that the one and only road to the
welfare of all lies through the absolute equality of goods. I doubt whether such
equality can ever be achieved where property belongs to individuals. However
abundant goods may be, when every man tries to get as much as he can for his
own exclusive use, a handful of men end up sharing the whole thing, and the
rest are left in poverty. The result generally is two sorts of people whose
fortunes ought to be interchanged: the rich are rapacious, wicked and useless,
while the poor are unassuming, modest men who work hard, more for the
benefit of the public than of themselves.
‘Thus I am wholly convinced that unless private property is entirely done
away with, there can be no fair or just distribution of goods, nor can the
business of mortals be happily conducted. As long as private property remains,
by far the largest and best parts of the human race will be oppressed by a
heavy and inescapable burden of cares and anxieties.’
From Thomas More, Utopia, Book 2
c)
46
Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war
How to divide the conquest of thy sight.
Mine eye my heart thy picture’s sight would bar;
My heart, mine eye the freedom of that right.
My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie
(A closet never pierced with crystal eyes),
But the defendant doth that plea deny,
And says in him thy fair appearance lies.
To ’cide this title is impanellèd
A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart,
And by their verdict is determinèd
The clear eye’s moiety, and the dear heart’s part,
As thus: mine eye’s due is thy outward part,
And my heart’s right thy inward love of heart.
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Betwixt mine eye and heart a league is took,
And each doth good turns now unto the other.
When that mine eye is famished for a look,
Or heart in love with sighs himself doth smother,
With my love’s picture then my eye doth feast,
Continued
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Continued
And to the painted banquet bids my heart.
Another time mine eye is my heart’s guest,
And in his thoughts of love doth share a part.
So either by thy picture or my love,
Thyself away are present still with me;
For thou not farther than my thoughts canst move,
And I am still with them, and they with thee;
Or if they sleep, thy picture in my sight
Awake my heart, to heart’s and eye’s delight.
From Shakespeare, Sonnets
’cide: decide
impanellèd: enrolled or constituted (a body of jurors)
quest: judicial inquiry
moiety: one of two parts (not necessarily equal)
league: a treaty of alliance
d)
So proud she shynèd in her Princely state,
Looking to heaven; for earth she did disdayne,
And sitting high; for lowly she did hate:
Lo underneath her scornefull feete, was layne
A dreadfull Dragon with an hideous trayne,
And in her hand she held a mirrhour bright,
Wherein her face she often vewèd fayne,
And in her selfe-loved semblance tooke delight;
For she was wondrous faire, as any living wight.
Of griesly Pluto she the daughter was,
And sad Proserpina the Queene of hell;
Yet did she thinke her pearelesse worth to pas
That parentage, with pride so did she swell,
And thundring Joue, that high in heaven doth dwell,
And wield the world, she claymèd for her syre,
Or if that any else did Joue excell:
For to the highest she did still aspyre,
Or if ought higher were then that, did it desyre.
And proud Lucifera men did her call,
That made her selfe a Queene, and crownd to be,
Yet rightfull kingdome she had none at all,
Ne heritage of native soveraintie,
But did usurpe with wrong and tyrannie
Upon the scepter, which she now did hold:
Ne ruld her Realmes with lawes, but pollicie,
And strong advizement of six wisards old,
That with their counsels bad her kingdome did uphold.
From Spenser, The Faerie Queene, Book 1, Canto 4
Continued
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trayne: tail
native: rightful, by virtue of birth
pollicie: political cunning, expediency
wisards: wise men; used contemptuously
3. Write an essay in answer to ONE of the following questions (32 marks). (1 hr)
a) Is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight a celebration or a critique of courtly life?
b) Explore Gawain’s perceptions of women in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
How are we encouraged to evaluate them?
c) ‘[Pandarus’] role as author shapes the “romance” of the lovers’ successful
experience in the first three books of Troilus and Criseyde’ (Windeatt, 1992).
Explore how this authorial role works in the first books, and discuss what happens
to it in Books 4 and 5.
d) Discuss the relation between predeterminism, free will and blame in Troilus and
Criseyde.
4. Write an essay in answer to ONE of the following questions (32 marks). (1 hour)
a) ‘Nothing is so arrogant as ignorance’ (Erasmus, Letter to Dorp). Examine
Erasmus’ presentation of knowledge and ignorance in the Letter to Dorp.
b) Consider the sonnet and the satire as contrasting modes of response to the
difficulties of Henrician court life in the poetry of Sir Thomas Wyatt.
c) How far does Astrophil and Stella succeed in escaping Sir Philip Sidney’s
criticism of other poets in The Defense of Poesy, that they ‘would never persuade
me they were in love?’
d) In what ways might George Gascoigne’s The Adventures of Master F. J. be seen
to reflect upon the concerns and anxieties of the age?
e) Is the chivalric romance enriched or enfeebled by its synthesis with religious
allegory in Spenser’s Faerie Queene, Book 1?
f) Compare and contrast the treatment of masculinity in Shakespeare’s Venus and
Adonis and Marlowe’s Hero and Leander.
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