If spiritually negative pathways are relevant, cf. the path within the
Garden of Love RR 729ff. "Tho wente I forth on my right hond/Doun by a
lytel path I fond/Of mentes full, and fenell grene/And faste by, without
wene,/Sir Myrthe I fond". But there must be many such paths, I realize.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sidney-Spenser Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of John Leonard
Sent: Thursday, 14 June 2007 11:35 p.m.
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: The grene path way to lyfe
Dear Bert,
The line you quote immediately made me think of "the broad way and the
green" In Milton's Sonnet IX, so I checked the Milton Variorum and found
a
goldmine of information, including this, from Ascham, Toxophilus,
English
Works, ed. W. A. Wright, Cambridge, 1904, 23: "Chauser doth saye verie
well
in the Parsons tale, the greene path waye to hel." Woodhouse and Bush
add:
"The phrase is not in the Parson's Tale and Ascham's memory was at
fault, as
Smart observes."
So, I find myself wondering whether E.K. has picked this up from Ascham,
and
that what we have here is one scholar's bad memory infecting another's
(a
common occurrence, even today). E.K. changes the significance of the
path
(it leads to virtue), but that might be either a further memory lapse or
a
deliberate inversion of Matt. 7.13 (the broad way) and Job 8.12-13 (the
'greenness' of the 'the paths of all that forget God'). One last
thought:
Puritans often thought that Chaucer had written Piers Plowman. I wonder
if
Langland might produce a missing piece of the puzzle?
Best,
John Leonard
----- Original Message -----
From: "A.C. Hamilton" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, June 13, 2007 7:20 PM
Subject: The grene path way to lyfe
>A time when the whole world seems ready to mount a green bandwagon - in
>Canada there is even a Federal Green Party - seems an appropriate time
to
>raise a matter that has bothered me for many years, in fact, from the
time
>I wrote an article on The Shepheardes Calender over fifty years ago. It
>concerns E. K.'s gloss on the November emblem: 'For though the
trespasse of
>the first man brought death into the world, as the guerdon of sinne,
yet
>being ouercome by the death of one, that dyed for al, it is now made
(as
>Chaucer sayth) the grene path way to lyfe'.
>
> Evidently Chaucer did not say this though only a major poet would be
> capable of such a powerful statement, even more powerful, surely, than
> Marvell's 'green Thought in a green shade'. I recall making my way
> unsuccessfully through Thynne in the hope that the line was from a
poem
> attributed to Chaucer. In 1982 I used E. K.'s phrase as the title of
an
> essay on Spenser's poem in the hope that I would be shamed into
finding
> its source. I didn't and I am.
>
> I can't recall that any comment on E. K.'s gloss in later
> twentieth-century editions of the poem, and, surprisingly, not even in
the
> Variorum Spenser. Of recent editions, the Yale Shorter Poems, has no
> comment at all. In a recent edition of the poem, Douglas Brooks-Davies
> writes: 'E. K. paraphrases the opening of the Parson's Tale (itself
> translated from Jeremiah 6:16: "seeth . . . which is the good way, and
> walketh in that way, and ye shall find refreshing for your souls".'
That
> tale begins by citing Jeremiah: 'Stondeth upon the weyes, and seeth
and
> axeth of olde pathes (that is to seyn, of olde sentences) which is the
> good wey, / and walketh in that wey'. In his edition, Richard McCabe
> glosses: 'cf. the opening sentences of The Parson's tale quoting
Jeremiah
> 6:16'. Robinson's edition of Chaucer notes that Chaucer cites the
Vulgate;
> and the Geneva Bible, which E. K. would certainly know, urges that we
> 'aske for the olde waie, which is the good way & walke therein, and
yet
> shal finde rest for your soules'. No hint here that death is 'the
grene
> path way to lyfe', though in the November eclogue, death for Dido is
the
> green pathway to life, for once resurrected, she is seen walking in
> 'fieldes ay fresh, the grasse ay greene', which is redolent of the
'green
> pasture' promised by the Psalmist.
>
> Is E. K.'s gloss simply unglossable, apart from idle speculation that
> Spenser as 'our new poet' demonstrated that he has replaced 'that good
old
> poet', Chaucer, by attributing to him a line that he wrote himself?
> Bert
>
|