I
recalled in my post I Liked It a
childhood memory of walking barefoot through alleyways after a rain. I was
commenting on Wordsworth’s recollections of childhood by offering my own parallel
experiences. What’s interesting is I can only recall these experiences, these
points in time, of walking through alleyways through the lens of narrative. I have to remember my friend, Tyler; I have to remember the lightning, the mud,
and the long walk back home. In class, Professor Porter discussed how morality
and past histories are some how intertwined, specifically with regard to
Wordsworth’s poetry, his recollections of viewing Tintern Abbey, and the
memories detailed in the Prelude. A
recurring theme in class was the complex relationship between man and nature. In
this essay I’d like to show how the imagination captures our personal histories
through the lens of narrative, and how this then bleeds into our perceptions of
nature, creating an interconnected dynamic that blurs the lines between man and
nature, raising the perplexing question: Are we the narrators or are we the
characters?
Our romantic poets
exemplify both sides of this question. Here I have in mind Wordsworth’s Prelude and Tintern Abbey, Clare’s Recollections
after a Ramble, and Darwin’s Loves of
the Plants. There is an incremental progression of how the dynamic
manifests in the poems, spanning from narrative as nature to finally, a full
conflation of the two. But before exploring these texts, I’ll turn to the idea
of narrative in our lives.
We piece together
the chronology of our lives by categories, not making demarcations for mundane
occurrences, e.g., brushing our teeth or tying our shoes, by contrast, we put
special effort towards the task of constructing a sense of narrative in our
histories. Notice we do this explicitly in our collections of photos: here we
are at the lake; here we are Christmas 05’; our first vacation together—yet the
phenomenon of collecting our histories may not always be so obvious.
In her essay, Exploring Biographical fictions:
The role of imagination in writing and reading narrative, Rosalind Barber interprets
Shakespeare’s Sonnets in such a way that makes the case for Marlovian
Theory—the idea Christopher Marlowe faked his death and wrote the works of
William Shakespeare. Her interpretive process rests on the ambiguity of
certainty in accounts of the past. She notes: “Through fiction, we have license
to construct alternative narratives, rethinking histories so widely assumed to
be ‘true’ that they have not been properly examined in the light of
contemporary scholarship” (Barber). In this quote, Barber has in mind biographical
narratives written by literary critics. Likewise, though, biography writers are
not the only ones who embellish the past. Our sense of nostalgia comes entirely
from rewriting memories to fit an ideal narrative. We see prominent strands of
this in Wordsworth’s poetry.
Classmate, C Jane,
writes in their post, Collecting Memories,
“The theme of nature is obviously present in Wordsworth's "The
Prelude", but what about the theme of collecting? It seems that Wordsworth
is recollecting childhood memories, experiences, etc. I think that by doing
this, Wordsworth allows his adult self to realize the importance of these
childhood memories-these memories have shaped who he is as an adult.” C Jane’s
post highlights the way in which Wordsworth frames nature as an entity that
influences his moral development, incorporating it as an agent in the narrative
of his childhood. Wordsworth writes:
Conquered or
conqueror. Thus our selfishness
Was mellowed down, and thus the pride of
strength
And the vainglory of superior skill
Were interfused
with objects which subdued
And tempered them,
and gradually produced
A quiet
independence of the heart (Wordsworth 67-72)
So we see Wordsworth capturing his
childhood in these miniature narratives, these miniature struggles, i.e.,
racing his friends to the banks of an island, furthermore, we see nature play
the role of mediation, assuaging the pains of shame, defeat, and lost glory. As
C Jane remarked, Wordsworth is looking back on his past and analyzing the moments
that shaped his being. But the analysis, we have reason to suspect, per
Barber’s article, may be a backwards self-fulfilling prophecy: the prospect of
narrative draws Wordsworth into selective perception, draws him into viewing
his life as novelistic.
But by giving nature
agency in The Prelude, Wordsworth is
showing signs of wanting to conflate nature and narrative, but more
importantly, the conflation suggests Wordsworth’s narrative may not be his own
subconscious fabrication; it may be an authentic facet of nature. The lines
begin to blur at this point, and John Clare’s Recollections After a Ramble bring the conflation to an even
greater pitch.
Sweet the Birds
did chant their songs
Blackbird linnet
lark and thrush
Music from a many
tongues
Melted from each
dripping bush
Deafnd echo on the
plain
As the sunbeams
broke the cloud
Scarce coud help
repeat the strain
Natures anthem
flowd so loud (Clare 161-169)
In this passage from Clare’s Recollections After a Ramble we can
clearly see nature taking on qualities of drama. Classmate Karoc comments, “Epics
are a product of man; nature has no epics written about it. Dante, Milton,
Homer, and Virgil do not wax eloquent for pages and pages upon the landscapes
of Hell, Paradise, Troy, and Carthage; they speak upon the heroic deeds of
their characters (or the justness of divine retribution in Dante's case).
Clare's work for the previous pages seems intent on justifying that all the
little moments of nature can be just as worthwhile as describing.” I think
Karoc’s comment is remarkably astute. Clare’s poetry reads like a celebration
of nature’s miniature triumphs, and in this way Clare is seeking out in nature
the same narrative Wordsworth sought in his own past memories. But while
Wordsworth brought narrative and nature near by giving nature agency, by
exploring nature’s own narrative, Clare is articulating an altogether different
perspective. Yet one feature of Clare’s perspective that stands between
narrative and nature’s total conflation is his framing of the poem from the
vantage point of observation. Both Wordsworth and Clare detail recollections of
being in nature, not nature’s own being.
Erasmus Darwin will make the turn completely.
Classmate EllieChan221 remarks of
Erasmus Darwin’s The Love of the Plants,
“I really enjoyed reading Darwin's poem The Love of the Plants, even more so
after reading all the footnotes because it helped me understand where Darwin
was going with all the sexual connotations. As noted by other posts in the
blog, there is a great sense of personification within the poem and it helps
the reader see plant reproduction in an even more beautiful and intriguing
light by allowing us to believe that these plants have human emotion and
actions.” While Ellie’s comment does justice to Darwin’s poem, on a deeper
level, Ellie’s comment alludes to the total conflation of narrative and nature
present in The Loves of the Plants.
Darwin’s poem does not merely “personify” nature by giving plants sexual
desires, but views nature as having its own essence. This is in large part a
product of Darwin’s scientific perspective, which we see in full tilt in The Economy of Vegetation, of which W.
E. Snell remarks:
As a poet Darwin
is best known for The Botanic Garden, published in two parts, The Economy of
Vegetation, and The Loves of the Plants. Far more than vegetation is described
in the former, which epitomizes all scientific knowledge in rhyming couplets.
Ample footnotes explain the argument of the poem, forming almost a textbook of
cosmology, geology, and natural history themselves.
While reading Darwin’s The Love of the Plants we are struck by
the poems overt personification, but Darwin’s footnotes, which are written in
scientific terminology, remind us that Darwin’s personification is merely a
rich description of natural phenomenon. Darwin’s occupation as both a scientist
and a poet allows him to bring to light what we usually don’t think of as
intrinsic to nature—narrative.
So
we can see how in the poems discussed, narrative progressively evolves from
something we think of as being fabricated—something we graft onto our histories
for the purposes of living meaningfully—to something we experience as being
inherent in nature. In a sense, our Romantic poets represent something highly
uncanny; it’s as if we have taken a telescope to look out into nature and seen
her gazing back at us through her own lens. The above picture is of a head of
Romanesco broccoli, which naturally displays a Fibonacci fractal. This is
nature looking back at us through her telescope, a phenomenon that begs the
question I started this essay with: Are we the narrators or are we the
characters? Following on the heels of this question are others of similar ilk.
Are we free or are we destined? Is math real? Is there a metaphysical order to
the universe, a life force that we are somehow the heralds of?
I
was probably ten years old when Tyler and I walked through the alleyways of
Pampa, Texas after the torrential rains. We talked bad guys and good guys, the
wasteland, and beyond. I remember I fell behind, walking slow, collecting the
environment.
“Do you have hair on your toes?”
Tyler asked not looking back.
“Yeah,” I replied.
“That means you’re sexy,” he said.
And then a bolt of lightening came
down and zapped the nearest telephone pole.
Tyler lives in San
Francisco now. He works for George Lucas, and I am a student at the University
of North Texas, presently contemplating if I’ve completed the narrative arc of
this essay satisfactorily. With that we come full circle. So are we the
narrators or are we the characters? We need not dwell on the question
indefinitely. The eclecticism of our romantic poets gives us a perfectly fine
answer: Both.
Further
Readings:
Works
Cited:
Rosalind Barber,
“Exploring Biographical Fictions: The Role of Imagination in Writing and
Reading Narrative.” Rethinking History
Vol. 14 Issue 2, (June 2010): p165-187, 23p
W. E. Snell, “Erasmus
Darwin, Physician and Poet.” The British
Medical Journal Vol. 1. No. 5795 (January 29, 1972). P. 303-305
