Artistic Legislation

Artistic Legislation

            Percy Bysshe Shelley said that poets are the “unacknowledged legislators of the worlds” (Shelley, A Defence of Poetry 918). His point was that poets crystallize the ideas of an age, and effect the movements of civilization. It seems that is only half of the story though. Poetry certainly does influence change, but it is also influenced by other movements. Throughout history this symbiotic relationship between poets, and the artistic periods they write in has been evident.

            Poetry during the Renaissance, for example, was just as interested in a resurgence of Greek and Roman artwork as was painting. Francis Petrarch exhibited this impulse in certain of his sonnets, such as sonnet 78 from his Rime Sparse, in which he appeals to the mythical artist Pygmalion, who fell in love with his own sculpture, saying, “how happy you should be/with your creation, since a thousand times/you have received what I yearn for just once!” (12-14). Here we see the poet not leading the times, but following the times. In sculpture Renaissance artists had already been appealing to Greek and Roman art for years, such as Donatello’s David which echoes Polykleitos’ Doryphoros. However, Petrarch also led the times with his humanistic impulse. Petrarch envisioned a Christianity that valued life on this earth, and even the most humble experience on it, instead of only emphasizing life after this earth. That outlook was adopted by other Renaissance thinkers like Pico della Mirandola. Thus Petrarch was an unacknowledged legislator of his times, but also was legislated to by other artistic movements of his day.

            The Baroque period in poetry exhibits this same relationship. John Donne in his poem “Batter My Heart,” dwells on the frustration of desiring to surrender to God, and finding oneself unable. Thus he does, “Labor to admit,” God, “but, oh, to no end.” Donne concludes his poem by comparing sexual congress with Christian conversion: “Take me to you, imprison me, for I,/Except you’enthrall me, never shall be free,/Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me” (12-14). One can see immediately ways in which Donne was influenced by his age, and ways in which he influenced others in his age. The association of conversion with sex could have been adopted from Caravaggio’s Conversion of St. Paul, in which Paul lays supine after being knocked off of his donkey in his conversion experience. The positioning of Paul’s body, relative to the divine presence, and his ecstatic facial expression deliberately evoke a sexual reaction. Donne is also influenced by Petrarch, since Donne composed his him in a Petrarchan, or Italian, sonnet form. The Italian sonnet influenced many subsequent poets also.

A truly innovative form was utilized by poets like John Dryden who wrote about the London fire, and the rebuilding that took place afterward. He praises the English for rebuilding London, “More great than human, now, and more august,/New-deified she from her fires does rise:/Her widening streets on new foundations trust” (1-3). Dryden’s poem is not written with an octave/sestet model. It is composed of two quartos, or stanzas with 4 lines. In this way perhaps Shelley would be correct in stating that Dryden was a legislator of the poetic form, but even Dryden was dependent on Rene Descartes for his imagery of rebuilding upon a new foundation.

Which brings us at last to Shelley’s own period, and his artistic legacy. In Shelley’s poem “Ozymandias,” Shelley makes a truly radical statement. He calls for anarchy by telling of a colossal statue in an unknown desert, dedicated to one, “Ozymandias, king of kings:/Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” (11-12). All around the statue of Ozymandias is the evidence of the works of which he boasts: desert and desolation. Shelly was making the point that empires eventually crumble and are therefore not worthy of putting one’s faith in. A truly new and radical statement that influenced fellow poets like Samuel Taylor Coleridge. He is, however, still dependent on the legislation of Petrarch, since his poem is still in that form.

It is when we enter into Modernity and the Realist movement that poets can most be seen to be the unacknowledged legislators of the world. In this age artists began to address contemporary realities in a more direct way. This had great influence on actual legislation: laws that effected change. An example is Charles Baudelaire. In poems such as “Carrion,” Baudelaire unflinchingly portrays the horrors one may find in the streets with absolute realism. “Remember my love,” he says, “the item you saw/That beautiful morning in June:/By a bend in the path a carcass reclined/On a bed sown with pebbles and stones;/Her legs were spread out like a lecherous whore” (Baudelaire 1-5). Baudelaire portrays the image of the carcass to create disgust in the reader, to demonstrate that such a sight should not be seen where the actions of humanity can prevent them. Here, too, Baudelaire was influenced by a painter: Ernest Meissonier. In his painting Memory of Civil War (The Barricades), Meissonier conveys the terrible reality of carcasses rotting in the streets (Sayre 410).

To trace these poets through their various artistic movements, is to see Percy Shelley’s thesis played out. The poets write the laws of art and humanity. We see, however, that this artistic legislation does not proceed in one direction only. Poets are just as influenced by other artists and politicians, as they are influential to the arts and politics.

Works Cited

Baudelaire, Charles. "A Carcass." Norton Anthology Western Literature. Ed. Sarah Lawall and Patricia Spacks. Trans. James McGowan. Eighth. Vol. II: The Enlightenment through the Twentieth Century. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2006. II vols. 1547. Print.

Brooke, Rupert. "The Soldier." The Longman Anthology British Literature. Ed. David Damrosch and Kevin J H Dettmar. Fourth. Vol. 2 C. New York: Pearson Longman, 2010. 2136. Print.

Donne, John. "Batter My Heart (1618)." Sayre, Henry. Discovering the Humanities. Second. New York: Pearson Longman, 2013. 321. Print.

Dryden, John. "Annus Mirabilis (1667)." Sayre, Henry. Discovering the Humanities. Second. New York: Pearson Longman, 2013. 346. Print.

Owen, Wilfred. "Dulce et Decorum Est." Sayre, Henry M. Discovering the Humanities. Second. New York: Pearson Longman, 2010. 453. Print.

Petrarch, Francis. "78 [When simon first received that high idea]." The Norton Anthology of Western Literature. Ed. Sarah Lawall and Heather James. Trans. Mark Musa. Eighth. Vol. I: The Ancient World Through the Renaissance. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc, 2006. II vols. 1905. Print.

Sayre, Henry M. Discovering the Humanities. Second. New York: Pearson Education, Inc, 2013. Print.

Shelley, Percy Bysshe. "A Defence of Poetry." The Longman Anthology: British Literature. Ed. Amelia Klein. Fifth. Vol. II A: The Romantics and Their Contemporaries. New York: Peason Longman, 2012. 919-929. Print.

Shelley, Percy Bysshe. "Ozymandias." Backpack Literature An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. Ed. X J Kennedy and Dana Gioia. Fourth. New York: Pearson, 2012. Print.