Latest / Reviews / 021 - A Literary Pilgrim

Transcript

021 - A Literary Pilgrim · Reviews

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Section twenty of reviews by Oscar Wilde. This is a
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit liberyvox dot org.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Recording by Philippa Willitts Reviews by Oscar Wilde, edited by
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Robert Ross. Section twenty a literary pilgrim. Antiquarian books, as
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: a rule are extremely dull reading. They give us facts
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: without form, science without style, and learning without life. An exception, however,
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: must be made for Monsieur Guston Wessier's Promenade Acciologique Bushu.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Boisier is a most pleasant and picturesque writer, and is
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: really able to give his readers useful information without ever
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: boring them, an accomplishment which is entirely unknown in Germany
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: and in England is extremely rare. The first essay in
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: his book is on the probable site of Horace's country house,
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: a subject that has interested many scholars from the Renaissance
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: down to our own day. Monsieur Boisier, following the investigations
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: of Signor Rosa, places it on a little hill overlooking
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: the Licenza, and his theory has a great deal to
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: recommend it. The plow still turns up on the spot
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: the bricks and towels of an old Roman villa. A
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: spring of clear water, like that of which the poet
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: so often sang, breaks babbling from the hollow rock, and
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: is still called by the peasants Fonte de la ratini,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: some faint echo possibly of the singer's name. The view
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: from the hill is just what is described in the
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: epistles continue montez misidsocientur Opachavale hard By is the site
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: of the ruined temple of Vacuna, where Horace tells us
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: he wrote one of his poems, and the local rustics
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: still go to Varia Vicovaro on market days, as they
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: used to do when the graceful Roman Lyrists sauntered through
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: his vines and played at being a country gentleman. Monsieur Boissier, however,
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: is not content merely with identifying the poet's house. He
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: also warmly defends him from the charge that has been
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: brought against him of civility. In accepting it, he points
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: out that it was only after the invention of printing
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: that literature became a money making profession, and that as
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: there was no copyright law at Rome to prevent books
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: being pirated, patrons had to take the place that publishes
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: hold or should nowadays. The Roman patron in fact kept
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: the Roman poet alive, and we fancy that many of
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: our modern bards rather regret the old system. Better, surely
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: the humiliation of the sportula than the indignity of a
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: bill for printing. Better to accept a country house as
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: a gift than to be in debt to one's landlady.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: On the whole, the patron was an excellent institution, if
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: not for poetry, at least for the poets. And though
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: he had to be propitiated by panegyrics, still are we
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: not told by our most shining lights that the subject
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: is of no importance in a work of art. Monsieur
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: Boissier need not apologize for Horace. Every poet longs for
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: a mason us An essay on the Etruscan Tombs at
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: cornetto follows, and the remainder of the volume is taken
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: up by a most fascinating article called Lupe de la need.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: Monsieur Boisier claims for Virgil's description of scenery an absolute
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: fidelity of detail. The Poetrincien, he says on lu de
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: la pricision de la fideliti ignimagin guerre de Beisa, Genlas,
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: and with this view he visited every place in Italy
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: and Sicily that Virgil has mentioned. Sometimes it is true
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: modern civilization or modern barbarism, has completely altered the aspect
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: of the scene. The desolate shore of Drepanum, for instance,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: is now covered with thriving manufactories and stucco villas, and
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: the bird haunted forest through which the tiber flowed into
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: the sea has long ago disappeared. Still, on the whole,
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: the general character of the Italian landscape is unchanged, and
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: Monsieur Boissier's researches show very clearly how personal and how
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: vivid were Virgil's impressions of nature. The subject is, of
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: course an interesting one, and those who love to make
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: pilgrimages without stirring from hope cannot do better than spend
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: three shillings on the French academicians Promenade acchio logique nouvelle
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: Promenade acchiologique a res evelgill by Gueston Boissier Aschette, end
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: of section twenty a literary Pilgrim recording by Philippa Willitts