[Bards] Prose Tales
Jay Rudin
rudin at ev1.net
Tue May 1 13:11:53 PDT 2007
Aesop's fables are in prose, and he was known as a story-teller (but he's a
slave). In an Egyptian myth the princess claims that he told her the
stories.
The Decameron is a Renaissance Italian story of people telling prose stories
to each other. This is not equivalent to a bard performing in court, but it
is equivalent to a bardic circle.
Similarly, the Canterbury Tales tell the story of pilgrims telling each
other stories on the road. While Chaucer's description of the pilgrimage
and the tales they told is in verse, there is no implication that the
pilgrims were all versifiers. The idea that the Miller, or the Reeve, could
invent a tale in verse boggles the mind.
Robin of Gilwell / Jay Rudin
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