Today I read this second chapter from The Romance of the Rose. It was originally a poem written by Guillaume de Lorris. De Lorris had only managed to complete the 4000 lines though. It was then continued by Jean de Meun after de Lorris died, adding to it another 18000 lines.I read the prose version of the story. Too bad I only got the second chapter of it. I was pretty eager to read the whole thing after I read the second chapter.
The second chapter was entitled "The Spring of Narcissus". It was written in a kind of first-person-point-of-view. Although, maybe the guy in the story wasn’t actually the writer. From what I’ve read so far, the story in this chapter was actually divided into several sections.
The first section, the writer (or is it more proper if I said as the "I" guy) described that he was somehow entered the most beautiful garden ever. I liked this section. It described the garden and its surroundings pretty well. Trees, grasses, bushes, streams, the animals living there, etc. I don’t know. It just made you feel like you were imagining the most prefect place to calm yourself. Just like the "I" guy thought it was, I thought so too that it may be the most beautiful garden, ever. An Eden.
Secondly, the "I" guy found a place where Narcissus’ story took place. Well, I believe most people know who Narcissus was. I think he was the guy who felt in love deeply with his own reflection, his own self, self-admiration. Narcissus ended up dying, I believe. A pretty strange story. A little bit of mythological in my humble opinion.
Third part, the part that I liked the most, was about how the "I" guy found a rose-bud and fell in love with it. This section was quite long actually, but that was the point of it. How he intially approached the rose, admired it, sought to pluck it but was hurdled by thistles and thorns. And when he decided to stay away, he realized that Love had him in grasp. This part was rather mythological also since it involved Cupid and the stuff he did, you know…like releasing his arrow and stuff. But it was rather interesting because Love unleashed series of arrows into the "I" guy’s heart that made him fell in love with the rose: Beauty, Simplicity, Courtesy, Company, and Fair-Seeming. The "I" guy described every part very well that it even made me somehow as if I was also hit. That I was actually…the "I" guy. I don’t know, maybe it was just me.
Well, did the "I" guy survived? Did he managed to overcome his problem? Or he actually ended up dead just like Narcissus? I believe we shall find out more after reading it through. I, myself, wanted to read the whole thing after I did the second chapter. Who knows the whole story might even more interesting! The language was pretty understandable for a poem-to-prose translation unlike most I read in the past. The point is, that, this story was totally inspiring for me, definitely!
As you may know, the original version was actually an allegorical poem. So in this story, the writer (or the "I" guy in this case) wasn’t actually describing what’s in the story itself. Like the garden, the rose, and Cupid himself. The garden may actually be a surroundings, environment, where the "I" guy lived. Or maybe the world itself, with all its things inside. While the rose-bud simbolized a beautiful maiden to which the "I" guy fell in love with. In the end, Cupid or Love was actually the love feeling he had inside him that he couldn’t conquer or some sort. Good representations, and I would give two thumbs up for this writing, really.
