He reinforces, he doubles the French daintiness by Italian
finesse. Thereupon, nearly all the force and all the seriousness of
French work disappear; only the elegance, the aerial touch, the perfect
manner remain. But this elegance, this manner, this daintiness of
execution are consummate, and have an unmistakable aesthetic value.
So the old French chanson, which, like the old Northern Gothic ornament,
though it sometimes refined itself into a sort of weird elegance, was
often, in its essence, something rude and formless, became in the hands
of Ronsard a Pindaric ode. He gave it structure, a sustained system,
strophe and antistrophe, and taught it a changefulness and variety of
metre which keep the curiosity always excited, so that the very aspect
of it, as it lies written on the page, carries the eye lightly onwards,
and of which this is a good instance:--
Avril, la grace, et le ris
De Cypris,
Le flair et la douce haleine;
Avril, le parfum des dieux,
Qui, des cieux,
Sentent l'odeur de la plaine;
C'est toy, courteis et gentil,
Qui, d'exil
Retire ces passageres,
Ces arondelles qui vont,
Et qui sont
Du printemps les messageres.
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