The Press Saturday, October 12, 1929. New Light on Piers Plowman.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19748, 12 October 1929, Page 16

The Press Saturday, October 12, 1929. New Light on Piers Plowman.

The rejoicings and congratulations on the new discoveries concerning the authorship of Pi*rs Plowman will be none tii« leas genuine and deep because they are necessarily confined to the comparatively few—mostly professed student* of oar older literature —who have learned to love and admire this

ooee famous work. During the Fourteenth Century it waa read by eveTj--body who eon Id read at all and rivalled ta popularity even the more polished and urbane works of Chaucer himself. It also found a host of imitators, some of whom were still deriving inspiration from it nearly two hundred years after its author first began to work upon it. But the archaic language, and still more the old-fashioned traditional metre, which waa doomed to die, made the old book very difficult reading", even for the Sixteenth Century, and it gradually fell into an oblivion which wa* a* complete as it was undeserved. * The alliterative mode of rersitkation, as we now eaJl it —** rime by " letter " is the old term —was the only mode known to the Teutonic nations. All the Anglo-Saxon poetry wu composed in it, but the new system of "end-rime," discovered and developed by the Romance peoples, was destined to displace it altogether in England and elsewhere. Tet, centuries after it seemed t% have perished, a gallant attempt waa made in the Fourteenth Century to reriYe it, and it is clear that it had never been forgotten by the folk. Throughout that eenrury it waa cultivated, and some very fine poetry was poured into this mould, but even the extraordinary vogue of Pier* Pl&wmom eoold not save it from ultimate extinction. Pmts Plowman is a long, rambling allegorical satire* written by a man of the people, fierce in parts, witty in parts, interesting throughoat. The author is an earnest and fearless critic of all classes, and relying upon the Bible as his sole guide and authority, he defines the duty of every class of man in the wvrM as he knows it, from the King himself to the meanest peasant. What be knows best is the life of the agneuttural labourer; the "glories" of war leave him cold; there is no mention of Creey or Poietiers in bis book. His work comes down to us in three distinct forms, representing three suceesmve revisions, or edition*, finished m about 1362, 1377, and 1399 respectively. Until about twenty years ago the authorship of one William Langland or Loogland wa* accepted universally on the authority of certain Sixteenth Century biographical notes. Research daring the Nineteenth Century tended to confirm what was already, known. and a fairly clear, if brief, account of the writer's life waa compiled and generally accepted. A good deal had to be inferred from internal evidence.

the writer revealing himself here and tben very clearly, but the allegorical character of hia work and the nature

of hia subject-matter, which was distinctly risky, combined to make tome of these inferences rather dubious. Bat every student of Piers Plowman, it is safe to say, did get from it a very real idea of a certain personality, and many found this personality very attractive and learned to lore? both the book and the man. Into this eosy corner Professor Manly, about twenty years ago, dropped a bomb, maintaining that the three texts are not the work of any one man but of several men. His arguments were very ingenious ajid baaed open a kmg and most minute study of all the texts, so that they shook the belief of many and roused a storm of eontroTwsy which has raged ever since. Old lovers of the poem were naturally shocked and distressed by the suggestion that they had all along been deceived, and that the personality of the author, which seemed to them so dear, was in fact that of a sort of syndicate of authors. Very welcome to these students is the tew book, A'ew Light <m Piert Plowman, by Allan H. Bright, issued by the Oxford University Press, with a preface by Professor B. W. Cham, bera, an acknowledged authority, who is quite convinced that Mr discoveries have restored to oar old friend his foil identity and re-estab-lished hia once more as the undoubted author of all the three texts of Piert Plowman. By far the most important of these discoveries concerns the setting of the poem and the name-place of its author. The scene is on the Mahrem Hills; the poet falls asleep by a brook and dreams, and the dream is his poem, lie sees a tower on a mil, a deep dale beneath, and a fair ield between, full of people. The spot has now been identified; not only does it correspond in the minutest detail with the scene of the Vision, but there is a farm a mile away which is called Longlands, and an old tradition preserves the connexion between this place and the famous old book. Mr Brigfat's researches do not end there. He has traced the family history of the Rokaylea, from whom the poet was •aid to be descended, and in the light of this and similar discoveries has been i abia fa traw the whose story «f hia

life in greater detail than has been possible hitherto. Obscure autobiographical references become clear to u*; his life-»tory becomes a connected wh<4e. ITi.- illegitimate origin; hi--birth at Ledbury, rather than at Cieobury Mortimer; his work on the land; his wandering in the Malvern Hills;

the refusal c>: his clerical relations to allow him t/> bear bi= fathers name; his departure for London: his entering into minor orders; hi- return lor a time to his native place; his final return to London; hi* irregular life; his marrtage; a long illness; the nature of hi* work; his residence in Cornhill; his continuation of his poem during his middle and late life; and even his personal appearance. Much of this had long ago been conjectured from the internal evidence of the work, but we hare now a far better ground of ascertained fact to build upon. It is not likely, of course, that all controversy on this subject will now cease. Men love orguing, and Professor Manly and his supporter?, especially among German scholars, will no doubt stick to th«i" guns. But an exceedingly strontr ease has been made oat; all lovers of Pier? Plowman will hope that it may prove incontrovertible and that the pious, brave, and honest William may enjoy for ever that great and fairly-won fame of which, for a time, he has been so cnielly despoiled.