As the taught section of my MA course is quickly coming to an end and I will soon face into a summer of thesis research and coffee binges, it is amazing to look back and see just how far I have come since I began this program in September. This blog has served as an outlet for my thoughts and through reading it again retrospectively, I can finally see the benefits of this exercise I was originally reluctant to undertake. Even though many of my original interests and aims remain the same as when I began blogging, they have grown and become far more nuanced, culminating in my mini-conference and future thesis topic of exploring the interplay between the oral and textual qualities of Old English poetry.
In the “About” section of my blog, I detailed my initial aims and interests for this blog and the course in general. Anyone who has been following my posts can see how I have digressed in certain ways from my original plan, but my general areas of interest remain the same.
“I aim to explore performativity in early English and Scandinavian literature and in turn what it teaches us about political and cultural contexts, gender roles, music and the boundaries performance creates and enforces within a culture. I am also keenly interested in adaptations of these originally performed texts by both the manuscript culture that consumed them and modern reinterpretations of these earlier styles, particularly in the area of music. Unfortunately I lack the focus to stick to these specific areas so do not be surprised to find unrelated articles posted that do nothing more than plot my slow decline into madness” (“About”).
In the ten days it took me to write my opening post entitled “Welcome”, these ideas had already become more refined within my own head as I began to get interested in the performance of early English and Old Norse poetry rather than viewing them purely as physical items of cultural significance.
“I aim to explore performativity and its effects on early English and Norse texts which are often negated by modern formalist study and philology. This blog in itself will serve as an experiment in performativity as I attempt to perform the role of someone competent in the field of digital humanities” (“Welcome”).
My interest in the performance of Old Norse and in performance as a signifier of early political and social contexts has been swept to one side as my understanding of orality and textuality has developed over the length of my studies.
My first research based post entitled “Cædmon’s Hymn: An Origin of False Readings” proved to be the genesis of my MA research and played a large part in shaping the work that would follow it. This idea came to me following my first EN6053 Old English Literature lecture where we discussed “Cædmon’s Hymn” as the oldest surviving poem in English. My interests and experiences as a musician and music graduate refused to read this work as just a poem, resulting in this rant against the common misconceptions made about the poem. This interest in the musicality of literature and music as a cultural symbol would emerge again in “Modern Vikings: An Introduction to the Viking Metal Scene” and “Hell Awaits”.
“The clue [to this poem’s musical qualities] is in the title but this seems to be missed so frequently that its name is called into question through how the text is generally approached. Bede makes reference to the texts musicality, referring to it as a “song” and a “melodious verse” (Bede 418) in his accompanying prose passage but yet the need to de-construct this work to fit critical poetic parameters persists. This ignores the nuance that defines “Cædmon’s Hymn” in its title as it is an oral piece designed to be sung. To ignore this text’s musical and performative qualities is to ignore its true effect on an audience and the reality of its oral origins. This limits our understanding of how the text works” (“Cædmon’s Hymn: An Origin of False Readings”).
Within this post, I attempted to exploit the interactive medium that is the internet in a way that I couldn’t before through paper. I created a heavy metal version of “Cædmon’s Hymn” to show the impact the manner a poem is performed in can have on ones comprehension of it. My biggest criticism of my blog from this point onward was that I failed to exploit this more. I have used hyperlinks and illustrations extensively throughout my posts while also entering the world of Twitter for the first time but nothing as fresh (for an English student) as using my blog to facilitate audio clips. I hoped to upload performances of different texts in different styles throughout the year to explore ways in which to recreate and reinterpret Old English works. Alas, time constraints and the demands of this program halted this. The research I have completed through this blog has helped me to create a few performance concepts which I aim to share with you once I finish my MA dissertation so watch this space!
“I have included an extreme example with this post in order to prove the power of music to suggest mood and influence ones interpretation of its subject. In the below example the combination of heavy metal with the poem’s religious content changes its feel from what the text alone suggests. I am not suggesting that “Cædmon’s Hymn” included blast beats and a guitar solo. Instead I argue that the musicality of the piece has the potential to wildly alter the reception of the work and that because of this, musicality and performativity within “Cædmon’s Hymn” deserve more attention from the academic community”.
(“Cædmon’s Hymn: An Origin of False Readings”).
This exploitation of a new interactive media was used again during MA English Wikipedia Edit-a-thon detailed in “#WikiEditLit: MA English Wikipedia Edit-a-thon 03/02/2016” and during Textualities 2016 where we got #Textualities16 trending on Twitter.
Throughout my blog, I explored performance in a different sense through providing multiple seminar reviews and reflections based around UCC’s School of English Seminar Series and others. These seminar reviews progressed from just summaries of the topics covered with little personal interpretation or application of the ideas presented into reviews that focused these presentations onto my own research.
The research Seminar Review of Dr. Tom Birkett’s “From Viking Ships to Reading Lists: Connecting Cultures with the World Tree Project” was the first seminar review I posted. As you can sense from its title alone, I was having some difficulties with how I would approach a seminar review and what tone to use within it. Because of this I decided to stick close to the original presentation, focusing on recreating the paper and its performance within 800 words.
“Tom used this example [of the Sea Stallion’s journey] to show both the validity and the potential pitfalls of a project like this as it showed how contributors can interpret material differently through national or personal biases which may affect the project’s content. Tom was keen to express that all reactions, no matter how uncomfortable they may be, are still valid and in need of compiling and studying as they are real ways in which Norse culture manifests itself in society. It is how these reactions are handled and portrayed that is key to the projects integrity. Academic integrity seemed to be a major underlying theme of the entire presentation and something Tom was eager to display” (“Research Seminar Review of ‘From Viking Ships to Reading Lists: Connecting Cultures with the World Tree Project‘”).
My review of Paul Hegarty’s seminar presentation in “Hell Awaits: A Review of ‘In the Malebolge, the Sowers of Discord: Music and Metal Theory in the Inferno’ by Prof. Paul Hegarty 16/02/16” resembled my review of Tom Birkett’s seminar paper but focused more on how the paper was communicated and received, along with the techniques employed within the presentation. This was because at this stage of my research I had decided to pursue exploring some element of the sonic within the texts of early English literature. Therefore, I was naturally looking at this presentation in regards to how I could understand and potentially communicate sound and performance within my studies. Paul’s paper became more personal through how I reviewed it as it gave me “a fresh approach to the idea of sound within text” (“Hell Awaits”).
“What I enjoyed most about this presentation was the sonic and visual experience it provided. As Paul was discussing the use of sound, he created a soundscape for his presentation which used extended metal works such as those by Burzum and 1349 to create an appropriate ambiance within the lecture theatre. The majority of these works did not include vocals, causing the audience to focus on the disunited, rebellious sound of the works and how they represented Hell in Dante’s Inferno. This was complemented with visuals designed to shock such heavy metal cover art, depictions of hell and pictures from World War II” (“Hell Awaits”).
My final School of English Seminar Series review of Andrew Power’s “Boy Actors in Shakespeare’s Early Plays” departed from the basic review through summery style found in my first two review attempts. Here I interpreted the paper in my own way through applying it to my own research, reviewing it in my own way. This approach made the blog post serve more as a review of my own thoughts and studies in light of the seminar presentation than as a review of the presentation itself.
“Andrew’s research focused very much on the textual nature of the plays as he had numerous charts detailing his laborious work in counting the amount of lines spoken by boy roles across all of Shakespeare’s works. He used this information to analyse their roles in relation to other roles played by veteran actors. As I am firmly in thesis research mode, I could not resist relating this to my current research. Andrew’s focus on these plays as set texts ignored the freedom in performance that drama and oral performance in general offers over textual works. Viewing Shakespeare’s texts as authoritative and final is not true as they were developed and altered to suit each performance, performer, venue and audience. Andrew’s study is based on the realities of the text as a blueprint for performance but ignores this basic reality of early modern theatre. Interpreting performative freedom is almost entirely speculative however, maintaining the necessity to understand the main prompt text in order to understand Shakespeare’s vision for each of these plays” (“Boy Actors in Shakespeare’s Early Plays: A Review and Reflection”).
This highlights just how much my thesis ideas have developed over the course of writing this blog. For better or worse, I seem to be currently unable to escape my thesis area regarding oral performance and textuality in Old English poetry.
“I have been focusing my research on an earlier pre-literate period. However it is true that Old English or Norse was never really pre-literate as runic inscriptions existed long before Latinate textual culture. As information on early English performance is sketchy at best while renaissance performance practices are well recorded and studied, the potential progression of this from Old English poetry through medieval English literature to renaissance theatre would make an interesting addition to my thesis or even a future project (potentially a PhD)” (“Boy Actors in Shakespeare’s Early Plays: A Review and Reflection”).
These seminar reviews represent how this blog found its purpose. It transitioned from being a monthly assignment to becoming a personal outlet for my own ideas as I discovered them through studying the ideas of others.
“Textualities 2016 (04/03/16): A Reflection” offered a review of our MA English mini-conference in which I presented my paper entitled “The Interplay Between Oral Performance and Textuality in Old English Poetry”. Even with my doubts and nerves regarding presenting in front of my peers, the day proved to be an enjoyable one where I received support and praise for my research, increasing my confidence in my work. It also raised new questions in my research which I was able to explore briefly within this blog post.
“The discussion after my presentation revolving around how one would perform Cynewulf’s runic inscriptions has been on my mind since the event. Musical cues to represent these symbols were discussed but since then I have been considering the use of the performance’s environment to evoke these symbols on a sensory level. The use of a fire or smells (the burning of incense) could be used to present these symbols to an audience. This mini-conference has left me with a lot to think about in my own research” (“Textualities 2016”).
The seminars which I reviewed before the mini-conference served as a way to prepare myself for Textualities 2016. They allowed me to learn from the successes and failures of these presentations as there have not been many opportunities for me to present my own work over the length of the program. Witnessing and blogging about the calm, ironic tone of Professor Paul Hegarty’s presentation while learning from the technical difficulties experienced by Dr. Tom Birkett have all helped shape my mini-conference presentation.
Following the mini-conference, I was able to see my own development through reviewing and reflecting on Andrew Power’s School of English Seminar Series paper in “Boy Actors in Shakespeare’s Early Plays: A Review and Reflection”. I made similar mistakes while presenting my mini-conference paper when it was in its infancy so seeing these mistakes charted my progression and allowed me to learn from myself as well as Andrew Power as to how one should and should not present. I was able to look upon his presentation empathetically.
“The presentation itself had its shortcomings. Andrew read the entire presentation from a tablet with little engagement with the audience and one hand firmly in his pocket for the duration of the seminar. The presentation slides were dull and his charts were clustered and difficult to read from the back of the room. He was clearly showcasing his current research as a work in progress and in this way, it reminded me a lot of the early presentations I gave in the run up to Textualities 2016. I can relate to his position and need to further develop his presentation style as I faced a similar predicament a few weeks earlier. His content however was interesting and intellectually stimulating so I look forward to seeing how his ideas and presentation style grows” (“Boy Actors in Shakespeare’s Early Plays: A Review and Reflection”).
From the beginning, I decided to use this blog as a way of gathering my wild and wide reaching thoughts into one area and through posting them, allow me to create a catalogue of interests that would shape my MA thesis and/or even future PhD research.
“This blog is an attempt to gather my disjointed thoughts into something vaguely cohesive in the hope of filling in some of the gaps in both our knowledge of Old English and Scandinavian culture and in the academic discourse that surrounds its study… This blog will track my journey throughout my postgraduate career as I explore early literature, music and my own abilities” (“About”).
Even though my interests, goals, means and objectives varied somewhat over the length of my course, this blog proved to be a useful outlet to develop my thoughts and realise what it is I really wanted to say within my discourse. More than anything, it has given me a space which facilitates my continuing growth as an academic. In my welcome address, I said I would use this blog to “allow me to build upon my ideas and hopefully discover new avenues of research” (“Welcome”). This is exactly what I did, so in this regard I would rate this blog and the course that surrounds it a success.
Works Cited
Bede. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Eds. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969. Print.
Illustrations
- Mehic, Benjamin. Finish Line Ahead. Utica.edu. Utica College. JPEG. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.
- O’Donnell, Daniel Paul. Cædmon’s Hymn: Tanner 10. University of Lethbridge. People.uleth.ca. JPEG. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.
- Burge, Kelly. The Back Wall, The Booth, The Ceiling. Pinterest.com. JPEG. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.
- Textualities 2016 Conference. 2016. Textualities16.wordpress.com. WordPress. JPEG. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.
- Dineen, Ellen. Squad on Point. 2016. University College Cork, Cork City. Twitter. JPEG. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.
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