Merie Tales of Skelton

 

The stories here discussed may be read in a modernized form at https://www.exclassics.com/skelton/skel007.htm.  Numbers in parentheses refer to the stories according to that source.

 

     John Skelton was capable of scholarship, witnessed by his translation of Diodoris Siculus, as well as of the magnificent rhetoric of Magnificence and the serious social and religious engagement of “Why Came Ye nat to Courte?”, but he is doubtless best known to those who have not read his complete works as a merry humorist.  His poems in this vein range from the “coarse” satire of “The Tunnyng of Elynoare Rummynge” to the delicate wit of “Phyllyp Sparowe” and jeux d’esprit such as “Jolly Butterkin.”  Apart from his writings, though, a significant factor in his reception was the publication a generation after the poet’s death of Merie Tales of Skelton (1566).  This collection of anecdotes is in part similar to other joke books such as the Hundred Mery Talys (1526) and Mery Tales and Quicke Answeres (1530), but it bears a resemblance as well to the celebrity stories that remain popular on television and in magazines today.  Skelton was close to the Tudor court and a sufficiently well-known figure that his supposed characteristics could form the basis for popularly circulating stories, either based in reality like anecdotes of Wilde’s wit or simply the basis for gags like Jack Benny’s tightfistedness.  Though the stories are largely if not entirely fabricated of whole cloth, they do reveal the era’s taste in humor as well as indicating Skelton’s reputation a generation after his death. 

    Most of the stories depict Skelton as a clever trickster, a sort of epigone of a character familiar from myth and folklore.  He calls “fire!” in an inn simply in order to get a drink at night (1), convinces a fellow traveler to pay his way to London by pretending to cure him of disease (2), displaces a friar from his bed after shitting on him and making him think he had soiled himself (9), and harasses a cobbler (12) and a miller (13) for his own entertainment.  Two are standard gags on the theme of gender: the macaronic epitaph for Swanborn the hen-pecked “knave” who had been often beaten by his wife (5) and the cowardly cobbler who suggests his wife would be a likelier warrior (12).  Another is a simple “man-bites dog” reversal with an ostler who bites the horse that had bitten him (11).

     The casual cruelty of comedy in which everything is played for laughs, exemplified by people swatting and kicking each other in Chaplin’s silent films and Wile E. Coyote suffering multiple defeats, any of which would have been lethal in a more realistic desert, is evident in all his deceptions, most transgressively perhaps when he shits on the friar’s sleeping body.  More likely to disturb a modern reader, though, is his putting the miller who cheated him through a series of challenges and, toward the end, still thinking ”it better that such a false knave should lose his head than to live” (13).  

     Other episodes rely on what must have been elements of Skelton’s public personality.  Some imply a bossy arrogance (8, 12, 13).  Skelton is represented as jealously defending the territory of his own parish (8), and having little patience with religious questioners (3).  His conflicts with ecclesiastical authorities are foregrounded repeatedly (6, 7, 10, 14).  Several stories (1, 15) indicate his fondness for drink, though a third suggests the opposite (4). 

    Of the fifteen sketches in the Mery Tales two have value beyond being examples of Renaissance humor and clues to Skelton’s image, if not his true personality.  One draws attention by its length alone.  Skelton’s miller who gives short weight (13) is part of a long tradition, including Chaucer’s pilgrim miller of whom his antagonist the reeve says: 

 

A theef he was for sothe of corn and mele,

And that a sly, and usaunt for to stele.

                                (“Reeve’s Tale,” 3939-3940)

 

The miller’s habitual sharp practices are assumed in Merie Tales and the plot concerns his gaining forgiveness from Skelton by his craftiness which allows him to accomplish a series of apparently impossible tasks.  The development of the tale is leisurely enough to more closely resemble a folktale than a joke.  In the course of detailing the miller’s four labors the narrator manages to indulge in scatology as well as ridiculing a priest before concluding with a grisly artifice involving the head of an executed criminal.  All three somewhat shocking elements sustain the narrative development and all may be forgotten when, in the end, Skelton does pardon the fellow. 

     Surely for most readers the most charming story is that of Skelton’s presenting his child to his congregation in church (7, appended).  Priestly celibacy, of course, had not been a dogma in the early church and was not required until the eleventh century.  Differences on the issue were one factor is the Great Schism.  After celibacy was asked of priests, enforcement remained very uneven.  Some priests, even after being reprimanded for keeping lovers and children, went then for years without changing their ways or losing their responsibility for the souls under their care.

     The story might possibly be a version of a real event, but, whether it is or not, it is told with such an appealing innocence and such natural wholesome confidence that it is memorable regardless of historicity.  Rather than reacting defensively, Skelton’s response is proud, accusing those who had complained of him to the bishop of jealousy and boasting of the beauty of both his wife and child and showing off the little one naked before the people, declaring “"How say you, neighbours all? is not this child as fair as is the best of all yours? It hath nose, eyes, hands, and feet, as well as any of your: it is not like a pig, nor a calf, nor like no fowl nor no monstrous beast.”

     He meets their secret denunciation of him not with a defense but by accusing his detractors of arrogance and predicting that those who exalt themselves shall be humbled.  He concludes with a witty turn by telling how he had to cure the presumption of his student hood which he tamed by making of it breeches (to wear upon his rear).  Only after he had taught the garment a lesson by this treatment, could he resume wearing it on his head.  After this whimsy the passage appropriately concludes “It is merry in the hall, when beards wag all.”  The reader would very much like to believe in the veracity of this account.

     The Merie Tales then illustrate several common varieties of comic story, one of which derives humor from a reversal, such as the trickster getting the better of an adversary, a woman beating her husband, or a man biting an animal.  Other stories are generated with the psychic energy invested in taboo topics, such as sexuality, excretion, and drinking.  As the book appeared only a generation after Skelton’s death, some stories may have arisen from incidents or traits associated with him during his life, among which one may number his susceptibility to the pleasures of the bottle and the flesh, his dislike of the church hierarchy and the mendicant orders, and his possessiveness about his own parish.  Living at the same age as the great Continentally-influenced sonneteers Wyatt, Surrey, and Sidney, Skelton composed idiosyncratic, more wholly English verse in forms sometimes of his own invention while also acquiring enough celebrity status to attract legends after his passing.  His own poetry remains well worth reading, but readers who scan the amusing anecdotes of the Merie Tales will enjoy as well a curious sidelong glance illuminating both the poet and his age.

 

 

 

How Skelton, when he came from the bishop, made a sermon. [Tale vii.]

Skelton the next Sunday after went into the pulpit to preach, and said, "Vos estis, vos estis, that is to say, You be, you be. And what be you?" said Skelton: "I say, that you be a sort of knaves, yea, and a man might say worse than knaves; and why, I shall show you. You have complained of me to the bishop that I do keep a fair wench in my house: I do tell you, if you had any fair wives, it were some what to help me at need; I am a man as you be: you have foul wives, and I have a fair wench, of the which I have begotten a fair boy, as I do think, and as you all shall see. Thou wife," said Skelton, "that hast my child, be not afraid; bring me hither my child to me:" the which was done. And he, showing his child naked to all the parish, said, "How say you, neighbours all? is not this child as fair as is the best of all yours? It hath nose, eyes, hands, and feet, as well as any of your: it is not like a pig, nor a calf, nor like no fowl nor no monstrous beast. If I had," said Skelton, "brought forth this child without arms or legs, or that it were deformed, being a monstrouus thing, I would never have blamed you to have complained to the bishop of me; but to complain without a cause, I say, as I said before in my antetheme, vos estis, you be, and have be, and will and shall be knaves, to complain of me without a cause reasonable. For you be presumptuous, and do exalt yourselves, and therefore you shall be made low: as I shall show you a familiar example of a parish priest, the which did make a sermon in Rome. And he did take that for his antetheme, the which of late days is named a theme, and said, Qui se exaltat humiliabitur, et qui see humiliat exaltabitur, that is to say, he that doth exalt himself or doth extol himself shall be made meek, and he that doth humble himself or is meek, shall be exalted, extolled, or elevated, or sublimated, or such like; and that I will show you by this my cap. This cap was first my hood, when that I was student in Jucalico, and then it was so proud that it would not be contented, but it would slip and fall from my shoulders. I perceiving this that he was proud, what then did I? shortly to conclude, I did make of him a pair of breeches to my hose, to bring him low. And when that I did see, know, or perceive that he was in that case, and allmost worn clean out, what did I then to extol him up again? you all may see that this my cap was made of it that was my breeches. Therefore, said Skelton, vos estis, therefore you be, as I did say before: if that you exalt yourself, and cannot be contented that I have my wench still, some of you shall wear horns; and therefore vos estis: and so farewell." It is merry in the hall, when beards wag all.

Hermes and the Art of Poetry

Having quoted Greek on these pages in characters that do not transfer to the blog and in distracting transliterations, I have decided this time to simply quote from the close if old-fashioned Loeb’s Library version by Hugh G. Evelyn-White. My references to line numbers are, of course, to the Greek. I would have preferred to use my own translation, but my version of the poem is as yet incomplete.




     Along with Homer and Hesiod, the so-called Homeric Hymns provide the earliest information about the literary theory of ancient Greece. These poems exemplify the role of poetry in providing access to the astonishingly efficient mythic system by which the Greeks understood the world. The Hymn to Hermes is the primary source for an aetiological myth of the origin of lyric poetry, a sort of back-story to the shining Olympian, Apollo who is commonly associated with the art. With the attribution of the lyre to Hermes comes a more dialectic complex picture of artistic signification, portrayed prior to the unadulterated Apollonian light, as a necessary duality of lie and truth.
     Most will recall the charming "Hymn to Hermes" an infant trickster story, something like Krishna the butter thief. The baby’s cheeky mendacity and his comically ingenious stratagems are undeniably entertaining, but in the hymn’s plot-line, they serve in the end simply to bring Hermes together with Apollo to allow the gift of the tortoise-shell lyre. Hermes had invented the instrument that very morning, but he gives it up to resolve strife he has himself created, a peace offering to the god who is to govern poetry for the next thousand years and more. [1]
     Hermes’ very first act is to seize the tortoise in his courtyard. With a lie, using his characteristic wile, he tells the animal it is dangerous outside (37), and a moment later, he kills it and fashions the lyre. His emphasis is wholly upon pleasure, for him it is a “comrade of the feast” (31), inspirer of joy (32). In a rush of invention, he conceives the instrument “as a swift thought darts through the heart of man when thronging cares haunt him, or as bright glances flash from the eye.” (43-45) He sang on it “sweet random snatches, even as youths bandy taunts at festivals,” (55-56) sliding into a celebration of his own birth and of the muses. The creative process is described as a delight in itself, the exercise of the forebrain damping pain and providing pleasure in itself, as well as enabling future art. After this mental work in done, the god’s attention turns to his belly. Motivated by a desire for meat (unsatisfied apparently with the prospect of nectar and ambrosia), his mind turns then to his larcenous plot, a design of “sheer trickery” such as “knavish folk pursue.” (66-67).
     Poetry appears then at first as a pure party pastime, whether it is casual improvisation or theogonies. It seems in this way on a par with other desires, such as a wish for a satisfying meal. Yet its unique characteristic is the unpredictable glancing energy of creative human thought which, through its potent symbolic manipulation, can design a new and useful object or compose a song.
     When Apollo first hears the lyre, his reaction is upwelling laughter. (420) Hermes sings again the story of the gods, first among them Mnemosyne “for the son of Maia was among her following,” (430) inspiring in Apollo a “longing” (eros) ”not to be allayed.” (434) He finds it in particular a “path” to remedy “desperate (or “irremediable”) “cares” (or “suffering”). (447) In his speech (436-463) Apollo praises the invention as a “marvel,” “noble,” “heavenly,” “wonderful, “sweet,” and “glorious,” while calling Hermes a “trickster” and “thievish.” He concludes by promising not to “deceive” Hermes, the habitual deceiver who does not shrink from bald-faced lies even before all-knowing Zeus.
     Instructing Apollo, Hermes advises him to give himself to “merriment” (or “triumphal display”[2]) The emphasis remains solidly on convivial dinners, “rich feast and lovely dance and glorious revel.” (480-481) According to Hermes, the lyre rewards the listener who is susceptible to “delight” (484) while bringing “the ignorant” only “vanity and foolishness.” (488) He proceeds to consider his theft repaid, though he asks to be caretaker for the herd, prophesying abundant offspring and assuming co-ownership. Apollo is so taken with the music he accepts with pleasure. (493-494)
     Through the hymn poetry, the lyric art, is consistently identified with pleasure, whether on the occasion of casual party verses or solemn hymns to the divine. Both offer necessary relief: the symbolic manipulations of art are essential to both passing the time with friends and reflecting on first principles and final things. The disquiet that awakes in the reader when the tortoise is tricked into death, by nature, one might say, at the outset can be salved only by verbal art. Redemptive song compensates for the distressing void of mortality, providing both “entertainment” and supernatural explanations in a pre-Horatian version of “teach and delight.”
     Little, however, in the character of Apollo matches the subversive, all-too-human character of Hermes. He is a con man because of his own selfish interests. He cancels out his own assertions by declaring his undependability. In this poem Hermes provides Apollo with a gift beyond the lyre: dissimulation.
     After the settlement between the Olympians, all seems harmonious, but Apollo’s nervousness about being again tricked leads him to elicit from Hermes a solemn vow not to steal from him. With this renewed settlement comes the acid test of the value of poetry: prophecy. Apollo says that only he can be confidant of Zeus with reference to the future, yet he prevaricates about the value of omens, claiming sometimes to tell the truth through signs and sometimes to deceive. This ambiguity is very broadly true, as he says also that he bedevils men as well as blessing them. He illustrates this very contradictory revelation – the truth that is untrue – by telling Hermes of the mysterious bee-like Thriae whose oracular reputation for speaking the truth (561) is tempered by the fact that they also lie (563). (We might all make the same claim for our prophecies.) Another analogue concludes the poem when Hermes is said to “profit” some and “cozen” others. (577-578)
     One would then have to qualify the marvelous image Nietzsche imagined, doubtless aware that he had heightened the contrast: “In an eccentric way one might say of Apollo what Schopenhauer says, in the first part of The World as Will and Representation [I:1, 3], of man caught in the veil of Maya: ‘Even as on an immense, raging sea, assailed by huge wave crests, a man sits in a little rowboat trusting his frail craft, so, amidst the furious torments of this world, the individual sits tranquilly, supported by the principium individuationis [principle of individuation] and relying on it.’ [The World as Will and Representation, I:4, 63] One might say that the unshakable confidence in that principium has received its most magnificent expression in Apollo, and that Apollo himself may be regarded as the marvelous divine image of the principium individuationis, whose looks and gestures radiate the full delight, wisdom, and beauty of ‘illusion.’” [3]
     The author of the "Hymn to Hermes" would have agreed with Nietzsche when he said, “Much will have been gained for aesthetics once we have succeeded in apprehending directly-rather than merely ascertaining-that art owes its continuous evolution to the Apollinian-Dionysian [sic] duality, even as the propagation of the species depends on the duality of the sexes, their constant conflicts and periodic acts of reconciliation.” He surely had in mind just such a conflict and reconciliation as that narrated in the  'Hymn to Hermes. '


1. Since writing this piece I have been told of an admirable treatment along similar lines in Lewis Hyde’s Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth, and Art.

2. Aglaia is also one of the Graces according to Hesiod.

3. Both quotations are from The Birth of Tragedy in Francis Golfing’s translation.