Can vei la lauzeta mover

Can vei la lauzeta mover (PC 70.43)[1] is a song written in the Occitan language by Bernart de Ventadorn, a 12th-century troubadour. It is among both the oldest[2] and best known[3] of the troubadour songs. Both the lyrics and the melody of the song survive, in variants from three different manuscripts.[2]

It is one of the first poems "to dramatise the effect of someone actually speaking in the present", in part by its formulation as a first-person narrative. Its lyrics are arranged in seven stanzas of eight lines, ending in a four-line coda. The first two verses speak of a lark (the "lauzeta" of the title) flying with joy into the sun, forgetting itself, and falling, with the speaker wishing he could be so joyful, but unable because of his unrequited love for a woman.[3] In subsequent verses, the subject compares himself to Narcissus and Tristan, and promises to go into exile if the woman he loves does not return his love.[4]

This song is one of three Occitan verses interpolated into the 13th century French-language romance Guillaume de Dole, and one of two similar interpolations in Gerbert de Montreuil's Le roman de la violette.[5] Some scholars have suggested that this song inspired a tercet in Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, Paradiso XX:73–75, which also describes the flight of a lark;[6][7] however, others have suggested that Dante might have come by this image indirectly through Bondie Dietaiuti,[8] or that this sight would have been common enough that no connection between the two poems can be ascribed.[7] Ezra Pound included a translation of parts of this song in Canto 6 of The Cantos, and returned to the same image in Canto 117.[9]

The song continues to be performed, and recordings are available on many albums.[10]

References
  1. This notation refers to the Bibliographie des Troubadours by Alfred Pillet and Henry Carstens (Halle: Niemeyer, 1933). The 70 refers to Ventadorn, and the 43 is the song number among Ventadorn's works.
  2. Roden, Timothy J.; Wright, Craig; Simms, Bryan R. (2009), "16. Bernart de Ventadorn, Can vei la lauzeta (c.1165)", Anthology for Music in Western Civilization, Volume I, Cengage Learning, p. 29, ISBN 9780495572749.
  3. Easthope, Antony (1989), "Bernart de Ventadorn: 'Can vei la lauzeta mover' (c. 1170)", Poetry and Phantasy, Cambridge University Press, pp. 75–81, ISBN 9780521355988.
  4. Murray, David (2016), "The clerical reception of Bernart de Ventadorn's 'Can vei la lauzeta mover' (PC 70, 34)", Medium Ævum, 85 (1): 259–267, doi:10.2307/26396373, JSTOR 26396373
  5. Paden, William D. (January 1993), "Old Occitan as a lyric language: The insertions from Occitan in three thirteenth-century French romances", Speculum, 68 (1): 36–53, doi:10.2307/2863833
  6. Holbrook, Richard Thayer (1902), "Chapter XLI: The Lark", Dante and the Animal Kingdom, Columbia University Press, pp. 266–269
  7. Alighieri, Dante (1984), Musa, Mark (ed.), Dante's Paradise, Indiana University Press, p. 244, ISBN 9780253316196.
  8. Durling, Robert M. (2010), The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, Volume 3: Paradiso, Oxford University Press, pp. 413–414, ISBN 9780199723355.
  9. Wilhelm, J. J. (2010), Ezra Pound: The Tragic Years, 1925-1972, Penn State Press, p. 50, ISBN 9780271042985.
  10. Bernart de Ventadorn, Quan (Can) vei la lauzeta mover, motet on allmusic.com, 40 versions listed, retrieved 2017-03-22. See also additional variant spellings at allmusic.com.

Further reading
  • Adams, Tracy (October 2000), "The ambiguous Narcissus figure of le lai de Narcisus and 'Can vei la lauzeta mover'", French Studies, LIV (4): 427–438, doi:10.1093/fs/liv.4.427.
  • Carlson, David (1983), "Losing control in Bernart de Ventadorn's 'Can vei la lauzeta mover'", Romance Notes, 23 (3): 270–276, JSTOR 43801915.
  • Gaunt, Simon (1998), "Discourse desired: desire, subjectivity and mouvance in Can vei la lauzeta mover", in Paxson, James; Gravlee, Cynthia (eds.), Desiring Discourse: the Literature of Love, Ovid through Chaucer, Selinsgrove: Sequehanna University Press, pp. 89–110.
  • Grange, Huw (2011), "A musico-literary commentary on Bernart de Ventadorn's 'Qan vei la laudeta mover'", Glossator: Practice and Theory of the Commentary, 4: 81–99
  • Hill, Thomas D. (1979), "The fool on the bridge: 'Can vei la lauzeta mover' stanza 5", Medium Ævum, 48 (2), doi:10.2307/43631371.
  • Kay, Sarah (1983), "Love in a mirror: An aspect of the imagery of Bernart de Ventadorn", Medium Ævum, 52 (2): 272–285, doi:10.2307/43628739.
  • Smith, Nathaniel B. (1975), "'Can vei la lauzeta mover': poet vs. lark", South Atlantic Bulletin, 40 (1): 15–22, doi:10.2307/3199081.
  • Smith, Nathaniel B. (June 1978), "The lark image in Bondie Dietaiuti and Dante", Forum Italicum, 12 (2): 233–242, doi:10.1177/001458587801200205.
  • Steel, Matthew C. (1982), "A case for the predominance of melody over text in troubadour lyric: Bernart de Ventadorn's 'Can vei la lauzeta mover'", Michigan Academician, 14: 259–271.
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