Bruce: a study of John Barbour's heroic ideal

Abstract

The purpose of this dissertation is to examine John Barbour's Bruce (c. 1375) as a literary work from the point of view of the author's heroic ideal. There has been singular confusion about the nature and form of the work and about Barbour's theme. Until recently, critics who have attempted to characterize and categorize the poem have concluded that although it shares some of the qualities and conventions of romance, epic, biography and verse-chronicle, it is a mixture of forms and is unusual because of Barbour's realistic treatment and patriotic emphasis. Various assumptions about medieval na tives have been brought to bear in these judgements and, on the whole, The Bruce has been found wanting or has been regarded as a modification of conventions especially with respect to chivalric codes of conduct and courtly ideals. Little attention has been paid to the poet's own statements, which are frequent and expository, about the nature of his work, his understanding of chivalry and heroism, and the relationship of the values he expressly admires to these concepts.

This study attempts to explore these ideast mainly through an examination of the language and vocabulary of the poem. The first chapter examines the nature of the work and Barbour's description of his narrative as a romance and as a "southfast story", and demonstrates that he conceived of his work as a romance about real historical personages and events and that he chose the romance form because he regarded it as the vehicle for the celebration of great deeds of prowess tempered by prudence and mesure.

The second chapter examines the theological-philosophical framework of The Bruce, which the prevalence of a number of significant abstracts indicates. It is here that one can trace the foundations of the poet's heroic ideal, in particular, his insistence on the need for prudence and the use of reason in all human undertakings.

The third and fourth chapters are devoted to his portraits of Douglas and, Bruce respectively as heroes, especially to his presentation of them as ideal figures--Douglas as an ideal knight and vassal and Bruce as an ideal king and general--effected, on the whole, through the epithets employed to characterize them.

The last chapter demonstrates how Barbour promoted the view of Bruce and Douglas as heroes by comparing them to other renowned historical and pseudo-historical individuals who had been celebrated in romances, and shows that the various references to romances were used by the poet to elucidate his own heroic ideal.