"Pleiades" is a constellation and poetry

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

According to the semantic meaning, the word "pleiade" implies a certain community of people of the same era and one direction of activity. The word originates in ancient Greek mythology. The Pleiades are the seven daughters of Atlanta and Pleione, whom Zeus raised to heaven and turned into a constellation. Six stars of them shine with a bright light, and only one bashfully hides - after all, she, unlike her obedient sisters, preferred her beloved mortal to the gods. According to the same mythology, it was the Pleiades constellation that served as a celestial beacon for ancient navigators.

It is not surprising that this space object has become a favorite symbol for the servants of the Muses for many centuries and millennia. The constellation of the Northern Hemisphere found a particularly vivid reflection in belles-lettres. Even in antiquity, in the 3rd century BC, the Alexandrian school of poetry was born. The seven poets who belonged to her - Homer Jr., Apollonius, Nicander, Theocritus, Aramur, Lykotron and Filik - organized themselves in a separate circle and called themselves "Pleiades". This trend remained in the history of ancient literature as an example of high poetry.

Millenniums passed, history repeated itself. During the Renaissance, in 1540, new poets of the Pleiades declared themselves in France. It was the time of French romanticism, and also the craze for ancient poetics. A group of young poets led by Pierre de Ronsard unveiled a truly revolutionary program for the development of national literature. It is noteworthy that there were also seven of them, they called their community none other than "Pleiades". It was an attempt to revive and give a new breath to native literature, and at the same time it was a kind of disregard for the centuries-old traditions of French poetry.

On what was the program of the "Pleiades" poets based? It was presented in the treatise of Joashen du Bellay and was a kind of manifesto not for revival, but rather for the creation of a new literature. The younger generation of poets was in favor of bringing into French literature the traditions of ancient Alexandrian verse. They explained such a wish by the fact that it was Hellenic, Alexandrian poetry that was close to perfection - both in style and in poetics in general. In a frankly weak and controversial treatise, a subtle nod to the native language was made: yes, French is beautiful, it has great opportunities, but it is not as developed as Greek or Latin, and therefore it needs to be developed. And what path of development did Pleiades advise to choose? It was nothing more than an imitation of the ancients.

The poetic community included five more - Etienne Jodel, Jean Antoine de Baif, Remy Bello, Jean Dora, Pontus de Tiar. Legacy of the Pleiadeswhich has come down to modern times, is better known for the poetry of Pierre de Ronsard, which has become a model of true French romanticism and lyricism, than for the failed experiments of the Young Hellenists of the Renaissance. Already in the 70s, in his declining years, he wrote real masterpieces, in particular, Sonnets to Helena, which remained in the history of French literature - a dedication to his last hopeless love. And there is not a trace of imitation in them, there is no Alexandrian verse dear to his heart, but there is only the living, suffering soul of the poet.

In later periods in the history of literature, the word "Pleiades" sounded more than once in relation to poetry. This was already, however, a purely definitive designation of poets of one trend or one era. So, in modern literary criticism, the term "poets of the Pushkin galaxy", "a galaxy of poets of the silver" age is often used. But this is already, as Goethe wrote, “a new age - other birds.”