Bertran de Born and War

When reading Bertran de Born, I found his sirvente to be especially striking. The beginning, in which he speaks to his fallen king, read to me sort of like many of the cansos directed to women written by other troubadors. Referring to him as "the greatest king," and showering him with praise, Bertran really displays his affection for the king in a canso-like way. However, there is a different underlying theme to his declaration of love for the king. Stating, "I never saw a man so brave, so warlike..." Bertran shows his first inklings of being war-loving and obsessed. He also displays this when he speaks of Richard I as wanting "war more than a hawk wants quail," and sort of displaying that as one of his positive attributes. I found this passage interesting to compare to 43, in which he speaks to his lady love and the "noble joy," which she provides, and how he wants to go around collecting parts of different women to create an image of her. Once again, in true troubador fashion, he is more concerned with the image of the woman than with the woman herself, and even then does not seem as concerned with the image of the woman as he did with the fallen king. However, 44 was the sirvente that I saw actually take on the form of the sirventes mentioned in Gaunt & Kay. He preaches/speaks about his opinions, about what makes women and men young or old. He seems to be instructing his listeners about what they should do in order to be "young" or "old," and even says "take my sirventes about young/ and old to Richard, let it guide him..." I was not sure here if he was talking about a random Richard, or King Richard, but either way—he was meaning this verse to be both satirical and didactic. It also is full of invective language, as mention in Gaunt & Kay in regards to Marcabru's sirventes. Bertran's 45 was definitely a sirvente glorifying battle and war, which matched with his passage of praise for his King. I felt it was interesting how he compared "the joyful time of easter" to the joy he feels when he sees knights and horses ready for war. His graphic imagery of war was quite shocking, especialy combined with his feelings of joy. As far as work and text tension, I definitely found that these sireventes, especially Bertran de Born's, had a much different feel than the cansos. Barthes called the work/text tension as a tension between "the reality and the real." Although I may be incorrect, I felt as though all these sirventes had a sense of "demonstration," as Barthes would define a text. They were meant to instruct and be interpreted by the people, as Bertran's statements about being "young" and "old" were. Even today, satire and politcal commentary is meant to be ingested and interpreted by the public; there is no one way to look at it. The sirventes of these troubadors were like that; they told of experiences, of opinions, of advice.