Themes
Henryson's expansion of Aesop's fable makes its inferences concrete, introduces complexity and raises a large number of themes in a very short space. In relation to other known fable literature in Europe up to that time, the loading is extremely rich.
Even though the moralitas comes down sincerely and emphatically on the side of the rejected stone, nevertheless, the cockerel has raised questions that are not necessarily easily resolved. The subsequent poems will appear to further intensify many of those doubts and dichotomies rather than resolving them. Therefore the riddling aspect to the Aesopian original is, in some regards, not ultimately overturned and is arguably maintined as part of the fabric of the poem.
Among the specific issues touched on or implied in Henryson's expansion are questions of fiction and truth, appetite, self-interest, fecklessness, materialism, duty, wisdom, hierarchy, equality, education, social order, government, the nature of aristocracy, the nature of royalty and many others. There is also the question of who the cockerel ultimately represents and whether, in some sense, Henryson's poem itself is ultimately the jasp which the reader has encountered "in the midden" to take or leave as he or she wishes.
Read more about this topic: The Taill Of The Cok And The Jasp
Famous quotes containing the word themes:
“I suppose you think that persons who are as old as your father and myself are always thinking about very grave things, but I know that we are meditating the same old themes that we did when we were ten years old, only we go more gravely about it.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“In economics, we borrowed from the Bourbons; in foreign policy, we drew on themes fashioned by the nomad warriors of the Eurasian steppes. In spiritual matters, we emulated the braying intolerance of our archenemies, the Shi’ite fundamentalists.”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)