pensamiento critico y practica poetica en donald davie - Universidad ...

11.2.3. Reivindicación de la h¡mnodia dieciochesca.
Defensor del siglo dieciocho inglés como un siglo cristiano y
reivindicador de la retórica clásica, Davie revaloríza una composición poética
que reúne en si ambos elementos: el himno. Coherente con el racionalismo
naturalista, Davie pondera el himno por su impersonalidad, que le hace ser “a
product of the English language and of the English-speaking peoples, rather
than of any ono speaker of that language at any one time” (ED, 158)
De la misma manera que “language is a public property” (ECH, 92), el
himno es un patrimonio común:
Responsible scholarship must surely recognize ibe congregational hyrnn as a
form of Obristian poetry that lies halfway between the anonymous and ihe
copyrighted; as it were quasi-anonymous. However it may be st ihe presení
day, iii past centuries ihe hyrnn-writer could nol claim copyright in bis
compositions as te secular writer did. It was bis glory and bis triumph thai bis
work was taken ovar by Iba body of Ihe worshipping folk, who iherealter
claimed Iba right lo modify bis wording as confidently as ihey modified iba
wording of Iheir folk-poetry. And jusí as scholars, dealing with a Bordar Bailad
like ‘Lord Randail’ or fha Twa corbies’, have learned nol lo lake a late version
as a corruplion of sorne perbaps irrecoverable original, so in ihe case of
congragational hymns thay must acknowiedge that a late version, smoothed
arid adapted tbrough generalions of usage, may have more authority iban a
original version sígned perhaps ‘John Keble’. The great hymns of Iba christian
Church are, or haya become, folk-poetry; and we treal them properly, witb
proper gralilude and raspad, when we treal them Ss wa Ireal olber folk-poetry.
(NoBcv, lnt.-xxiv)
Tanto es así que es el himno un género vivo, cambiante:
Real scandal; which is that, when we study the corigregational bymn, we are
studying a Uve genre wtxich is changing even as we study it. It is the liveness
tbat disconcerts us. These poems are alive - in tattered hymnals, en insecure
music-stands, and in the inexact memorias of infrequent worshippers
everywbere from London to Kuala Lumpur. (ECH, 19)
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