MEEF 2 Anglais (texte en anglais).

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Dossier 5

Document 1: As You Like It, Shakespeare

Document 2: Robinson Crusoe, Defoe

Document 3: Kidnapped, Stevenson

"I know how men in exile feed on dreams", wrote the famous Greek tragedian Aeschylus. Exile is a main topic in many literary works. It can be defined as a forced or involuntary separation from the State, the city, and the home without the protection of Government, friends and family. In the Ancient Greek world, this was seen as a fate worse than death. The exile is a topic used in literature all around the world and in all the periods. For instance, in Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare, exile is a personal matter that becomes political: Romeo is banished from Verona for a private affair (revenge-killing Tybalt), in order to keep a public peace and he is sent to Mantoue. For him, this sentence is worse than death. Another Shakespeare's play evokes this motif: As You Like It. This pastoral comedy was written in circa 1599. There are some features and conventions that are common in both pastoral literature and Shakespearian comedy. The presence of shepherds, characters from the city or court running away to the country make this play pastoral. The text is written in unrhymed blank verses. In this excerpt, the figure of Duke Senior is banished and he exposes the prodigies of life in the forest and the figure of Jacques moralized on the virtue of killing a deer. The second document is an excerpt from Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. It is a novel first published on 25 April 1719. This first edition assigned the work's fictional protagonist Robinson Crusoe as its author. Many readers believed Robinson Crusoe was a real person and the book a travelogue of true incidents. This book is a fictional autobiography of the title character. So, the first person is used. The story is widely perceived to have been influenced by the life of Alexander Selkirk, a Scottish castaway who lived for four years on the Pacific island called "Más a Tierra". In this excerpt, Crusoe discovers wild goats on the island. He kills one of them and then, sees that it had a kid, which he kills too. On about his twelfth day on the island, he erects a large cross that he inscribes with the date of his arrival, September 30, 1659. The last document is from Kidnapped, which is a historical fiction adventure novel by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. It was written in 1886. In this excerpt, David Balfour, the main character, begins eating raw shellfish. He is especially depressed because he can see a church and several houses on the mainland, but he knows he cannot cross the river. David Balfour is both the narrator and the central character. The main effect about the story being in first person is that the reader can feel caught up in David's experiences, like the reader is really sitting and listening to him telling him his story.

In all the documents given, the characters are away from their homes. They are banished or lost on an Island. And a main issue is raised through the excerpts: How does the exile lead to the characters' introspection and lead them to wonder about their existence?

So, in these three documents, it is noticeable that the exile in general conveys the ideas of self-awareness, survival through food, and the opposition between the city and country or wild lives.

First of all, self-awareness is essential in the life of the isolated characters.

In the second document, the author uses the word "expostulate" to qualify exile. This word has a stronger impact because its use is quite uncommon. Concerning self-awareness, Robin Crusoe tells his own story retrospectively from his personal point of view. Every little detail that goes on his head can be read. His existence on the island deepens his self-awareness as he retires from the external social world and turns inward. This idea that the individual must keep a regard of the state of his own soul is a key point in the Presbyterian doctrine that Defoe defended seriously all his life. Crusoe wants to keep a journal to record his daily activities and he feels the importance of staying aware of his situation at all times. For that, he asks a lot of questions aloud as if he wanted to keep his mind awaken and aware of the fact he is still alive despite his isolation. Concerning the fact that he will "lose (his) reckoning of time", Crusoe marks the passing of days "with (his) knife upon a large post, in capital letters, and making it into a great cross... set(s) it upon the shore where (he) first landed..." The large size and capital letters show how important the cross is to Crusoe as a timekeeping device and thus also as a way of relating himself to the larger social world where dates and calendars still matter. The enumeration of questions in this passage is also important to keep the mind alive. It is also the case in As You Like It. Indeed, Senior Duke asks several rhetorical questions. This can be a solution for him to be still attached to the life of civil court with education and reflexion. Moreover, it seems that within this banishment the figure of Jacques is also banished from the group in the forest. He is extremely melancholic and his companions don't understand him. Jacques's self-awareness is represented through the attention he draws on nature. He keeps on wondering about the purpose of the men and he seems to be tired from worries and grieves of the world. In the last document also, self-awareness appears. Indeed, when the narrator evokes the story of Robinson Crusoe, it may show that the character wants to be rooted into the reality. Furthermore, in the two last paragraphs, the expression "to keep hope alive" is repeated twice. The author probably wanted to insist on the importance of hope in the survival of the character. In these documents, another more material tool to survive emerges. In fact, hunting is essential to stay alive in a savage place.

To hunt animals in order to eat and to survive in harsh conditions of life may be considered as a basic aspect of survival. But, in As You Like It, hunting can lead to a moral reflexion. In this passage, one of the lords announces that Jacques, who is constantly melancholy, had moralized on the virtue of killing the deer. Jacques remarked that the men are usurping the forest from the animals when he watched a wounded deer. The Duke proposes that they hunt some roebuck, but he cannot help but mown the fate of the deer. When Jacques goes on and

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