Justifying My Degree... Again?

I just realized that I owe half of my university degree to a failed model of encounter from the Elizabethan age of discovery… Depressing, but fun!

After spending the entire semester compiling evidence that supported the importance of my Arts degree in English (see “Justifying My Degree”), I have now also found a root for my Environmental Studies minor!

Looking at narratives of discovery and encounter, we discussed the “myth of unfathomable bounty” that is alluded to in Raleigh’s “The Discovery of the Large, Rich, and Beautiful Empire of Guiana.”  Raleigh takes time to list some of the various wildlife and landscapes of Guiana, but says that to list them in full exhaustion would bore the reader (350, right column).  Instead, Raleigh simply concludes, “that both for health, good air pleasure and riches, I am resolved it cannot be equaled by any region” (350).  Ultimately, Raleigh expresses the land as having unfathomable bounty, or endless richness, which was essential considering colonial desires for an expanded market.  This mentality, however, is problematic and in its continuance throughout western history, it has led to the threatened state of our environment and its resources.

            Here’s where I come in.  As first-year student I was introduced to this massive, environmental degradation in one of my science, elective courses.  Following that semester, I registered to start a minor in Environmental Studies to become more informed and find a way to do my part to make change.  Now, as a fourth-year English major, I’m finally finding out that there is a lot more in common between my major and minor that I once thought… What a way to finish!

"The Lie"

            Sir Walter Raleigh’s “The Lie” is my favourite course text to date.  Though fascinated by the manipulative nature of James’s writing, Elizabeth’s unconcealed angst, More’s socio-political critique in Utopia, etc., there is something about the strength in the simplicity of Raleigh’s poem that I was struck by.  Knowing he was to be executed and that any convictions of treason would obviously be nullified by the fact that he was already to be beheaded, Raleigh addresses the political, social, and monarchic issues that exist in society, head-on. 

Within the first three stanzas, Raleigh attacks the monarch, the court and the church, three institutions not to be meddled with, showing their corrupt and rotting foundations and their deceiving ways.  Raleigh points to the falsehood and weakness of monarchic rule stating, “they live / Acting by others’ action; / Not loved unless they give, / Not strong but by a faction” (13-16), unequivocally commenting on exactly what caused James and Elizabeth so much anxiety.

These obtrusive revelations continue in the tenth stanza as Raleigh subverts some of the fundamental principles people live by. He equates fortune with blindness, nature with decay, friendship with unkindness, and justice with a lack of action (55-58).  Although Raleigh appears simply as a bitter and pessimistic prisoner, he is encouraging people to challenge the accepted state of affairs.  He forces them to look past the superficial stability of these socio-political systems to their rotten core by telling people, in his powerful and passionate, monosyllabic phrase “give them all the lie.”

While I appreciate the effectiveness of Raleigh’s language and style, I think most of all I applaud his attitude.  Instead of sulking over the fact that he is soon to be beheaded, he is empowered by his inevitable demise, this invincibility of the soul.  He cannot be beheaded a second time for treason.  Understanding this he rips open the confines of society to expose to the people the ruin that has governed their lives.

Sinner or saint? The choice is pretty clear to me.