Emil Turdeanu on Byron’s Oscar of Alva: Mythological Analysis and Literary History

Developed especially through the studies of Mircea Eliade and Ioan Petru Culianu,^[1] the method of “mythological analysis” is characterized by the tension between two dominant hermeneutical directions. The first, markedly speculative, is represented by the aforementioned scholars as well as by the philosopher and logician Anton Dumitriu and literary critics Eugen Todoran and Nicolae Balotă.^[2] It is developed in close connection with philosophical anthropology and classical theological metaphysics. This approach seeks to elucidate the presence of mythological-religious themes and motifs in the works of prominent writers and poets, themes which were not intentionally encoded in their writings by the authors themselves.

The second approach focuses on investigating the historical, diachronic dimension of the circulation of various literary themes and motifs derived from ancient myths and legends. It limits itself to establishing influences between authors from different eras and their works. In practice, analysis in this category aims to trace with maximum accuracy the circulation of themes and motifs initially known from the ancient creations of Greco-Latin culture. Initiated within the Romanian cultural context by Bogdan Petriceicu Hașdeu, later employed by Moses Gaster, and especially by Lazăr Șăineanu in his monumental work, Basmele române în comparațiune cu legendele antice clasice și în legătură cu basmele popoarelor învecinate și ale tuturor popoarelor romanice (Romanian Fairy Tales as Compared to the Legends of Classical Antiquity and Those of All Romance Peoples, 1885), the predominantly historical approach to practicing mythological analysis reached its pinnacle in a study of exemplary erudition dedicated by Emil Turdeanu to Lord Byron’s Oscar of Alva.

Trained under the guidance of Nicolae Cartojan, a historian of Romanian folk literature, Turdeanu distinguished himself in the field of research on Eastern European apocryphal biblical texts. His intellectual background is truly impressive. It suffices to mention that, in addition to mastering ancient languages—Greek, Latin, Slavonic—he was proficient in French, German, English, Italian, Spanish, as well as Bulgarian and Russian. He became known to the Western academic audience through his activity at the renowned Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Paris) and his contributions to significant international journals such as the Revue de l’Histoire des Religions. The culmination of his life’s work came with the publication of two major monographs by Brill: Apocryphes slaves et roumains de l’Ancien Testament (1981) and Études de littérature roumaine et d’écrits slaves et grecs des Principautés Roumaines (1985). Throughout his career, Turdeanu maintained a constant interest in the history of modern literature, an interest manifested in his substantial study “Oscar de Alva by Lord Byron.”^[3] In this work, mythological analysis is employed in its rigorous form of historical-literary research.

How does Turdeanu proceed? By carefully reading Lord Byron’s poem Oscar of Alva, he first isolates three main literary motifs (or themes):

“a) A young man kills his brother, blinded by love for his fiancée; or, by broadening the theme to a more familiar one: two brothers fight over the same woman.

b) A sinister character interrupts a wedding, causing the death of one of the protagonists.

c) The ghost of the deceased fiancé appears at the wedding banquet (or ball) of his beloved.”

After meticulously isolating these key literary motifs, essential to the development of the plot in Byron’s epic poem, the scholar embarks on a winding journey that ultimately leads him to the mythological origins of these themes. His project’s objective is explicitly stated: “We will now attempt a study of each theme individually, to trace the millennial thread at the end of which lie, neither more macabre nor more surprising, their reinterpretations in our literature.”

Chronologically, the study follows a dual direction. First, it is regressive, moving from Byron’s work toward the ancient origins of the discussed motifs, with a lengthy and detailed excursion into the modern sources of Oscar of Alva. The initial impulse comes from a note by the British author, who states, “The catastrophe of this tale was suggested by the story of Jeronyme and Lorenzo, in the first volume of Schiller’s Armenian or the Ghost-Seer. It also bears some resemblance to a scene in the third act of Macbeth.” Thus, two primary sources—Schiller and Shakespeare—are identified as the origins of Byron’s poem. But what is the ultimate origin of these motifs? And through what channels did they reach Byron’s predecessors?

Turdeanu notes the significant differences and transformations these motifs underwent, shaped by the psychological profile and context of the authors. For Byron, the influence of “frenetic” literature inaugurated by Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764) and represented during his childhood by Matthew Gregory Lewis’s Ambrosio, or the Monk (1795) was decisive in shaping the distinctive atmosphere of the Gothic genre. By contrast, Friedrich Schiller’s novel Der Geisterseher (The Ghost Seer, 1785–1789) is decidedly de-mythologizing, presenting a plot where all magical and miraculous elements are ultimately revealed as deception. After outlining these differences, Turdeanu catalogues every edition of Schiller’s novel from the first half of the nineteenth-century, its circulation through French and English translations, and the works influenced by it—works that, in turn, influenced Byron. Even minor writings by anonymous authors, such as the imitation Le droit d’aînesse (The Birthright, 1826), or shorter poems like Charles Nodier’s Le rendez-vous de la trépassée (The Meeting of the Deceased, 1804), are not overlooked.

After detailing the direct influences received by Byron and their contexts, Turdeanu opens a second, ascending line of study, oriented chronologically from antiquity to modernity. The inclusion of his analysis in the mythological school is due to his insistence on the need to study the mythological origins of the literary archetypes underlying the themes in Oscar of Alva:

“To grasp the earliest sources where the theme of rival brothers first erupted into imperishable literary expression, we must pause on the terrace of legends in Greek mythology. We do not know what blend of real events and primitive fictions coalesced, through the myth-creating force of time, into the wealth of Greek epics. Today’s research can trace, through the preserved testimonies, only as far as the boundary where the vision of the first ancient writers uncovered the vein of tradition and transposed it into their works. The real event, even to the extent it may have inspired the epic imagination of peoples whose transfigured memories we barely have, has lost its own dimensions over time and been distorted through the lens of popular creation. Rarely, through the thicket of mythic themes, can one glimpse the vague outline of a reality that gave rise to the legend or shaped its course.”

In this quotation, the author’s strictly historical vision becomes crystal clear. The metaphysical speculations of thinkers like Eliade and Balotă are absent, replaced by questions about the historical events that might have generated the theme of rival brothers. Considering the chronology of myth-analytical works by Eliade and Turdeanu (the former published his studies in 1939, while the latter in 1944), it seems plausible to assume that Turdeanu aimed to offer a strictly historical-philological response—possibly polemical—to Eliade’s daring speculations. Despite their differing theoretical perspectives, both assert that the origin of the most significant creations of Western culture over the past two centuries lies in Greco-Roman mythology.

Regarding Emil Turdeanu’s study of Byron’s Oscar of Alva, it culminates in an erudite excursion through Greco-Roman mythology and literature as illustrated by Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and Seneca. Turdeanu engages with these authors after first rhetorically asking, “Where did the legend of the two rival brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, originate in the epic cycles of the Oedipodea and Thebaid?” After demonstrating that this theme is “the link between the myth of Oedipus’s suffering and the myth of Thebes’ internecine conflicts,” he offers a hypothetical historical explanation: “It was perhaps initially an independent theme, as some researchers believe, emerging as a symbol of the fratricidal conflicts that divided the tribes of the prehistoric Hellenic peninsula.”

Like Vladimir Yakovlevich Propp in his monumental study Historical Roots of the Wonder Tale (1946), Turdeanu investigates the historical origins of myths. Though conclusive sources are lacking, neither scholar can propose more than plausible hypotheses. However, the value of such analysis lies in demonstrating the resilience and endurance of themes that have traversed millennia to reach us through the pens of modern writers.

Regarding the primary theme under discussion, that of estranged brothers, it is first fully embodied in the works of the “great pioneer of literary horizons, Aeschylus.” His play Seven Against Thebes (467 BC), according to Turdeanu, “captures the vigor of the original myth.” In this dark-toned work, which could be considered a precursor to frenetic literature, Aeschylus conveys a theme that another great Greek author, Sophocles, would imbue with a new psychological dimension: ambition. This transformation occurs in Oedipus at Colonus (c. 401 BC) and Antigone (440 BC), where the theme evolves into a fully developed literary motif. This development would later influence Euripides’ Phoenissae (c. 413 BC). Thus, Turdeanu observes, “an important milestone was reached. The motif, drawn from the old epic tradition, achieved a distinct form and a more defined unity, securing its literary destiny to this day.”

Fully crystallized, the theme was adopted by one of the most influential Latin authors, Seneca the Younger (c. 4 BC–AD 65), who wrote a play that retained not only the theme but also the title of Euripides’ work: Phoenissae. To this, he added another work, Thyestes, marked by sinister cynicism and absolute darkness (in its most horrifying scene, Atreus deceives his brother, Thyestes, by serving him the flesh of his own sons).

From Seneca’s works, the motif of brothers in conflict reached the heart of the English Renaissance through the tragedy of Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton, Gorboduc or Ferrex and Porrex (1562). From there, William Shakespeare adopted and developed it with his unparalleled genius in Hamlet (1599–1601), King Lear (1605–1606), and The Tempest (1610–1611). Turdeanu dedicates ample space to Shakespeare, fittingly for an author whose work he describes as simultaneously “a compendium of classical elements and a source of modern ones.”

Just as Seneca enhanced the fratricidal conflict motif by adding the darkest possible details, Shakespeare added yet another layer: erotic passion. The comparison between these two great authors leads the Franco-Romanian scholar to one of the most spectacular and provocative assertions in his entire study: “Seneca—the tragedian—is the last romantic of the ancient world, just as Shakespeare is the first romantic of the new world.”

If we recall that in the first part of his analysis, Turdeanu proceeded in reverse chronological order, from Byron and Oscar of Alva to Schiller and Shakespeare, we now find ourselves tracing an ascending path from the ancient myths of Greece to the works of the Bard. From here, after a journey through French literature and, especially, German literature—where Goethe also assimilated the motif of enemy brothers before Schiller definitively consecrated it—Turdeanu highlights its use in four of Schiller’s works: Kosmus von Medicis (a lost youthful writing), Die Räuber (The Robbers, 1781), Der Geisteseher (The Ghost Seer, 1785–1789), and finally Die Braut von Messina (The Bride of Messina, 1804). Byron himself revealed familiarity with the third work, Der Geisteseher. Thus, the path of the estranged brothers motif extends from the classical Greco-Latin world, via Shakespeare, to the poem Oscar of Alva. Turdeanu does not stop there.

In the final part of his study, the scholar examines the influence of Byron’s poem in the context of nineteenth-century Romanian literature. Citing and discussing a multitude of authors whose texts, unfortunately, remain inaccessible to English-speaking audiences, I will forgo a detailed presentation. Suffice it to say that after revealing the influences on numerous Romanian writers such as Alexandru Sihleanu, Dimitrie Bolintineanu, Mihai Zamfirescu, and especially the last great Romantic poet, Mihai Eminescu (1850–1889), Turdeanu considers Oscar of Alva “the golden link connecting several fascinating Romanian fantastical poems to universal literature.” Focused mainly on the trajectory of certain mythological derived motifs in literary history, he appears to leave no room for speculative interpretation:

“Without a historical perspective on the theme, we would scarcely recognize its identity.”

A proponent of a historicism dominated by the perpetual debate over the “question of influences,” Emil Turdeanu is a practitioner of mythological analysis convinced that the origins of many literary creations of recent centuries lie in biblical archetypes or the myths of the classical Greco-Latin tradition. However, what he overlooks is the presence of the estranged brothers motif in one of the most significant parables of Our Lord Jesus Christ: the return of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11–32). The inimical reaction of the elder son toward his younger brother undoubtedly highlights the exceptional value of a motif that conveys a profound symbolic-theological meaning. This is made clear by the way in which the most refined genius of Christian allegorical-symbolic exegesis, Saint Maximus the Confessor (c. 580–662), interrogated the deep significance of the two brothers. This is why I believe that, despite the risks involved, a metaphysical-theological interpretation is not only superior to the historical one but also absolutely necessary. Clearly, this does not diminish the value of the historical investigation, which occupies its rightful place—connected to the historical-literal sense of the text—within the hermeneutics subsumed under the cultural tradition of “mythological analysis.”

NOTES:

^[1] I have extensively discussed the interpretations of Mircea Eliade and Ioan Petru Culianu in the study “Images and Symbols in the Work of J.R.R. Tolkien. A Theological Hypothesis” included in the collective volume edited by Virgil Nemoianu and Robert Lazu, J.R.R. Tolkien. Credință și imaginație (J.R.R. Tolkien.  Faith and Imagination, Arad: Hartmann Publishing House, 2005, pp. 177-272). In English, I have published a succinct exposition of Mircea Eliade’s theory in The Imaginative Conservative: https://theimaginativeconservative.org/2024/03/mircea-eliade-mythological-origins-literature-robert-lazu-kmita.html [Accessed: 26 December 2024]. Another text in English, exclusively dedicated to Ioan Petru Culianu’s exegesis, will be published in the journal coordinated by Joseph Pearce, Saint Austin Review.

^[2] I have published two texts about Anton Dumitriu’s use of mythological analysis. The first, entitled “Don Quixote, the Hidden Knight,” can be read online on The European Conservative website: https://europeanconservative.com/articles/essay/don-quixote-the-hidden-knight/ [Accessed: 26 December 2024]. The second, “Goethe, Dante, and Literature,” was included in the printed version of The European Conservative, Summer 2024, Issue 31, p. 68 sqq. I discussed N. Balotă’s challenging speculations in a section of my study “Images and Symbols in the Work of J.R.R. Tolkien. A Theological Hypothesis” cited above (see note 1).

^[3] Published in the journal Studii literare, (Literary Studies, vol. III, 1944, pp. 1-79), the text was included in the volume: Emil Turdeanu, Laetiția Turdeanu-Cartojan, Studii și articole literare (Studies and Literary Essays, Bucharest: Minerva Publishing House, 1995), pp. 77-136.

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