Stephen Knight, Reading Robin Hood, Manchester: Manchester
University Press, 2015.
Reviewed by Sabina Rahman (srah2881@uni.sydney.edu.au)
Reading Robin Hood stands as Stephen Knight’s third book
devoted to the outlaw hero, preceded by Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the
English Outlaw (1994) and Robin Hood: a Mythic Biography (2003), and
demonstrates some deviation from these earlier works by containing a stronger
theoretical focus. While A Complete Study was a wonderfully detailed overview
of the myth and A Mythic Biography traced the manner in which the myth changed
and evolved and how it operated politically, this book situates itself much
more in the Greenwood gloaming as it attempts to address points of unclarity in
the outlaw tradition and associated scholarship. In his usual meticulous style,
Knight draws together disparate threads of scholarship within this rhizomatic
field of study, his distinct voice containing not only the attention to detail
that one has come to expect from him but also a clear and unabashed enthusiasm
for the subject matter. Though the book weaves in and out of eras and
discussions, because the nature of the texts and discussions cannot be neatly
constrained by either of those features, it is split into eight discrete
chapters.
The first three chapters focus on what Knight refers to as
the 'enigmas of uncertainty arising from the early materials' (p. 8), with the
first chapter discussing the nature of the early ballads. Beginning with an
analysis of works by H. J. Chaytor, Clanchy, Walter Ong, Marianna Boerch
(amongst others), Knight builds a foundation for examining oral traditions and
cultures, a scholarly approach which he argues tends towards an
oversimplification of a complex cultural field as ‘writing [was] a version of
speaking’ in medieval times (p. 15). The discussion encompasses the
fetishisation of literacy and literary products in scholarship, with David C. Fowler’s claim of orality being a frayed and decayed form of literacy. Knight
uses Richard Green and his work to demonstrate the surviving powers of oral
material, and continues to posit the Robin Hood material as an exemplar of an
alternative model as they are from their earliest incarnations ‘both oral and literary, and maintain that
complexity to the present, with varying intensities of an instrumental and
context-driven kind’ (p. 16). The discussion that Robin Hood stories are
grounded in songs and chants, and a compelling argument for the popular and
even usual orality of the Robin Hood texts through the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries (the tales being told via song or performance of some sort, and the
capability of the broadside ballads being sung) all lead Knight to the
conclusion that the printing of the material did not silence the oral and
performative tendency of these tales (p. 25). Indeed, there is a dialectical
interrelationship of orality and literacy at the core of the Robin Hood
material.
The second chapter traces some Scottish connections to the
tradition, identifying a significant gap in the scholarship field where, though
there is an acknowledged recurrent element of Scottish involvement with the
tradition, there is almost no critical engagement in the area. In an
interesting move, Knight uses post-colonial critical discourse to engage with
the texts, despite Scotland not being a colony but rather a negotiated ally and
federate, and discusses how colonial implants may interact with native
traditions, and how they may ‘in turn, and in return, influence the culture of
the colonising power itself’ (p. 37). The chapter examines Robin Hood in
Scotland and Rabbie Hood in England, noting that the nature of this traffic is
not one way, and that there is indeed
evidence of an interrelationship in these outlaw myths. There are some keen
observations in the Scottish relocation of the Robin Hood myth through
play-games in that region, and his appropriation as the date and season of the
play-games change from the traditional May in England to a winter’s December
day in Scotland, thus changing the figure in question by ‘detaching him [...]
from the strong natural symbolism of the English Whitsun practices [...] and
making him a figure of year-round urban harmony‘ (p. 40). The significance of
Robin Hood changes as he is entwined with the Rabbie Hood myth, the Scottish
reading of the character differing greatly from the English, especially in
terms of national significance, a point that Knight traces in some depth with
the available texts.
The final chapter in this section addresses the sources and
avatars of “A Gest of Robin Hood”, and argues that the Gest draws substantially
on the late medieval tradition of sub-chivalric romance, especially as this is
found in Sir Launfal, Gamelyn, and the ‘King and Subject’ ballads, and there is
some significant space given to the argument that the “Gest” relies on the
narrative of Fulk Fitz-Warren. The discussion necessitates a re-ordering of the
conventional time lines of the plays and the ballads, suggesting that “Robin
Hood and Guy of Gisborne” and the plays “Robin Hood and the Potter” and “Robin
Hood and the Friar” all predate “Gest”, thus using the narratives of these
texts to glean greater understanding of the older texts. The argument for the
alternate chronology is highly plausible, the evidence sound; however, as
Knight concedes, there is room for scholarly dispute on the matter.
The second section of the book attempts to address the lack
of clarity in structures and interrelationships of a considerable number of
texts, beginning with an analysis of the broadside ballads, their dates, types
and sociopolitical meanings. The
broadside ballads are an aspect of Robin Hood studies that were once considered
central but have lacked any significant critical work in the last few decades,
and this chapter is steeped in a desire to regenerate interest in this area.
Knight creates a framework for a revival of these studies by loosely placing
them in two categories: anti authority and celebratory, where the outlaws’
skills and traditions are celebrated. There is also a meticulous attempt to
sort the broadsides chronologically, creating a valuable tool for those future
scholars. This chapter blends seamlessly into the fifth with a continuation of
these intricacies of the broadside ballads in a more Romantic setting, and
discusses also the garland traditions thriving in the eighteenth century.
Knight also unearths evidence of the old play tradition showing signs of
survival in festivals in high summer, a displacement of the early summer
festivals which had featured Robin Hood play-games. This chapter also contains
a discussion of Joseph Ritson, his history and his works, acknowledging the
vast impact he had on this field, though he does not participate in nor comment
upon the reconstruction of Robin Hood as a Romantic figure. For him, Robin
‘displayed a spirit of freedom and independence’ (p. 108). Knight also neatly
pulls together the Romantic Robin from his appearances in works by John Keats,
John Hamilton Reynolds and Leigh Hunt before analysing Thomas Love Peacock’s
Maid Marian novella which maintains and adds to this Romantic discourse while
adding political elements through satire. This Romantic Robin Hood remains an
‘available and potent part of the outlaw repertoire’ (p. 139) and has thrived
and flourished to current depictions from these roots, which Knight traces
further in the sixth chapter, and the re-formation of Robin Hood in poetry and
prose in the nineteenth century. This chapter sees Robin settling into the ‘patriotic, masculine,
leaderly role of the mid-Victorian popular novel’ (p. 143) through a study of
Robin Hood: A Tale of Olden Time (anonymous), Ivanhoe (Walter Scott) and the
Maid Marian novella mentioned above (Peacock). There is also an exploration of
Robin Hood being brought to mainstream audiences, the first evidence of which is
cited as Pierce Egan the Younger’s serialised rendition of the tales, and the
lasting influence of Howard Pyle as the impact and importance of his work ‘was
to a large degree visual’ (p. 179). Robin Hood had not been a popular subject
for artists, not as much as Arthur and the medieval knights, so the
illustrations in these books led to a revival in artistic interest, a
discussion which Knight engages in.
The final section of the book works across all materials,
from thematic viewpoints, content, form and reception, and discusses the
multiplicity of portrayals of Maid Marian, and her changing role in millennial
modernity. The chapter traces the history of Marian in the tradition, from
Robin et Marion c. 1283, which, as Knight previously notes, is not really part
of the outlaw cycle at all despite the tantalising similarities in name and
date. However there are some links to the blending of the two traditions within
the play-games, and this is explored briefly. There is also some discussion of
the eighteenth century opera with the uninspired title of Robin Hood: An Opera,
and other plays during that time in which Marian began to emerge as a standard
character, though as Knight states, ‘in general, the eighteenth-century did not
find Marian an inspiring figure’ (p. 198). It is in the nineteenth century that
Marian begins to take a larger role, even given the title of a Robin Hood story
for the first time (the aforementioned Maid Marian by Peacock) and there is an
emerging recognition of her as a partner of Robin, an element that grew
stronger in twentieth-century film and TV. Knight traces this figure through
the twentieth century, examining her evolution on the screen, particularly in
line with feminist thought, adding that surging interest in the role of women
will give Marian ‘renewed power’ (p. 198).
This final section also provides the model of a rhizomatic
structure as a way of understanding a tradition which has ‘been opposed to,
even ostracised by, canonical tradition which is linear, uniform or, in their
terms, arboreal’ (p. 9). The usual model of canonisation of literature, Knight
argues, does not work with Robin Hood: ‘it has long been established that there
is a different formation in this long-loved and highly dynamic cultural myth’
(p. 229). This chapter, possibly my
favourite of the book, addresses pedagogical issues and triumphs that Knight
encountered with Robin Hood and his surprising and perplexing avoidance of
being pinned down. There is large array of material here and Knight bounces
from one to another like a pinball, his excitement palpable with every new
encounter. With the excitement, there is also confusion, maybe even
frustration, at the nature of this hero, this myth, whose ‘multiformed nature
is rooted in the contextual ground itself’ (p. 254). It is due to this that
Knight concludes with the caution that commentators will need a ‘volatile
capacity to comprehend - meaning both understand and hold onto - the continuing
rhizomaticity of Robin Hood’ (p. 254).
This book could, perhaps, be read as a call to arms. Knight
begins by addressing the idea that the Robin Hood tradition is remarkably open
to new materials and ideas in a way that seemingly comparable medieval legends,
such as King Arthur, and Tristan and Isolde for instance, are not (p. 1). There
is an uncertain and anarchic nature to the myth, bred perhaps from the manner
in which Robin Hood material was not culturally treasured and did not undergo
the venerative process of literary criticism of seemingly comparable medieval
material that began around the turn of the twentieth century. While Joseph
Ritson began this process in 1795 when he published his edition of the ballads
and Francis James Child provided the
'finest piece of early outlaw scholarship' (p. 3), Reading Robin Hood makes it
clear that the process has not yet scratched a considerable surface.
Scholars and interested parties may notice some slight
overlap in the material. The chapter on the Scottish myth is essentially
“Rabbie Hood: The Development of the English Outlaw Myth in Scotland”,
published out of conference proceedings in Bandit Territories.[1] The inclusion of the chapter is appropriate
here too, however, as some repetition of material is necessary in order to tie
the threads of the book’s thesis together, to demonstrate the fertility of the
scholarly lands available.
This is not a book of answers. This book is said to be
Knight’s final book on Robin Hood and in keeping with the volatile, evolving
nature of the myth on which he writes, Knight does not provide the final word
on the subject matter. Rather, he has, via a neat trilogy of books, provided
future scholars the means by which to descend into the forest and see the
trees.
Sabina Rahman
University of Sydney
[1] Helen
Phillips (ed.), Bandit Territories: British Outlaw Traditions, Cardiff:
University of Wales Press, 2008.
