‘The vessel of her life was full’: The Literary Muse Prevails
By Imogen Sykes
Edited by Naomi Adam
Ahead of the imminent release of The Letters Page Volume 5, members of the web and production teams are taking a closer look at some of the letters that made it to print. Their reflections offer a sneak preview of the pieces included in the new edition, and the wide-ranging themes they explore. Today, the writer’s ‘muse’ is visited, prompted by Soviah Khoriyati, who writes from Jakarta about inspiration in the form of her elderly landlady.
When we think of a muse, we are transported all the way back to Ancient Greece – to nine beautiful goddesses, daughters of Zeus, each one embodying different elements of the arts and sciences. These figures of knowledge and inspiration, however, have become increasingly detached from the modern-day term ‘muse’. So now, when the poet, the novelist, the letter writer even, speaks of a muse, what does it mean?
‘Goddess, sing of the cataclysmic wrath of great Achilles’
As translated by Emily Wilson, these iconic opening lines from Homer’s The Iliad famously invoke the muse, calling upon her to help deliver this epic tale. Be it a plea to Calliope (muse of poetry), to Euterpe (muse of music and song), or to another of their seven sister muses, Homer looks to this figure for inspiration, borrowing her voice and talent. For Homer, she adopts a role of divine guide, taking part in the composition process, in creating the artwork itself.
Since the 8th century BCE, Homeric invocations of the muse have appeared in many literary works: Virgil’s epic The Aeneid also opens with a call to the muse, as does Shakespeare’s play Henry V.
Shakespeare’s relationship with the muse, however, is more complex, as he experiments with the concept throughout his works. His Sonnet 38 is particularly famous for its invocation of the muse. Shakespeare both personifies his own creative spirit as an internal ‘muse’, and refers to an external, unidentified figure as a ‘tenth muse’ – one worth far more than the nine ancient muses. In the former sense, the term ‘muse’ becomes something with which to define creativity itself – still befitting, in a way, Homer’s muse who aids in composing his epic. In the latter sense, however, the power originally attributed to goddesses is attached to a real, living person. Under Shakespeare’s quill, the ‘muse’ becomes tangible.
And yet, a divine essence still remains – particularly for the Romantics of the 18th century who make a muse out of the natural world. Wordsworth’s pantheistic lines on Tintern Abbey come to mind, as he worships nature’s power to inspire. He speaks of a sublime quality that resides in nature and impels all living things into motion, into creation. This quality of divine origin, is attached, as with Shakespeare’s tenth muse, to a real, concrete object.
Today, the ‘muse’ upholds this tangible sense. Its divine connotations may have evolved over time, but the compulsive power of inspiration remains inexplicable – both in the sense of its strength, and perhaps where it resides, too. It is this that permeates Soviah Khoriyati’s letter in the upcoming print issue of The Letters Page (in collaboration with UNESCO Cities of Literature), where she relates the discovery of her muse in Ibu E.:
‘Unknowingly, I shifted from being a mere listener to someone who began to draw from her personality.’
Soviah’s inspiration, unfathomably, attaches to Ibu E., her elderly landlady. In her entry to The Letters Page, she writes of how she and Ibu E. met in the outskirts of East Jakarta, Soviah searching for a kos (an Indonesian boarding house), Ibu E. searching for a tenant – each looking for the other. Ibu E. offers her a cheap deal, complete with an extra package of home-cooked meals and home-spun stories. Soviah takes her up on the offer, gaining a muse more than she’d bargained for. She remarks:
‘Her life was so full of stories. The vessel of her life was full.’
Ibu E.’s stories mark each day, tying Soviah’s written identity to her – it is not just Ibu’s tales which inspire Soviah, but her very being. And what more is a muse, than someone whose existence becomes material with which to create?
In essence, a writer’s ‘muse’ is an embodiment of inspiration. From thinking it a divine power and the work of goddesses, to seeing it as tangible and within real entities – such as Ibu E. for Soviah Khoriyati – since the 8th century the term ‘muse’ has served as an attempt to define the incomprehensible creative spirit. Even today, in the modern age, there is no technological advancement that can explain it. Thus, the literary muse prevails.
Got your own muse to write about? The Letters Page team are back in the office, and ready to read your real letters again. We publish stories, essays, poems, memoir, reportage, criticism, recipes, travelogues, and any hybrid forms, so long as they come to us in the form of a letter. We are looking for writers of all nationalities and ages, both established and emerging.
Your letter must be sent in the post, to:
The Letters Page, School of English, University of Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK
See our submissions page for more information.
Enjoy articles that explore concepts across history? Take a look at this piece on the history of letter writing – tracing its origins back to ancient Mesopotamia.
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