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From: asente@decwrl.UUCP (Paul Asente)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: Arthurian Legends
Message-ID: <2670@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 18-Jul-83 12:04:04 EDT
Article-I.D.: decwrl.2670
Posted: Mon Jul 18 12:04:04 1983
Date-Received: Mon, 18-Jul-83 19:58:24 EDT
References: sri-arpa.3070
Lines: 34

Both Malory and "History of the Kings of Britain" are excellent books, but
each is quite a bit older than reported.  Malory is about 14th century, and
"History" (by Geoffrey of Monmouth) is about 10th century.  In addition to
the Arthur story, "History" contains the stories of King Lear and of
King Coel ("Old King Cole was a merry old soul...").

Two more books, both heavy going but worth it, are "Tristan" by Gottfried
von Strasbourg and "Parzifal" by Wolfram von Eschenbach.  (not sure about
the spelling of the names)  These are more or less contemporary with
Mallory but are much closer to the original source versions than Mallory.
"Parzifal" is very long and has about a million characters; a little
notetaking as you go along helps a lot so you can go check out what
happened with the characters when you meet them again 150 pages later.

"Tristan" is much more romantic (in the modern sense) and contains a
number of derogatory references to "Parzifal", which came out about the
same time.  It just goes to show that cattiness is nothing new.
Unfortunately "Tristan" is unfinished; however, most books contain the
fragments of "Tristram" by Thomas.  This was Gottfried's source and most
of it has been lost, but between the two you get the whole thing.  The
difference in style between the two is interesting; while Thomas just
basically tells you what happened, Gottfried goes into great detail about
the court and personal motivations.  This isn't a novel (they weren't
invented yet) so it doesn't go into character development very much,
but it's a lot closer to being one than Mallory or "Parzifal".

Also, if you're interested in this from a scholarly point of view, there
is a weighty tome called "Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages" which
has discussions on all these books and many others.  It's big and expensive
but quite easy to read.

Have fun,

	-paul