Misunderstanding, Misperception and Mistakes: The Logic of the Grail in Old French Arthurian Romance and Thomas Malory’s Tale of the Sankgreal

This article seeks to resituate critical discussions about logic in the Old French Grail romances and Thomas Malory’s Tale of the Sankgreal. Where previous scholarship has emphasised the mystical elements of the Old French Grail narratives to suggest alternate meanings for the Grail itself, this article reads the Grail miracles as structuring devices that reflect classical theories of dialectic and demonstrative argumentation. Through examining one example from Chrétien de Troyes’ Perceval, the Didot-Perceval, The Vulgate Cycle Queste del Saint Graal, and Thomas Malory’s Tale of the Sankgreal, this article also highlights fundamental similarities between the logical systems underlying each Grail narrative that are not restricted by language or date of composition. Thus, the article depicts Malory not just as consciously drawing upon the Vulgate Queste del Saint Graal, but also as unconsciously inheriting elements from each of his Old French predecessors.

La voix et la lettre dans les romans arthuriens de la seconde moitié du XIIe siècle

The perplexing question of the interrelations between hearing and sight looms large in the verse novel of the second half of the twelfth century, a newly promoted genre of literary fiction, no longer sung but written and intended for public reading in small circles, it seems, permanently shaped by the written word, yet brought to life by a fleeting voice. In what is commonly and sometimes abusively referred to as the Arthurian romance in verse of the second half of the twelfth century – the Arthurian part of Wace’s romance of Brut (in fact, a text between the chronicle and the romance in terms of style), the romances of Chrétien de Troyes, the romances of Tristan by Thomas and Béroul – the ‘soundtrack’ of the Arthurian literary world is poor: the human voice in particular, the sole focus of my study, is rarely mentioned, while discourse proliferates. For multiple reasons, above all because it is an acoustic phenomenon of physiological origin which is linked to breathing, the voice, as an undeniable vital force, seems to be stifled: this is what will be examined to start with. The paradoxes haunting the voice need to be addressed and assessed. In fact, it is as if vocality gave way to a rustle of words, both those of the characters and those of the narrative instances. A second step of the analysis will therefore consider how orality, patently obvious as it is, tends to mask the vocality of the text to draw attention to itself: if the voice, in its materiality, appears neglected, it is because it is henceforth subsumed under the spoken word. Yet, the voice is most saliently causing distinct stylistic traits or modes of writing which animate the jongleresque performance. The latter is having its heyday, since, at the turn of the thirteenth century, prose and the advent of silent reading would soon bring about a substantial change in the production and reception of fictional literary works: a third and last point will deal with how, until the book is to enjoy the prestige that the voice once possessed, the letter will not be that irreducibly separated from the very voice from which it originates. Far from being independent from each other, voice and letter converge in the same collaboration, that of the reading experience that allows us, to this day, to make these texts our own.

The Evil as a Generic Interference: On the axiological Scaling of Middle High German Poetry (Heroic Poetry, Arthurian Romance, Minnesang) Das Böse als generische Interferenz: Ein Beitrag zur axiologischen Dimensionierung mittelhochdeutscher Dichtung (Heldenepos, Artusroman, Minnesang)

The article discusses a poetic phenomenon typical for central genres of MHG poetry, heroic poetry, Arthurian romance, Minnesang, namely the question if characters and their actions are, or can be, evaluated as evil, and for what purpose. The axiological system of MHG poetry proves to be of extraordinary instability, the main reason for that being a strong tendency towards a rigid idealization of the poetic 'world' and its characters. Hence, the evil is not a genuine part of the poetic blueprints. Where it is, for one reason or the other, indispensable, it usually manifests as a generic interference, that is to say as an import from alien generic conventions, including day-to-day narration. Im Zentrum des Beitrags steht ein für die wichtigsten Genres der mhd. Dichtung – Heldendichtung, Artusroman und Minnesang – typisches poetisches Phänomen; es geht um die Frage, ob und inwieweit in dieser die Figuren und deren Aktionen böse genannt werden können, und wenn ja, zu welchem Zweck. Die Axiologie der mhd. Dichtung erweist sich dabei als außerordentlich instabil, was primär an einer starken Tendenz zur rigiden Idealisierung der poetischen 'Welt' und ihrer Figuren liegt: Das Böse ist nicht eigentlicher Teil der poetischen Baupläne. Wo es dennoch, aus verschiedenen Gründen, unverzichtbar erscheint, wird es häufig manifest als genetische Interferenz, also als ein Import fremder generischer Konventionen, zu denen auch das Alltagserzählen zu rechnen ist.

Das Erbe des Lazarus

Following the resurrection of the Arthurian knight Erec at the castle of Limors, this article attempts to review the question of the religious ties of the courtly romance by investigating figurations of re-entering life. These typological ties, when considered in detail, turn out to be ambivalent precisely when the religious horizon appears particularly affirmative, as in the case of Limors. This gets especially palpable in connection with returnees who, like Lazarus and Erec, become ambiguous between religious wonder and judicial discussion. The article explores their interferences in a 13th-century Latin debate poem as well as in a key scene of the first vernacular Arthurian romance, which both equally glorify and disempower their heroes.

Voorbeeldige vorsten?

This article examines the concept of kingship in the Middle Dutch Roman van Walewein, a thirteenth-century Arthurian romance from Flanders, by analyzing the roles of the six different kings in the work from different perspectives. The rulers are studied based on their depiction within the story in relation to historical views on kingship, their actions in relation to the narrative’s plot, and finally their role as king in relation to the narrative’s hero, Walewein. This analysis lays bare a pattern in which problematic aspects of kingship are connected to the different rulers, resulting in a lack of social order that needs to be restored by Walewein, whom in doing so proves his excellence and fitness to rule as a king himself. These problematic aspects include a lack of measure from the kings, the frustration of social integration at their courts, and finally their common use of the ‘don contraignant’ motif in a negative manner. In this light, I argue that the Roman van Walewein can be read as a type of ‘mirror for princes’.