Table Be Round
Listening to more of the audio book of Le Morte d'Arthur. Right now I'm in the middle of the tales of Sir Tristram.
All I can say is, "The sword! Went through! His HEAD!" Sir Marhaus must have constitution up the wazoo, if he takes a sword to the brain pan so deep that Sir Tristram can't pull the sword out again, and still he manages to get up, hop back on his ship, sail back to his home country, have his sister the surgeon look at the wound and say, "We can't get this chunk of sword out of your head" before he finally dies. Geez. What are they feeding these guys?
Also, Palimedes finally showed up for some substantial airtime. He'd been mentioned before, but usually in the context of lengthy lists of which knights showed up at which tournaments. He's not necessarily a bad knight, and he gets a lot of flak for courting a woman who's in love with Tristram; I feel that the flak is undeserved because he didn't seem to be aware of the fact that she privately loved some other guy. I mean, it's not like she ever attempted to turn down his advances or anything, or made her love for Tristram public. All the same, after having seen Palimedes played up for so long as a jerk in Shadows Over Camelot, I can't help but imagine him as one. Probably undeserved, but there it is. (Actually, in this particular version of the Arthurian tales, Gawain seems to be the biggest jerk so far, or at the very least, he's tied with Sir Kay.)
Also, I am amused that everyone in the book seems to be an unabashed screaming fanboy/closet stalker of Lancelot. Even people who have never met him are all, "Lancelot is so awesome!" or "That knight is pretty good...Maybe he's Lancelot in disguise!" or "Hey, who are you? Because I am totally in love with Sir Lancelot, and if you're him I want to tell you how awesome you are...! Aww...you're not him D:" Seriously, Tristram has never met the guy, and he's going around doing good deeds "for the love of Sir Lancelot." And sparing Lancelot's relatives in battle because he doesn't want to hurt the kin "of so fair a knight as Sir Lancelot."
People. I know he's great and all. But please go take a cold shower. In fact, a shower in general might not be a bad idea.
Also, knights of Cornwall get no respect. Seriously. Maybe it's because Cornwall is considered kinda provincial and only good for mining and farming? But the moment a knight finds out that Tristram is from Cornwall, they're all, "What's the point of fighting you? No knight from *pfft* Cornwall can take us on! We're totally knights of the Round Table!" And then Sir Tristram beats them into a bloody pulp.
Hmm...I wonder if that's why Jack the Giant-Killer is explicitly called "a farmer of Cornwall"? Maybe it's to make him about as provincial and ordinary as possible?
Anyway, I'm just babbling about some really amusing thoughts that came to me while listening to this book. Seriously, I can't wait to finish the whole thing and then play Shadows over Camelot. I wonder if the knights' individual powers would make more sense?
All I can say is, "The sword! Went through! His HEAD!" Sir Marhaus must have constitution up the wazoo, if he takes a sword to the brain pan so deep that Sir Tristram can't pull the sword out again, and still he manages to get up, hop back on his ship, sail back to his home country, have his sister the surgeon look at the wound and say, "We can't get this chunk of sword out of your head" before he finally dies. Geez. What are they feeding these guys?
Also, Palimedes finally showed up for some substantial airtime. He'd been mentioned before, but usually in the context of lengthy lists of which knights showed up at which tournaments. He's not necessarily a bad knight, and he gets a lot of flak for courting a woman who's in love with Tristram; I feel that the flak is undeserved because he didn't seem to be aware of the fact that she privately loved some other guy. I mean, it's not like she ever attempted to turn down his advances or anything, or made her love for Tristram public. All the same, after having seen Palimedes played up for so long as a jerk in Shadows Over Camelot, I can't help but imagine him as one. Probably undeserved, but there it is. (Actually, in this particular version of the Arthurian tales, Gawain seems to be the biggest jerk so far, or at the very least, he's tied with Sir Kay.)
Also, I am amused that everyone in the book seems to be an unabashed screaming fanboy/closet stalker of Lancelot. Even people who have never met him are all, "Lancelot is so awesome!" or "That knight is pretty good...Maybe he's Lancelot in disguise!" or "Hey, who are you? Because I am totally in love with Sir Lancelot, and if you're him I want to tell you how awesome you are...! Aww...you're not him D:" Seriously, Tristram has never met the guy, and he's going around doing good deeds "for the love of Sir Lancelot." And sparing Lancelot's relatives in battle because he doesn't want to hurt the kin "of so fair a knight as Sir Lancelot."
People. I know he's great and all. But please go take a cold shower. In fact, a shower in general might not be a bad idea.
Also, knights of Cornwall get no respect. Seriously. Maybe it's because Cornwall is considered kinda provincial and only good for mining and farming? But the moment a knight finds out that Tristram is from Cornwall, they're all, "What's the point of fighting you? No knight from *pfft* Cornwall can take us on! We're totally knights of the Round Table!" And then Sir Tristram beats them into a bloody pulp.
Hmm...I wonder if that's why Jack the Giant-Killer is explicitly called "a farmer of Cornwall"? Maybe it's to make him about as provincial and ordinary as possible?
Anyway, I'm just babbling about some really amusing thoughts that came to me while listening to this book. Seriously, I can't wait to finish the whole thing and then play Shadows over Camelot. I wonder if the knights' individual powers would make more sense?