The History of the Arthurian Legends in Ten Easy Steps (with Recommended Reading)

[zahrawithaz]

There is no set canon. There never has been.

Unlike many other legends that have been retold repeatedly, there’s no unified original text for the stories about Arthur and his associates. Bear in mind that for most of their history, the Arthurian legends circulated orally and through manuscripts; just as oral traditions can vary over time, different

Comments

[wee_warrior]

so there are some large omissions (Tristan & Isolde, practically the entire German canon, etc. etc.).

Alas, Wolfram von Eschenbach! The Lady Kundry - his version, not Wagner's - is probably my favourite character in anything ever.

(now back to reading your list, just wanted to mention that first. :))

[zahrawithaz]

Oh, yes, go ahead and make me feel more guilty! I myself mourn the absence of all the Big Three of the medieval German Arthurians--I myself adore Gottfried's Tristan.)

It was hard, but brevity is not my strength and I was really striving to keep it a manageable length. And unfortunately the show Merlin, like most Arthuriana in English, tends to ignore the German sources...I hope you enjoy it despite these omissions.

[wee_warrior]

I enjoyed it immensely, thank you. The time when I was really, massively interested in Athurian Legend has long passed, but this brought back a lot of memories - and I don't think I saw all of it so comprehensively listed.

As a German, Parzifal (or Percival, or Peredur, as he also often ends up) is one of the characters I'm of course most familiar with, and I like him a lot, especially since he's so flawed. When I was little, I had a rather well-read abbreviated and simplified version of Eschenbach's epic, and a lot of things, such as his childhood and the story with the songbirds, are still vividly in my mind.

Have you ever read Philip Reeve's Here Lies Arthur? It's a very interesting modern treatment, an extremely ambitious YA novel, with emphasis on gender and the fluent relation between truth and lies and myth building. It has a crossdressing heroine and rather unusual versions of most of the characters.

(Finally, thanks for mentioning Bradshaw, I used to love her trilogy so much!)

[zahrawithaz]

So glad you did

[utterlunacy]

Now that was a great read! Thanks for all the research!

[zahrawithaz]

Thank you, and you're welcome!

[fragmentedsky]

Thank you SO much for this post! I'm familiar with some of the aspects of this but not most, and while it was always lurking in the back of my mind when I watched the show (what was or wasn't 'jumping the shark' so to speak in regard to the original legend) I didn't have it in me to pull it all together. I'm far too easily distracted. This is readable, interesting, witty, and of course wonderfully eye-opening. Kudos!

[zahrawithaz]

Thanks very much! I wanted to do something that would be a resource for people, but also set up some of why it's so hard to keep track of the different versions--the manuscripts really do vary a lot--and still give people a narrative they could follow. I'm so glad it worked for you!

[heather]

Super-fascinating post, Z! I enjoyed it from start to finish. ♥ I think it's interesting Morgan is Ygraine's daughter more than once, and that Ygraine was married to Gorlois in another version. (My mind's still turning over possibilities for what that family tree will shape up to look like on Merlin, hee.)

Especially interested (predictably, heh) in how Guinevere's been portrayed from the very beginning.

I'm going to check out some of this reading for sure - thank you so much for putting this together and for your thoughts at the end when it comes to Merlin/the things that are new (or not new). They're playing with a lot of recognizable elements from various legends, but it's pretty clear they're not exactly retelling any particular one. I kind of enjoy how they toy with viewer expectations and it'll be interesting to see how many of our expectations will be subverted in the end.

[zahrawithaz]

So glad you enjoyed! Yes, Morgan is usually Ygraine and Gorlois's daughter (sometimes Ygrain and Uther's) if she's related to Arthur, so it's interesting that the show has thus far gone another route...I'm really not sure what they're going to do there, but I do hope that there's at least one juicy secret to be revealed.

And the way Guinevere has been portrayed over the years is endlessly fascinating...Her portrayal in the show is one of the few elements that does feel genuinely new in this treatment--both making her a servant (historically the legends haven't been very interested in class) and in the emotional journeys of the character--growing from a shy woman into a more forceful figure who rescues others, and from a character who hides her emotions and vulnerability to one who allows and takes risks on intimacy.

I also love the way the show plays with viewer expectations. Many recent retelling use the same technique, making the audience (or, in cases like the fun and fluffy YA book Avalon High, genre-savvy characters) think that

[heather]

(historically the legends haven't been very interested in class)

This fascinates me because class permeates this show and the character dynamics on almost every level I can think of and it adds a lot of interesting layers. I wonder what made them focus so much on that. (I'm glad they do.)

Gwen's emotional journey on Merlin is really satisfying to watch even though it doesn't get much screentime - especially since we don't get much of her side of things historically until some of the other modern versions. But yeah, watching her grow is just about my favorite thing on the show. ♥

(You should link this at onceandfutures, if you feel like it! I think quite a few people would love to read a roundup like this that flows so cohesively over the years -- and anything Arthurian that touches on either or both Arthur and Guinevere is more than relevant. *g* Also, I messaged you back re: crossposting at the Fleet.)

[snarp]

If this is what you do when fandom discussions annoy you, then I think I'm going to have to hope you get annoyed more often.

[zahrawithaz]

Hee! There actually wasn't much annoyance, though I will admit I'm not fond of the assertion that the show is following some magical medieval canonical text.

But I do think that the older (read: medieval) versions of the story can be very hard to follow or disentangle, and I wanted to put together a resource that would work for people who haven't spent years of their life working with medieval lit. Glad you enjoyed!