jan 1, 1180 - Lanval

Description:

o Information is limited: we know the author’s name and country of origin (France); writing short romances with fairy elements in England during the 1180s.
o Wrote a translation of Aesop’s fables.
o She is one of the few named women authors of the Middle Ages; there are more in French than in English – the latter only has two: Margery Kempe and Julian of Norwich. She continues to be read and translated throughout the Middle Ages.
- Why Reading Medieval Literature is difficult for the modern reader.
o Lanval is a Romance, which does not mean a love story (contemporary sense); rather, it is written in one of five Romance languages: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian – referred to as such because they are derived from Latin, which is the language of Rome – they are Rome(ance) languages.
 Rather than a love as an idealized form, Marie is writing a vernacular tale.
 Problem of Medieval Romance from a contemporary perspective: we lack the knowledge that underlies structure and expectations – they feel meandering and chaotic; we expect a coherent narrative (e.g., consider horror films: certain tropes signify a forthcoming event).
 Medieval Romances are primarily allegorical texts, which means they seldom present fully realized characters; rather the characters are types.
o Arthurian Structure: an adventure begins in the court; the characters leave the court to another space that is often otherworldly; an adventure therein changes them; concludes with a return to the court.
 Liminality: the journey into an alternate space is where the hero may learn something and we, as readers, also learn something; liminal spaces are marked out by transitions across thresholds.
o Romance, meanwhile, often critiques the Arthurian world. How can we, in our own feudal society, learn from Arthur – how can we live up to a potential that Arthur may represent or fail to achieve.
- Lanval
- Ferrante believes that Marie’s texts are about ideal spaces: that love is idealized, and the hero is going off into an idealized world of abstract, sensual, and emotional pleasure, leaving the corrupt Arthurian world.
o Consider reading against this: what if the characterization of the idealized space is negative rather than positive.
 The narrator (also, presumably, the author) is reading this aloud, which allows you to hear the words, focus on your jaw (increases articulation), and makes reading a multi-sensory experience.
 (line 7) Arthur is under attack by the Picts; if we consider society around 1180 CE., there are no longer individual bands of warriors that hold individual segments of land – the alliances of Anglo-Saxon England and Norse Society give way to a Feudal system, which implies a hierarchical structure wherein the landholders owe allegiance to those above them, who also owe allegiance to those above them, and so on. When invasion happens, the King goes down the hierarchy in procuring defenses.
• (Lines 17-18) how feudal society is maintained: assistance is redistributed: the King gets the spoils of war (wives and lands), which he divides amongst those below him. This helps him strengthen his kingdom. Through marriage and land contracts, everyone owes allegiance to someone else. Arthur, in the opening lines, is trying to solidify feudal relations.
- Lanval is a vassal, but the King does not distribute gifts to him. He is out of both the vertical and horizontal bonds that bind this feudal society together.
o (Lines 39-46) sense of isolation; symbolic vocabulary that is relevant: when he arrives at a stream, we as readers should know that the stream symbolizes an escape from the real world; however, our literary experience is not that of a medieval reader: we don’t always recognize the clues that are dropped (this just takes a lot of experience with these texts).
 Consider Lord of the Flies  the boys are surrounded by water; they enter a new space wherein they change (also, the Odyssey, Arthur going off to Avalon, etc.).
o (Line 57) The horse picks up on this pending change, but consider how the horse is treated: in Medieval literature, horses have a symbolic value that they no longer have; when we think of horses, we often associate them with aristocracy or in the Old Western sense; everyone in the Middle Ages, however, rides a horse, especially Knights. That Lanval should dismount his horse and enter the new realm without it implies an abandonment of his chivalric identity.
 Horse in contemporary metaphors:
 today, we confuse the words “Reign” and “rein” in a lot of horse metaphors that have their origins in the Middle Ages: consider the riding metaphors in phrases such as “give free rein” or “rein someone in”. They are both about using reins to conrol a horse
 A horse who is “headstrong” will not respond to the pressure you produce via the reins.
 To “spur” someone on refers to kicking a horse’s backside.
 “the bit in his teeth” is someone who is determined to follow through on a plan regardless of consequences; based on the manner in which horses shake their heads in an attempt move the bit until they can bite down on it, making it effectively useless. When a horse has “the bit in his teeth”, you can’t control it.
 All of these metaphors stem from medieval authors who use horses as metaphors for will. When Lanval removes the saddle, every medieval reader knows what this means – Lanval has abandoned control of his will by letting his horse run free.
o (Lines 77-79) Lanval’s in big trouble, for he gives no thought to his horse – i.e., he is no longer acting under rational will.
- Look at the description of the fairy lady (lines from 50-160): think of the way details are brought out and what they mean (to you and to medieval readers). Pay particular attention to the lengthy descriptions of women – every description tells you something about them.

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