Special Themes in Literature: Arthurian Legends

Cross listed with MDVL_REN 3005-01

How can a pseudo-historical king and his court help us explore our relationship to history, love, ethics, and manners? The myth of King Arthur spans centuries of literary work and ranges across cultures and genres, accruing a dizzying array of characters, tropes, and symbols as it developed. we’ll meet giants, wizards, queens (evil and good and in-between), damsels (in and out of distress), knights, squires, as we traverse nearly a millennia of storytelling. 

We will start in the Middle Ages, whence the myth originated in prose histories, such as Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain, and poets like Chretien de Troyes rendered the matter in verse – and directed their imaginations to the romantic intrigues of Camelot’s royal court. Next, we’ll examine how Victorians responded to the tremendous social, economic, and cultural changes wrought by the Industrial Revolution with an Arthurian revival: poets, like Alfred Tennyson, and the painters of the pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood nostalgically reimagined the medieval texts, rewriting chivalric ethics to suit Victorian social and moral codes. We’ll conclude by surveying the dizzying array of Arthurian films, from Disney’s The Sword in the Stone to the Green Knight (2021) and consider how contemporary filmmakers reimagine Arthur to suit our own tastes and values. 

Assignments will include: a handwritten reading journal, lively discussions, 3 essays (2 short and 1 long), and a final presentation.