ENL 4218.001 Fall 2023 Johnson

This course aims to explore some of the broader historical, narrative, poetic, and thematic contexts at work in the literature of the European Middle Ages by examining as a case study the varied and voluminous body of texts surrounding King Arthur. We will begin with the earliest chronicle accounts of his deeds and move through Geoffrey of Monmouth's influential History of the Kings of Britain before spending a considerable amount of time in the chivalric romance tradition, as established by Chrétien de Troyes and Marie de France, that flourished in French-speaking locales soon after. The Holy Grail and related issues of spirituality and sexuality will come into focus halfway through, and we will close out the semester by dwelling on the particular English treatment of the legend that came about in the later Middle Ages with so-called minstrel romances, the masterful Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and the English Death of Arthur tradition.