On King Arthur

As some of you may know, I'm doing a course on King Arthur this semester.  We've only had three classes - one class last week was cancelled for snow - but it's still very interesting.  We're going over the various aspects of the Arthurian myth, starting from Arthur's origin story.
The thing about Arthur's legend is that, well, he's a legend. Someone important named 'Arthur' can be traced back to the Welsh writing during the Saxon invasion of what is now Wales in 410 AD, after the collapse of the Roman empire - and even then, it was a passing reference, as if everyone knew who Arthur was.  (He's like Jesus like that... is that bad to say?)  Since he's been around for several thousand years, the legend has changed.

Since the part we've focused on in class so far is just Arthur's origin story, that's what I'm focusing on today.

There have been four assigned texts for this portion: Geoffrey of Monmouth's A History of the Kings of Britain, which was finished around 1136 AD and contains accounts of other (also mythical) kings like Cymbeline and Lear; Thomas Malory's Le Morte Darthur, completed in 1467-70 (Malory, by the way, could have a novel written about his shenanigans, including the fact that he was knighted and then arrested and escaped prison via the moat... and again, with several swords and daggers); Lord Alfred Tennyson's Idylls of the King, written in 1839 to bad reviews and then re-released in 1859; the first 100 pages of The Once and Future King by T. H. White are due on Tuesday.

There only a few things agreed upon in the span of 800 years of myth: Igraine is pretty but married and Uther wants to get it on with her; on the night that her husband, Gorlois, dies in battle (that Uther started... probably), Uther goes in (possibly in the disguise of Gorlois because MAGIC) to bed her.  This is the night that Arthur is conceived; a short while later, they get married and Arthur is born. There are some stories that say that Merlin has him whisked off to grow up in a more humble area with a knight.

There are differences in the accounts, however. Geoffrey is more concerned with Arthur's exploits in the battlefield than his origins, so this whole story is the work of a few paragraphs. Igraine is consenting to sleep with Uther, and Gorlois apparently dies while Uther is in the building. When Igraine finds out the truth about who the father of her baby is, she is completely okay with the whole thing and rejoices in her new marriage. She's more of an object than a person here. Merlin is around - he gives Uther 'medicines' to change his face to that of Gorlois (this is a very Christian work, so 'magic' is probably not the best word to use). In Malory's account, she's similar - not only consenting to the match, but outright rejoicing that the baby is Uther's. This is the first time that Merlin is mentioned as taking the baby away afterwards. Also, Merlin seems more magical here - he casts a spell over Uther and several others to make Uther look like Gorlois and himself and one other man to look like Gorlois's companions.
In Tennyson's account, however, Igraine is the most different from the other two. Not only is Uther not disguised, but he goes in after Gorlois is dead and takes Igraine right there. She is CRYING at the wedding and CLEARLY NOT OKAY WITH IT.  The other interesting bit of Tennyson's account is that Guinevere is a bit different, too. She's beautiful, sure, but Tennyson's account really highlights that the relationship between Guinevere and Arthur: when they first get the chance to see each other, Arthur isn't wearing anything to distinguish himself as a king, so she barely notices him and he thinks she's the most attractive person that he's ever laid eyes on.  This sets up the interesting relationship between the two - it's the first time that you see the one-sidedness of it. Also, Tennyson includes two life lessons that we now know NEVER TO DO if we find ourselves in a work of fiction: first, Arthur sends his wingman LANCELOT to go get Guinevere from her palace on their wedding day; second, Arthur says to Guinevere at their wedding, "Behold, thy doom is mine... I love thee to the death."  words such as these have been said by John Grady Cole in Cities of the Plain by Cormac McCarthy; Romeo probably said it to Juliet.  Basically, the words "I WILL DIE FOR YOU" (or, you know, "I will love thee to death and doom and blah blah blah" or something) will be immediately noted by Fate and used for further reference.

That's all I have for now.  Farewell.