Study Guide: Le Morte d’Arthur (Kiley Dhatt)
Title: Le Morte d’Arthur
Author (if known): Sir Thomas Malory
Publication Date: 1485 (1st ed. William Caxton)
Form/genre: Prose, episodic (pre-novel)
Short context (historically speaking): The fifteenth century witnessed a cult of chivalry such as
had never been known before; its practitioners seem to have thought of it as a revival, but it is
hard to find actual precedents. Chivalric orders were founded in order to set standards of
aspiration in a world that was less than ideal. Local and national disorder in England increased in
intensity in the course of the fifteenth century. The weak adult rule of Henry VI culminated in
civil war between his house of Lancaster and the rival dynasty of York (War of the Roses); but
the battle for the throne was only the extreme form of a more general feuding and civil
disturbance, which a stronger king could have controlled. Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur rewrites
prior Arthurian material from Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain c. 1136),
Chretien de Troyes’s French Arthurian verse romances (c. 1160-90), the French prose Vulgate
Cycle (Lancelot-Graal, c. 1215-25), Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (c.1380), and the
alliterative Morte Arthure (c.1390), among others. (Adapted from Introduction to Le Morte
Darthur: The Winchester Manuscript ed. Helen Cooper 1998.)
Content (brief overview of the entire narrative):
Book I: Le Morte d'Arthur tells the story of King Arthur and his Knights at the Round Table.
Arthur, who is son of King Uther Pendragon but was raised by another family, takes his rightful
place as king when, as a boy, he is able to pull the sword called Excalibur from the stone.
Although he rules wisely and is counseled by Merlin the magician, Arthur makes enemies of
other kings and is often at war. When Arthur marries Guinevere, her father gives Arthur the
Round Table, at which 150 men can sit. Arthur is nearly betrayed by his sister Morgan le Fay,
but he is helped by Nineve, a sorceress who learned her magic powers from Merlin before killing
him.
Book II: When Emperor Lucius of Rome demands that Arthur bow to him, Arthur then fights
the Romans. Although the war requires several battles, Arthur and his knights win and return to
Guinevere and the other wives.
Book III: Soon after, Lancelot establishes himself as the greatest knight in all the world by his
virtue, loyalty, and bravery.
Book IV: At the same time, Sir Gareth, Gawain's brother, proves valiant in his adventures.
Book V: Tristam (also known as Tristan) kills Sir Marhault to free his uncle from a debt owed to
King Angwyssh of Ireland, and then falls in love with Isode (also known as Isolde), Angwyssh's
daughter. Isode marries Tristam's uncle Mark, but Tristam and Isode remain lovers. Tristam is
exiled by Mark, which means he can no longer use his true identity; thus, he fights as The Knight
with the Black Shield. Tristam duels and beats many of Arthur's knights, but is eventually
thrown in prison and becomes ill. He escapes and eventually meets and fights Lancelot in a duel
predicted by Merlin. They become the best of friends.
Lancelot, who is in love with and completely loyal to Guinevere, rides one day in search of
adventure. He kills a dragon, sees the Grail, and is tricked into lying with Pellas' daughter
Elayne, with whom he has a son, Galahad. Guinevere, upon hearing of the affair, has Lancelot
banished from court; Launcelot then wanders from place to place in his grief, having gone mad.
Elayne, through her father, heals Lancelot through the Grail, and he eventually returns joyously
to Camelot and the Round Table.
Book VI: Lancelot introduces his son (by Elayne), Galahad, to the court, and Galahad takes the
Siege Perilous, the seat at the Round Table that no knight has been worthy enough to fill.
Galahad also draws the sword from the floating stone, establishing him as the best knight in the
world, but also accepting the sword's curse — that it will later cause a grievous wound. Most of
the knights of the Round Table then set out separately on Grail Quest. During the Quest,
Lancelot, Percival, and Bors experience deep religious conversion, while Ector and Gawain are
told by a hermit that they are not pure enough to achieve the Grail Quest. Lancelot and Galahad
continue to the Grail at Castle Corbenic, where Lancelot is shown to be unworthy of the Quest.
When Sir Evelake dies after his embrace with Galahad, Galahad is identified as the knight who
will achieve the Grail Quest. Galahad is made a king who dies shortly thereafter, while Percival
becomes a hermit. Bors returns to King Arthur's court.
Book VII: Lancelot also returns to the court and continues his love for Guinevere. After a series
of trials, Guinevere is convinced of Lancelot's love for her.
Book VIII: Although Arthur knows of the affair and overlooks it, he is prompted by Aggravain
and Mordred (Arthur's son by Lot's wife) to take action; Guinevere is sentenced to be burned at
the stake. Lancelot rescues her and takes her to his castle, Joyous Gard, but in the battle,
Lancelot kills Gareth and Gaheris, who are at the execution but are unarmed. Lancelot returns
Guinevere to Arthur, but Lancelot is banished, along with his followers. Gawain swears
vengeance for the death of his brothers and insists that Arthur attack Lancelot. Arthur agrees, but
while Arthur and Gawain are away, Mordred makes himself King of England, claims Guinevere
as his wife, and attacks Arthur's army. Gawain is mortally wounded and warns Arthur in a dream
not to continue the battle. Through a misunderstanding, however, the battle continues; Arthur
kills Mordred but is mortally wounded by him, as Merlin has prophesied. Lancelot and
Guinevere both die of illness soon after, and Constantine becomes king. The Round Table is
disbursed.
(Summary adapted from Cliff’s Notes.)
Themes: Helen Cooper argues that Malory’s version of the legends of Arthur is not a clash
between earthly and divine focused on the issue of sexual sinfulness, but a study of the personal
rivalries that underlie political disintegration. She claims that the work is not an exercise in
nostalgia for a golden age, but an account of the destruction of an ideal. The ideal of knighthood
that Malory presents is summarized in the oath sworn by the Round Table knights: to avoid
treason and wrongful quarrels; to show mercy; never to offer violence, especially sexual
violence, to gentlewomen (the aristocratic social basis is a premise almost universal in medieval
romance, not least in Arthurian material) and to fight on their behalf. Cooper also observes that
Malory’s Arthurian world operates by the principles of a shame culture, where worth is
measured in terms of reputation, rather than by the principles of guilt culture, of what one’s
conscience may declare to be right or wrong. This is why it doesn’t really bother Arthur that
Guinevere has a longtime affair with Lancelot.
Keywords/Tags: chivalry, knighthood, courtly love, Arthurian romance, kings and rulers,
adultery, sin, confession, mysticism, magic, imagining the nation, legend, fellowship
Key Passages: The following passages are from books V-VIII; for passages from Books I-IV, see
Naghmeh’s SG.
Context: This vision occurs during Lancelot’s quest for the Holy Grail. It turns out that this was a
religious test/warning of sorts, as a woman recluse [one of many throughout the stories] explains
to Lancelot that the knights in black “betokeneth the sins whereof they be not confessed,”
whereas the knights in white “betokeneth virginity, and they that hath chosen chastity.”
Lancelot’s inclination to demonstrate his chivalry by helping the side that was failing overlooked
a moral obligation in favor of pride/vanity, which, the hermit explains, greatly angered God, who
sent the vision “to say to thee [Lancelot] that thou were of evil faith and of poor belief, the which
will make thee to fall into the deep pit of hell if thou keep thee not better. Now have I warned
thee of thy vainglory and of thy pride, that thou hast many times erred against thy Maker.”
And then Sir Lancelot and he went to supper, and so laid them to rest; and his hair
pricked fast and grieved him sore, but he took it meekly and suffered the pain. And so on
the morn he heard his Mass and took into a forest and held no highway. And as he looked
before him he saw a fair plain, and beside that a fair castle, and before the castle were
many pavilions of silk and of divers hue. And him seemed that he saw there five hundred
knights riding on horseback, and there were two parties: they that were of the castle were
all on black horses and their trappings black, and they that were without were all on white
horses and trappings. So there began a great tournament, and each hurtled with other that
it marvelled Sir Lancelot greatly. And at the last him thought they of the castle were put
to the worse. Then thought Sir Lancelot for to help there the weaker party in increasing of
his chivalry. And so Sir Lancelot thrust in among the party of the castle, and smote down
a knight, horse and man, to the earth; and then he rushed here and there and did many
marvellous deeds of arms. And then he drew out his sword and struck many knights to
the earth, that all that saw him marvelled that ever one knight might do so great deeds of
arms. But always the white knights held them nigh about Sir Lancelot for to tire him and
wind him; and at the last Sir Lancelot was so weary of his great deeds that he might not
lift up his arms for to give one stroke, that he weened never to have borne arms. And then
they all took and led him away into a forest, and there made him to alight to rest him.
And then all the fellowship of the castle were overcome for the default of him. Then they
said all unto Sir Lancelot, ‘Blessed be God that ye be now of our fellowship, for we shall
hold you in our prison.’ And so they left him with few words. (From Book VI, “Of Sir
Lancelot [#2]”)
Context: Essentially in reference to the love between Guinevere and Lancelot. Malory seems to
recognize degrees of virtuousness: whereas Galahad is the embodiment of virtuous perfection, he
is almost unearthly for it; Lancelot, on the other hand, is technically a sinner because he often
puts his love for Guinevere above that for God, but he is also selfless in his love for Guinevere,
and is somewhat redeemed by that.
For like as winter rasure [destruction] doth alway erase and deface green summer, so
fareth it by unstable love in man and woman. For in many persons there is no stability;
for we may see all day, for a little blast of winter’s rasure, anon we shall deface and lay
apart true love for little or nought, that cost much thing. This is no wisdom nor no
stability, but it is feebleness of nature and great disworship, whosoever useth this.
Therefore, like as May month flowereth and flourisheth in every man’s garden, so in like
wise let every man of worship flourish his heart in this world, first unto God, and next
unto the joy of them that he promised his faith unto. For there was never worshipful man
nor worshipful woman, but they loved one better than another; and worship in arms may
never be foiled. But first reserve the honour to God, and secondly thy quarrel must come
of thy lady. And such love I call virtuous love.
But nowadays men cannot love seven night but they must have all their desires. That love
may not endure by reason; for where they be soon accorded and hasty, heat soon cooleth.
And right so fareth the love nowadays, soon hot, soon cold—this is no stability. But the
old love was not so; for men and women could love together seven years, and no
lecherous lusts were betwixt them, and then was love truth and faithfulness. And so in
like wise was used such love in King Arthur’s days. Wherefore I liken love nowadays
unto summer and winter; for like as the one is cold and the other is hot, so fareth love
nowadays. And therefore all ye that be lovers, call unto your remembrance the month of
May, like as did Queen Guenivere; for whom I make here a little mention, that while she
lived she was a true lover, and therefore she had a good end. (From Book VII)