3 Review(s)

This volume offers newly translated texts that exemplify the two most important traditions of Arthurian literature in the Middle Ages. Encompassing such key works such as Lawman's Brut and Wace's Romance of Brut, written respectively in Middle English and Old French, the Arthurian Epic Tradition depends on Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain, written in Latin. Many modern readers are more familiar with Arthur and his fabled court as the centrepiece of a massive Fictional Tradition, well represented in the second part of this volume, including Chretien de Troyes's Story of the Grail, The Quest of the Holy Grail, and the Perlesvaus. These selections emphasise the connection between secular and religious understandings of chivalry that is the most distinctive quality of medieval Arthurian romance. Useful as a classroom text, the volume provides material for a semester's worth of study.