Type
Text
Type
Dissertation
Advisor
Spector, Stephen | Martinez Pizarro, Joaquin | Pfeiffer, Douglas | Kerth, Thomas.
Date
2016-12-01
Keywords
Arthurian legend, Geoffrey of Monmouth, knighthood, Malory, nostalgia, romance | Medieval literature -- English literature
Department
Department of English
Language
en_US
Source
This work is sponsored by the Stony Brook University Graduate School in compliance with the requirements for completion of degree.
Identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/11401/77509
Publisher
The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY.
Format
application/pdf
Abstract
This dissertation examines nostalgia for the ideals of King Arthur’s court as represented in medieval versions of Arthurian legend. Nostalgia has typically been considered a modern phenomenon and has often been disparagingly associated with sentimentality or strict conservatism; however, this project aims to show that nostalgia can be a useful critical framework for understanding medieval approaches to romance, particularly the retellings of familiar tales like the stories of King Arthur and his knights. Using a chronological study of significant medieval Arthurian retellings, I argue that both the ideals themselves and the sense of nostalgia evoked are malleable and dependent on the context of the individual work. However, the stability of the legend’s plot, its sustained popularity, both during the Middle Ages and since the nineteenth century, and the consistent engagement with the past in a way that highlights its superiority and invites the reader to long for or even recreate both the abstract values and concrete forms allow us to appreciate how the values themselves evolve and how authors are able to work within the tradition to achieve their own ends. An unavoidable element of the Arthurian myth is its failure: the Round Table fellowship is doomed to collapse. A central concern of this project is how medieval authors navigate the failure of the ideal while preserving nostalgia for it. Some, like the Stanzaic Morte Arthur, are unable to reconcile the failure of the Round Table with longing for its values and end in mourning. Others, like the Queste del Saint Graal, resort to critique. But the culminating work of medieval Arthurian legend in English, Sir Thomas Malory’s Morte Darthur balances longing and loss resulting in a work that allows the audience to revel in the bittersweet feeling of nostalgia, take pride in the past glory of both their nation and their knightly institution, and find hope rather than despair for the future of chivalry and the future of England. | This dissertation examines nostalgia for the ideals of King Arthur’s court as represented in medieval versions of Arthurian legend. Nostalgia has typically been considered a modern phenomenon and has often been disparagingly associated with sentimentality or strict conservatism; however, this project aims to show that nostalgia can be a useful critical framework for understanding medieval approaches to romance, particularly the retellings of familiar tales like the stories of King Arthur and his knights. Using a chronological study of significant medieval Arthurian retellings, I argue that both the ideals themselves and the sense of nostalgia evoked are malleable and dependent on the context of the individual work. However, the stability of the legend’s plot, its sustained popularity, both during the Middle Ages and since the nineteenth century, and the consistent engagement with the past in a way that highlights its superiority and invites the reader to long for or even recreate both the abstract values and concrete forms allow us to appreciate how the values themselves evolve and how authors are able to work within the tradition to achieve their own ends. An unavoidable element of the Arthurian myth is its failure: the Round Table fellowship is doomed to collapse. A central concern of this project is how medieval authors navigate the failure of the ideal while preserving nostalgia for it. Some, like the Stanzaic Morte Arthur, are unable to reconcile the failure of the Round Table with longing for its values and end in mourning. Others, like the Queste del Saint Graal, resort to critique. But the culminating work of medieval Arthurian legend in English, Sir Thomas Malory’s Morte Darthur balances longing and loss resulting in a work that allows the audience to revel in the bittersweet feeling of nostalgia, take pride in the past glory of both their nation and their knightly institution, and find hope rather than despair for the future of chivalry and the future of England. | 245 pages
Recommended Citation
Miscavige, Katherine Marie, "Recapturing Camelot: Nostalgia for the Failed Ideals of Arthurian Legend" (2016). Stony Brook Theses and Dissertations Collection, 2006-2020 (closed to submissions). 3318.
https://commons.library.stonybrook.edu/stony-brook-theses-and-dissertations-collection/3318