The Romance Of The Grail

The first collection of Joseph Campbell's writings and lectures on the Arthurian romances of the Middle Ages, a central focus of his celebrated scholarship, now in paperback Throughout his life, Joseph Campbell was deeply engaged in the study of the Grail Quests and Arthurian legends of the European Middle Ages. In this new volume of the Collected Works of Joseph Campbell, editor Evans Lansing Smith collects Campbell's writings and lectures on Arthurian legends, including his never-before-published master's thesis on Arthurian myth, "A Study of the Dolorous Stroke." Campbell's writing captures the incredible stories of such figures as Merlin, Gawain, and Guinevere as well as the larger patterns and meanings revealed in these myths. Merlin's death and Arthur receiving Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake, for example, are not just vibrant stories but also central to the mythologist's thinking. The Arthurian myths opened the world of comparative mythology to Campbell, turning his attention to the Near and Far Eastern roots of myth. Calling the Arthurian romances the world's first "secular mythology," Campbell found metaphors in them for human stages of growth, development, and psychology. The myths exemplify the kind of love Campbell called amor, in which individuals become more fully themselves through connection. Campbell's infectious delight in his discoveries makes this volume essential for anyone intrigued by the stories we tell -- and the stories behind them.

Vivid translation of one of the earliest and most important Grail romances.

Written around 1200 A.D., probably in monastic circles, this is one of the earliest accounts of the Grail and its importance. It traces the cup from the Last Supper into the company formed by Joseph of Arimathea.

The early thirteenth-century French prose Lancelot-Grail Cycle (or Vulgate Cycle) brings together the stories of Arthur with those of the Grail, a conjunction of materials that continues to fascinate the Western imagination today. Representing what is probably the earliest large-scale use of prose for fiction in the West, it also exemplifies the taste for big cyclic compositions that shaped much of European narrative fiction for three centuries. A Companion to the Lancelot-Grail Cycle is the first comprehensive volume devoted exclusively to the Lancelot-Grail Cycle and its medieval legacy. The twenty essays in this volume, all by internationally known scholars, locate the work in its social, historical, literary, and manuscript contexts. In addition to addressing critical issues in the five texts that make up the Cycle, the contributors convey to modern readers the appeal that the text must have had for its medieval audiences, and the richness of composition that made it compelling. This volume will become standard reading for scholars, students, and more general readers interested in the Lancelot-Grail Cycle, medieval romance, Malory studies, and the Arthurian legends. Contributors: RICHARD BARBER, EMMANUELE BAUMGARTNER, FANNI BOGDANOW, FRANK BRANDSMA, MATILDA T. BRUCKNER, CAROL J. CHASE, ANNIE COMBES, HELEN COOPER, CAROL R. DOVER, MICHAEL HARNEY, DONALD L. HOFFMAN, DOUGLAS KELLY, ELSPETH KENNEDY, NORRIS J. LACY, ROGER MIDDLETON, HAQUIRA OSAKABE, HANS-HUGO STEINHOFF, ALISON STONES, RICHARD TRACHSLER. CAROL DOVER is associate professor of French and director of undergraduate studies, Georgetown University, Washington DC.

The Old French Lancelot-Graal is an important but massive work, providing a place for King Arthur not only in the history of Britain but also in Christian history. This new translation of one section, the Quest of the Holy Grail, will be a flexible addition to courses on medieval literature or romance. The notes and guides are designed to help readers enjoy the text while appreciating its relationship to social and literary history. Appendices include translations of material from two of Chrétien de Troyes’s romances (Perceval and Yvain); translations from other parts of the Lancelot-Grail Cycle (the early history of the Grail and the conception of Galahad); and excerpts from apocryphal works (from French versions written at about the same time as the Quest).

The mysterious and haunting Grail makes its first appearance in literature in Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval at the end of the twelfth century. But Chrétien never finished his poem, leaving an unresolved story and an incomplete picture of the Grail. It was, however, far too attractive an idea to leave. Not only did it inspire quite separate works; his own unfinished poem was continued and finally completed by no fewer than four other writers. The Complete Story of the Grail is the first ever translation of the whole of the rich and compelling body of tales contained in Chrétien's poem and its four Continuations, which are finally attracting the scholarly attention they deserve. Besides Chrétien's original text, there are the anonymous First Continuation (translated here in its fullest version), the Second Continuation attributed to Wauchier de Denain, and the intriguing Third and Fourth Continuations - probably written simultaneously, with no knowledge of each other's work - by Manessier and Gerbert de Montreuil. Two other poets were drawn to create preludes explaining the background to Chrétien's story, and translated here also are their works: The Elucidation Prologue and Bliocadran. Only in this, The Story of the Grail's complete form, can the reader appreciate the narrative skill and invention of the medieval poets and their surprising responses to Chrétien's theme - not least their crucial focus on the knight as a crusader. Equally, Chrétien's original poem was almost always copied in conjunction withone or more of the Continuations, so this translation represents how most medieval readers would have encountered it. Nigel Bryant's previous translations from Medieval French include Perlesvaus - the High Bookof the Grail, Robert de Boron's trilogy Merlin and the Grail, the Medieval Romance of Alexander, The True Chronicles of Jean le Bel and Perceforest.