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Florida State University Libraries Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2019 Between Past(s) and Future(s): Translating the Space of Appearance in MChriisdtopdhelre Je nEsenn glish Arthurian Literature Follow this and additional works at the DigiNole: FSU's Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES BETWEEN PAST(S) AND FUTURE(S): TRANSLATING THE SPACE OF APPEARANCE IN MIDDLE ENGLISH ARTHURIAN LITERATURE By CHRISTOPHER JENSEN A DissertAtion submitted to the Department of EnglisH in partiAL fulfiLLment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of PhiLosophy 2019 Christopher Jensen defended this dissertAtion on MAy 20, 2019. The members of the supervisory committee were: DAvid F. Johnson Professor Directing DissertAtion Reinier Leushuis University RepresentAtive JAmie C. Fumo Committee Member Bruce T. Boehrer Committee Member A. E. B. Coldiron Committee Member The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members, and certifies tHAt the dissertAtion has been approved in accordance with university requirements. ii For KeLsey, wimmonnen leofvest me. And for MArgery And Arthur, oft boþe blysse and blunder. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I must begin by tHAnking the people who plAnted and cultivated mAny of the ideAs tHAt found some version of mAturity in this present volume. DAvid Johnson introduced me to ArthuriAn literature in my first semester of graduate school and has endlessLy encouraged and refined my criticAL approach in the yeArs since. Anne Coldiron opened up the wide worlds of mAteriALity and FrencH-to-EnglisH transLAtion to me, giving me my first foothold in the methodologies tHAt would lAter define my course of study. Bruce Boehrer tAught me patient reAding and why MiLton wiLL aLwAys be my favorite acAdemic hobby. Lori WALters immersed me more fulLy in the Francophone and wALked me for the first time through the wiLderness of the Roman de la Rose. FinaLLy, JAmie Fumo showed me how to turn my lifeLong fascination with cLAssicAL myth into something worthwhiLe and tAught me (At lAst) how to stop worrying and love Chaucer. My work would be nothing—or worse, on HAwthorne—without the support and encouragement shown to me throughout my graduate study by these briLLiAnt scholArs and teAchers. I aLso tHAnk Charles Brewer for serving as my University RepresentAtive through the mAjority of the process and Reinier Leushuis for his wiLLingness to fiLL tHAt role At the very lAst minute. Looking backwArd, my time in the Frederick M. Supper Honors Program at PALm BeAch AtLAntic University gave me much of the mentAL furniture tHAt I arranged and reArranged time And again in the eArly yeArs of my twenties when my interest in mAny of these ideAs, if not these texts specificALLy, wAs born. KAtHLeen Anderson gave me tHe push I needed to study literature, Josh Avery brought me into the Middle Ages for the very first time, SAm JoeckeL trusted me with his own reseArch and gave me the tools necessAry for my MAster’s-LeveL work, and BeAte RodewALd, most of aLL, suffered through four straight semesters of my adolescent seLf-discovery And kindled my ongoing love affair with HAnnah Arendt. iv I aLso extend my profound gratitude to the Strozier Library stAff members who HAve tireLessLy processed my hundreds of requests and deLivered Loans to the WiLLiAms BuiLding. I don’t think I could have written any of this without the Library Express DeLivery Service. My parents, of course, provided me with the opportunities I needed to pursue my very speciALized interests and, for better or worse, knew better tHAn to try to cHAnge my mind. I hope they’re proud of me. The MedievaL Studies Workshop at FSU, organized by Beth CoggesHALL, gave me useful feedback on a very eArly draft of Chapter Three, as did the paneL and audience of my session at the 2018 New ColLege Conference on MedievaL and RenaissAnce Studies. In particulAr, JAmie Fumo, DAvid Johnson, and Francis Cairns asked difficult questions for which I had to reALLy dig for an answer. The audiences of my paneLs at the 2017 InternationaL Congress on MedievaL Studies and SoutheAst MedievaL AssociAtion conference likewise gave me heLpful comments on smALL arguments tHAt together becAme the bones of Chapter Four. DAvid Johnson wAs especiALLy encouraging regarding my reAding of despair as the motivating affect of the StAnzAic Morte Arthur And sent me a draft of his own articLe on the WheeL of Fortune in tHAt poem, soon after published in Arthuriana. KAt Tracy aLso gave me brief reseArch notes on a reLAted project tHAt found their wAy, as these things often do, into tHat cHApter. FinaLLy, I would be remiss if I did not acknowLedge my friends and colLeAgues in TALLAHAssee, especiALLy Kim Anderson and RacheL Duke, who let me sit with them at conferences, and RitA Mookerjee, who gave me the venue to write something eLse for a cHAnge. Above aLL, KeLsey WArd fed me and heLd me and tALked me down off the ledge more times tHAn I recALL, especiALLy in the lAst month of the process, and I cAn’t tHAnk her enough for enduring my dissertAtion stress whiLe she did most of the work of plAnning our wedding. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................. vii INTRODUCTION—ALWAYS ALREADY FALLEN: THE SPACE OF APPEARANCE AND TRANSVERNACULAR ADAPTATION ..................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER ONE—ARTHUR AND THE SUBJECT OF HISTORY: THE INVENTION OF SPEECH IN LAȜAMON’S BRUT ............................................................................................... 27 CHAPTER TWO—OTHERS SPOKE OF LOVE: RECONFIGURING THE CHIVALRIC IDENTITY CIRCUIT IN YWAIN AND GAWAIN ........................................................................ 67 CHAPTER THREE—ONE OR SEVERAL GAWAINS: IDENTITY AND INTERTEXT IN SIR GAWAIN AND THE GREEN KNIGHT ...................................................................................... 102 CHAPTER FOUR—AFTER ARTHUR: THE STANZAIC MORTE ARTHUR AND THE PROBLEM OF SALVATION .................................................................................................... 143 AFTERWORD—ARTHURIAN AFFECT: THE “ONCE AND FUTURE” THING ............... 180 BIBLIOGRAPHY ....................................................................................................................... 183 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ...................................................................................................... 196 vi ABSTRACT The genre of ArthuriAn literature is defined by its presentAtion of a noble society of knights and lAdies, most often utiLized in literary texts as A kind of medievaL shortHAnd for AcceptAble sociAL beHAvior, perhaps especiALLy in aristocratic settings. Knighthood is configured most often in FrencH-LAnguage literature of the “tweLftH-century renaissAnce” as an aspirationaL mAsculine sociAL identity, an office ordained by God for the eLite cLAss. When tHAt literature wAs transLAted into Middle English in the folLowing centuries, however, the different sociAL functions And expectAtions of literary chivaLry in EnglAnd provided a distinct terroir in which it might grow, producing narratives with a courtLy cAst for a decidedly broader audience, an audience perhaps far removed from the LiteraL offices of king and knight. Arthur’s knights in Middle English literature thus often embody a more generaLized etHos, but the imAginary space of ArthuriAn BritAin ensures tHAt its speculAr cApacity for sociAL commentAry and the stimulAtion of AspirationaL identity remAins intAct, even when the practicAble nobiLity of Arthur’s court does not necessAriLy cohere Across texts and traditions. vii INTRODUCTION ALWAYS ALREADY FALLEN: THE SPACE OF APPEARANCE AND TRANSVERNACULAR ADAPTATION Wherever people gather, it is potentiALLy there, but only potentiALLy, not necessAriLy And not forever. THAt civiLizAtions cAn rise And faLL, tHAt mighty empires And greAt cultures cAn decLine And pass AwAy without externaL cAtAstrophes—And more often tHAn not such externaL ‘cAuses’ Are preceded by A Less visible internaL decAy tHAt invites disAster—is due to this peculiArity of the public reALm, which, becAuse it ultimAteLy resides on Action And speech, never ALtogether Loses its potentiAL cHAracter. HAnnah Arendt, The Human Condition Introduction The themAtic core of ArthuriAn literature is the court. Across every lAnguage of composition and literary genre, the narrative of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round TAble, even when cALLed by other names, depends centraLLy on the ideA of a chivaLric public estAblished in the presence of its king. The geographic space of Arthur’s domAin is identified variousLy— BritAin, EnglAnd, Logres—And finds its cApitAL in any number of cAstLes, most often Caerleon, CarlisLe, and CameLot, but the defining feAture of the ArthuriAn reALm is its body politic, its court of knights and lAdies with whom innumerable authors have populAted their imAginings of a noble society lost to the ravages of time. Norris LAcy and Geoffrey Ashe argue tHAt in aLL of its permutAtions, “King Arthur’s BritAin is an ideALized medievaL kingdom, a sort of chivaLric UtopiA,”1 which is to sAy, in the tradition of ThomAs More, No-PLAce, an artificiAL world or “speculAtive myth… designed to contAin or provide a vision for one’s sociAL ideAs.”2 For this reAson, the ArthuriAn legend is an inexhaustible mine for literary
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