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Perceforest Reader
Perceforest is one of the largest and certainly the most extraordinary
of the late Arthurian romances, and is almost completely unknown except to a handful of
scholars. But it is a work of exceptional richness and importance, and has been justly
described as "e;an encyclopaedia of 14th-century chivalry"e; and
"e;a mine of folkloric motifs"e;. Its contents are drawn not only from
earlier Arthurian material, but also from romances about Alexander the Great, from Roman
histories and from medieval travel writing - not to mention oral tradition, including as it
does the first and unexpurgated version of the story of the Sleeping Beauty. Out of this,
the author creates a remarkable prehistory of King Arthur's Britain, describing how
Alexander the Great gives the island to Perceforest, who has to purge the island of
magic-wielding knights descended from Darnant the Enchanter, despite their supernatural
powers. Perceforest then founds the knightly order of the "e;Franc
Palais"e;, an ideal of chivalric civilisation which prefigures the Round Table of
Arthur and indeed that of Edward III; but that civilisation is, as the author shows, all too
fragile. The action all takes place in a pagan world of many gods, but the temple of the
Sovereign God, discovered by Perceforest, prefigures the Christian world and the coming of
the Grail and Arthur. Nigel Bryant has recently adapted this immense romance into English;
even in his version, which gives a complete account of the whole work but links extensive
sections of full translation with compressed accounts of other passages, it runs to nearly
half amillion words. A Perceforest Reader is an ideal introduction to the remarkable world
portrayed in this late flowering of the Arthurian imagination.
of the late Arthurian romances, and is almost completely unknown except to a handful of
scholars. But it is a work of exceptional richness and importance, and has been justly
described as "e;an encyclopaedia of 14th-century chivalry"e; and
"e;a mine of folkloric motifs"e;. Its contents are drawn not only from
earlier Arthurian material, but also from romances about Alexander the Great, from Roman
histories and from medieval travel writing - not to mention oral tradition, including as it
does the first and unexpurgated version of the story of the Sleeping Beauty. Out of this,
the author creates a remarkable prehistory of King Arthur's Britain, describing how
Alexander the Great gives the island to Perceforest, who has to purge the island of
magic-wielding knights descended from Darnant the Enchanter, despite their supernatural
powers. Perceforest then founds the knightly order of the "e;Franc
Palais"e;, an ideal of chivalric civilisation which prefigures the Round Table of
Arthur and indeed that of Edward III; but that civilisation is, as the author shows, all too
fragile. The action all takes place in a pagan world of many gods, but the temple of the
Sovereign God, discovered by Perceforest, prefigures the Christian world and the coming of
the Grail and Arthur. Nigel Bryant has recently adapted this immense romance into English;
even in his version, which gives a complete account of the whole work but links extensive
sections of full translation with compressed accounts of other passages, it runs to nearly
half amillion words. A Perceforest Reader is an ideal introduction to the remarkable world
portrayed in this late flowering of the Arthurian imagination.
156 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 19, 2012
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