courtly romance

This paper examines the multifaceted role of silence in the medieval romance La Mort Artu and its psychoanalytic and symbolic implications. Far from being a mere absence of speech, silence emerges as a vector of meaning, desire, and inner conflict, shaping both narrative structure and character subjectivity. Through a dual approach—narratological and psychoanalytic—the study distinguishes between the silence of the work (narrative omissions, ellipses, and structural gaps) and the silence within the work (the characters’ muteness and withheld speech). These two dimensions reveal a writing system in which the unsaid becomes a secondary language, expressing repressed impulses, moral prohibitions, and unconscious tensions.
Drawing on Freud’s concepts of repression, the death drive, and sublimation, as well as Lacan’s notion of symbolic castration, this analysis highlights silence as both a defensive mechanism and a site of revelation. The muteness of the characters—especially in relation to adultery and incest—reflects a deep struggle between passion and law, guilt and the chivalric ideal. Silence thus functions as both a tragic motor and a principle of order, a symptom of a collapsing Arthurian world.
Ultimately, La Mort Artu emerges as a narrative where speech exhausts itself before fate, and where silence—echoing psychoanalytic theory—embodies the temptation of return to non-being, the ultimate fusion of desire and death.

Glyn Hnutu-healh is a researcher focusing on Arthurian studies, alchemical traditions, and the intersection of history, mythology, and physics. He is best known as the primary author of Circle of Logres: Encyclopaedia Arthuriana, a comprehensive resource on the legends of King Arthur. His work explores the intersection of historical research, alchemical philosophy, and scientific inquiry. Early Life and Education Glyn Hnutu-healh holds a degree in Physics, which provides a scientific foundation for his interdisciplinary research. His academic background informs his approach to both Arthurian studies and the philosophical aspects of alchemy, allowing him to blend empirical methods with mythological and esoteric traditions.

Time and place forever blur the meaning of ancient writings and lost in the mists are the perspectives of authors. Many people write about their interpretations of what was long ago written, yet are not their writings based on their own biased opinions? This is such a work. I, a modern pagan, shall show my own perspectives on medieval British literature. As a focal point, I have chosen Sir Gawain & the Green Knight. I shall expand on this with reference to the Irish Tain and the Scottish Mobigonon. My intent is to show that medieval British literature exhibits

ria de Ponthieu constructed by Gerbert de Montreuil in Roman de la Violette reveals a reinterpretation of fin'amor, to be developed from a monarchic and clerical perspective in works such as Cléomadès i meliacin, composed in the literary circle of Maria de Brabant from a story by Blanca de França.

The parallel hunting and bedroom scenes in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight have been much discussed by scholars, though the argument usually centers on Lady Bertilak's role as a hunter. Exploring the poem through the lens of game theory demonstrates that not only is Gawain a hunter, but also that the central Exchanges Game is not a game, but rather an illusion of a game. This revelation opens up a means of investigating the Anglo-Norman and Welsh roles of the landscape and characters that both facilitate such an illusion but also cause a political tension in the poem. This article contends through close readings and historiographic analysis that the reader's identification with Gawain sets up an unease by the end of the poem when the figures of Bertilak, Lady Bertilak, and Morgan La Fay are revealed as both Otherworldly and decidedly Welsh. This discomfort is a means of reacting to and interrogating Anglo-Norman appropriation of Arthuriana.

The parallel hunting and bedroom scenes in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight have been much discussed by scholars, though the argument usually centers on Lady Bertilak’s role as a hunter. Exploring the poem through the lens of game theory demonstrates that not only is Gawain a hunter, but also that the central Exchanges Game is not a game, but rather an illusion of a game. This revelation opens up a means of investigating the Anglo-Norman and Welsh roles of the landscape and characters that both facilitate such an illusion but also cause a political tension in the poem. This article contends through close readings and historiographic analysis that the reader’s identification with Gawain sets up an unease by the end of the poem when the figures of Bertilak, Lady Bertilak, and Morgan La Fay are revealed as both Otherworldly and decidedly Welsh. This discomfort is a means of reacting to and interrogating Anglo-Norman appropriation of Arthuriana.

D en som undersöker riddarasögur är ofta hänvisad till mycket unga handskrifter. Erex saga har t.ex. bevarats enbart i eftermedeltida handskrifter. Det är i sådana fall ovisst vad den bevarade texten egentligen säger om riddarasögur som medeltida fenomen och om den norröna översättningsverksamheten vid kung Håkons hov. Vissa forskare, som Marianne Kalinke, har rått bot på detta genom att konsekvent tala om redaktören i stället för översättaren (Kalinke 1977: 126 etc.). Men då är det egentligen inte längre 1200-talets norröna litteratur man diskuterar. Och det har trots allt sitt intresse att försöka komma åt de ursprungliga tendenserna inom riddarasögur, de litterära drag som kännetecknade gruppen på 1200-talet, de likheter och skillnader som fanns i förhållande till annan norrön 1200-talslitteratur. Och då blir handskriften De la Gardie 4-7 av stor betydelse. Strengleikar -och i någon mån Pamphilus och Elíss saga ok Rósamundu, vilka finns i samma handskrift -intar en nyckelroll. Här har vi en handskrift från 1200-talet, möjligen från kung Håkons egen tid. 1 Kan typiska riddarasagatendenser beläggas i dessa verk är det sannolikt att det rör sig om ursprungliga 1200-talsdrag.

A principal aim of the book is to establish the tendencies and technique in the literary treatment of love and eroticism in the Icelandic saga literature. How do the sagas tell about erotic themes and emotions of love? What literary function do these motifs have? What kind of differencies are there between the different parts of the Old Norse literature? On the basis of these examinations I analyze the theme of love in seven individual family sagas: Laxdoela saga, Bjarnar saga Hítdoelakappa, Gunnlaugs saga ormstungu, Kormáks saga, Hallfreðar saga, Fóstbroeðra saga, and Víglundar saga. Another principal aim is to examine how the continental/courtly tradition of love depiction was received in Old Norse literature and to examine how the indigenous and the courtly tradition influence each other. These are some of the main conclusions of the book:

• There is a well-developed and distinctive indigenous tradition of love depiction. Love is in several family sagas a more important motif than most scholars have realized, due to their misinterpretation of elements in the technique of love depiction in the sagas.
• The indigenous saga literature and the indigenous poetic tradition show in all essentials different tendencies. There is not only one indigenous tradition of love depiction in Old Norse literature.
• The translated riddarasögur reproduce to a great extent the courtly continental tendencies from their originals as regards love/eroticism.
• The indigenous saga tendency does hardly at all influence the treatment of the motif of love/eroticism in the translated riddarasögur, and the continental tendency does only slightly influence the depiction of love/eroticism in the family sagas.
• Fornaldarsögur connect in their treatment of love on to the tradition of the indigenous saga literature. The theory of a strong influence on the fornaldarsögur from the translated riddarasögur and courtly literature is refuted. The indigenous riddarasögur connect in their treatment of love principally to the tendencies of the translated riddarasögur. The prevalent theory of a close relationship between the groups of fornaldarsögur and indigenous riddarasögur is strongly overstated.