Four Arthurian Romances | Page 5

For the
glaring inconsistencies between the reality and the ideal, one may turn to the chronicles
of the period. Yet, even history tells of many an ugly sin rebuked and of many a gallant
deed performed because of the courteous ideals of chivalry. The debt of our own social
code to this literature of courtesy and frequent self-sacrifice is perfectly manifest.
What Chretien's immediate and specific source was for his romances is of deep interest to
the student. Unfortunately, he has left us in doubt. He speaks in the vaguest way of the
materials he used. There is no evidence that he had any Celtic written source. We are thus
thrown back upon Latin or French literary originals which are lost, or upon current
continental lore going back to a Celtic source. This very difficult problem is as yet
unsolved in the case of Chretien, as it is in the case of the Anglo-Norman Beroul, who
wrote of Tristan about 1150. The material evidently was at hand and Chretien
appropriated it, without much understanding of its primitive spirit, but appreciating it as a
setting for the ideal society dreamed of but not realised in his own day. Add to this
literary perspicacity, a good foundation in classic fable, a modicum of ecclesiastical
doctrine, a remarkable facility in phrase, figure, and rhyme and we have the foundations
for Chretien's art as we shall find it upon closer examination.
A French narrative poet of the twelfth century had three categories of subject-matter from
which to choose: legends connected with the history of France ("matiere de France"),
legends connected with Arthur and other Celtic heroes ("matiere de Bretagne"), and
stories culled from the history or mythology of Greece and Rome, current in Latin and
French translations ("matiere de Rome la grant"). Chretien tells us in "Cliges" that his
first essays as a poet were the translations into French of certain parts of Ovid's most
popular works: the "Metamorphoses", the "Ars Amatoria", and perhaps the "Remedia
Amoris". But he appears early to have chosen as his special field the stories of Celtic
origin dealing with Arthur, the Round Table, and other features of Celtic folk-lore. Not
only was he alive to the literary interest of this material when rationalised to suit the taste
of French readers; his is further the credit of having given to somewhat crude folk-lore
that polish and elegance which is peculiarly French, and which is inseparably associated
with the Arthurtan legends in all modern literature. Though Beroul, and perhaps other
poets, had previously based romantic poems upon individual Celtic heroes like Tristan,
nevertheless to Chretien, so far as we can see, is due the considerable honour of having
constituted Arthur's court as a literary centre and rallying- point for an innumerable
company of knights and ladies engaged in a never-ending series of amorous adventures
and dangerous quests. Rather than unqualifiedly attribute to Chretien this important
literary convention, one should bear in mind that all his poems imply familiarity on the
part of his readers with the heroes of the court of which he speaks. One would suppose
that other stories, told before his versions, were current. Some critics would go so far as
to maintain that Chretien came toward the close, rather than at the beginning, of a school
of French writers of Arthurian romances. But, if so, we do not possess these earlier
versions, and for lack of rivals Chretien may be hailed as an innovator in the current
schools of poetry.

And now let us consider the faults which a modern reader will not be slow to detect in
Chretien's style. Most of his salient faults are common to all mediaeval narrative
literature. They may be ascribed to the extraordinary leisure of the class for whom it was
composed--a class which was always ready to read an old story told again, and which
would tolerate any description, however detailed. The pastimes of this class of readers
were jousting, hunting, and making love. Hence the preponderance of these matters in the
literature of its leisure hours. No detail of the joust or hunt was unfamiliar or unwelcome
to these readers; no subtle arguments concerning the art of love were too abstruse to
delight a generation steeped in amorous casuistry and allegories. And if some scenes
seem to us indelicate, yet after comparison with other authors of his times, Chretien must
be let off with a light sentence. It is certain he intended to avoid what was indecent, as did
the writers of narrative poetry in general. To appreciate fully the chaste treatment of
Chretien one must know some other forms of mediaeval literature, such as the fabliaux,
farces, and morality plays, in which courtesy imposed no restraint. For our poet's lack of
sense of proportion, and for his carelessness in