Malory II: The Sankgreal and the Fellowship's Trial

Malory calls his sixth tale "the Tale of the Sankgreal, whyche is a tale cronycled for one of the trewyst and of the holyest that ys in thys worlde" — and says he has "brefly drawyn [it] oute of Freynshhe." The brevity is the criticism. Following the Vulgate Queste (Unit 21) closely in event, Malory systematically lowers its clerical temperature: hermits' sermons shrink, allegorical exposition thins, and the axis of judgment tilts from chastity toward stability — steadfastness of heart. His Lancelot is the great beneficiary. Where the French Lancelot is a case study in condemned worldliness, Malory's is a tragic penitent whose confession costs him visibly, who "forgot the promyse and the perfeccion that he made in the queste... but in hys prevy thoughtes" — and whom the narrative loves even in failure. Malory keeps the hierarchy (Galahad achieves; Lancelot is granted the half-vision and told plainly that he has seen as much as he may); but where the Queste's verdict reads like a verdict, Malory's reads like a wound.

Read this tale asking what compilation is. Malory is not a translator but a re-proportioner: by cutting exegesis and keeping event, he lets the romance body reassert itself against the allegorical frame — and English literature's whole realist instinct is arguably being born in those cuts. Note too what he preserves with full force: the Pentecost oath, the Siege Perilous, Bors's return and the recording of the adventures "in grete bookes" — the scriptorium scene again, now in English. The tale ends with Lancelot half-healed and the court re-gathering; the last two units of Malory (Unit 29) will spend that remission with terrible efficiency.