Wolfie's Excalibur

 Well, it had to happen: Wolfie got his own Excalibur. Made of wood and not steel, but still. I will explain how he came into possession with it. Last week, we went to a "medieval festival", just for him (and me too, I am actually a medievalist). It was a rather simple affair, nothing too fancy or immersive, with jousting (more like professional wrestling disguised as jousting), falconry, archery and, well, nobody disguised but the entertainers. We had fun in any case. There were a few kiosks, among them one that sold wooden shields and swords from Tymeagain. And among the wooden toys, well, there was Excalibur. Other swords were cheaper, but neither Wolfie nor I could resist. In any case, it is an educational toy, allowing me to teach him a thing or two about the Arthurian legend. The sword will be central to our games in the next months, I am sure of it. I will keep you posted.

World Book Day

 It is World Book Day today, which I try to celebrate every year. I Wolfie celebrates it at school by dressing up, it's a special tradition they have in this country (and elsewhere?). I hope he gets back home with a book token to be spent in the local bookshop, like last year. That would be great. Wolfie is going to school dressed up as a king. Maybe King Arthur, maybe not, don't ask me why, but I do suspect the Arthurian legend sort of influenced him, as I did tell him about it recently and he got quite curious. We have a few books about which I intend to read them with him.

"Brocéliande et ses légendes"

Je suis (re)tombé sur un bouquin il y a quelques minutes Brocéliande et ses légendes. Un ouvrage de vulgarisation sur la forêt de Brocéliande, plus touristique qu'autre chose. Il n'y a sans doute rien dedans que je ne sais pas, étant médiéviste de formation, justement spécialisé dans la littérature arthurienne. Cela dit, je me suis rendu compte que je n'ai pas terminé de le lire. Je voulais le faire en 2016, peu après notre déménagement ici, question de renouer avec mes amours médiévales, mais la naissance de petit loup a chamboulé mon programme. J'essaierai de le faire cette année.

GrailQuest (The Den of Dragons)

A couple of weeks ago, I paid myself another trip down nostalgia lane and it only cost me £0.99. You may remember on this blog a few mentions about  J.H. Brennan, a writer of, among other things, gamebooks. I was quite fond of his work when I was a child. Well, I found on a charity shop the second bok of his GrailQuest series. I bought it on the spot. As the name indicates, it is freely inspired by the Arthurian legend, although the tone is mostly parodic. You play a young man transported magically by Merlin into the reign of Arthur through a spell, the book being a sort of "portal", as well as into the body of a young knight named Pip. It is pretty smart in a meta way. The medievalist specialised in the Arthurian legend will probably recoiled at the amount of silliness (you use a sword called Excalibur Junior, or EJ), but I do remember Brennan being capable of adding pretty dark touches here and there, as well as a few gory moments. I'm looking forward to revisiting the book in any case.

Souvenir de Brocéliande

En faisant du ménage dans les bouquins (oui, ça m'arrive), je suis retombé sur un marque-page que j'avais oublié, achetéen Bretagne. Jolie allusion à la légende arthurienne, même si c'est inexact: l'épée dans le roc (qui n'est pas Excalibur) n'était bien évidemment pas en Brocéliande. Depuis que mes beaux-parents sont revenus en Angleterre, nous n'avons plus vraiment l'occasion de retourner en Bretagne, ce qui est dommage. J'ai l'impression que l'on n'a pas fait le meilleur usage de notre temps là-bas, surtout en ce qui concerne Brocéliande justement. Mais au moins, j'ai un joli marque-page.

To see Tintagel

As some of my readers may know, I am a medievalist by trade, which means I have a PhD in medieval literature. I am also a specialist of Arthurian literature. And I have a confession to make here (I have done it already, but it is always mebarrassing to say): while I have been living for about 20 years in the UK, I have never visited Cornwall or Tintagel Castle, where King Arthur was conceived (in morally questionable circumstances) and born. It gets even worse as English Heritage keeps taunting me on social media with adverts featuring the picture you see on the left. I was hoping to visit it this year as soon as we have some holidays, now I think it is going to have to wait until 2022, but it is on my to go list.

The Welsh Flag and me

Today is the first of March and it is also the Feast of Saint David, also the patron saint of Wales. It is therefore Wales' National Day. I took this picture while visiting Cardiff Castle. That was back in 2017. I have a bit of history with Wales and the Welsh people, which dates back to my first year at uni and I have detailed in this post. That same year, I asked one of my Welsh friends to buy a Welsh flag for me next time she went home, because I thought it looked really cool with the dragon on it (you don't see it so well on this pic) and its call back to the Arthurian legend. Back then, it was not something I would have done over the internet. Anyway, she bought it and the flag is still in my parents' place somewhere. I wonder if dad takes it out to fly it. I guess the neighbours would think it weird, but among all the flags of the world, I think the Welsh one might be the coolest. And today, I wish I could fly it here, even though I am not Welsh.

Merlin and a new old story

Time goes so fast that I did not have time recently to report here on this blog a piece of news that got the former academic and medievalist that I am very, very happy: they found a "new" XIIIth century manuscript telling the story of Merlin at the University of Bristol. As you may know, I specialized in Arthurian literature, so this is right up to my alley. when I read something like this, I wish I was still in academia and I envy the lucky team of experts that will investigate things further. It especially reminds me of the time I was studying paleography some twenty years ago. Now I hope the text will soon be available to the general public. Or I might just book this family a short holiday to Bristol...

The nature of the Holy Grail

My mother-in-law sent me recently a link to an article about the Holy Grail. Back in another life, I used to be an academic and a medievalist at that, specialized in the Arthurian legend and the work of Chrétien de Troyes, who was the first to introduce the Grail in Le Conte du Graal. It remains to this day my favourite Arthurian romance. In the story, the Grail is not a cup like in subsequent versions and the many adaptations, but a plate or a bowl, to contain large amount of food. While it is mentioned that a wafer is in it, so there are associations with the Eucharist, there is no explicit association with Jesus's death and his blood. Its origins remain obscure, as well as its ultimate purpose. Perceval/Percival does not ask the question that could potentially reveal its nature: "Whom does the grail serve?" The romance being unfinished, we will never truly know about its core subject, the rest is pure speculations. My bet, and I might be wrong, is that what the Holy Grail is was never meant to be revealed. It was meant as a MacGuffin: it makes the story flow, it creates tensions and motivations for the character, but otherwise we do not know because we do not need to know. Moral of this post: sometimes I miss academia.