Queeste. Tijdschrift over middeleeuwse letterkunde in de Nederlanden. Jaargang 2004

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Naar aanleiding van...

Arthur in de Lage Landen
Thea Summerfield

Naar aanleiding van: Geert H.M. Claassens & David F. Johnson (eds.), King Arthur in the Medieval Low Countries. Leuven, University Press, 2000, Mediaevalia Lovaniensia Series I, Studia XXVIII. ISBN 90 5867 042 2. Prijs €39,04.

One of most heartening developments of recent years in the study of medieval literature in general, and medieval Dutch and Arthurian literature in particular, is the publication not only of a large number of Middle Dutch Arthurian texts with parallel translations in English, but also of indispensable secondary literature about those texts in English. The Roman van Walewein has been available for some time with a facing translation,¹ while volume XVII in the authoritative series Arthurian Studies offers a range of articles on this wonderful romance.² Recently a monograph on the Lancelot Compilation by Bart Besamusca was published in the same series (no. LIII),³ while in November 2003 a new parallel text edition has been announced of five romances from the Lancelot Compilation as the third volume in the Dutch Romances series.⁴

The collection of articles published in Leuven in 2000 by Claassens and Johnson includes contributions in English from Dutch, Belgian and American scholars on both the Roman van Walewein and the Lancelot Compilation. To assist any reader not familiar with the primary texts, the book has an extensive appendix of nearly sixty pages, giving detailed summaries of the romances discussed. This is a helpful extra, not just for first readers, but also for anyone who, like your reviewer, loses track at times about who did what in which romance.

The first article offers an introduction to Arthurian literature in the medieval Low Countries, written jointly by Claassens and Johnson (although in a later article Claassens refers to it as ‘my introduction’, p. 181), discussing Maerlant's attitude towards Arthur and Arthurian literature, the Lancelot Compilation, the Burgsteinfurt codex, a number of fragments, Ferguut and Walewein. It is not easy to write a lucid and readable overview, but this certainly is one. Recent, sometimes conflicting theories are mentioned, as well as matters of reception, such as the sudden change in the popularity of Arthurian literature after the fifteenth century, with the result that there are very few Arthurian romances in print as opposed to Charlemagne romances. Changing tastes during and after the Reformation may

1 David F. Johnson (ed. and transl.), Penninc and Pieter Vostaert, ‘Roman van Walewein’. New York, Garland, 1992. Garland Library of Medieval Literature, Series A, Volume 81); also in Geert H.M. Claassens & David F. Johnson (eds.), Dutch Romances I. Cambridge, D.S. Brewer, 2000, Arthurian Archives VI.

2 Bart Besamusca & Erik Kooper (eds.), Originality and Tradition in the Middle Dutch ‘Roman van Walewein’. Cambridge, D.S. Brewer, 1999.

3 Bart Besamusca, The Book of Lancelot. The Middle Dutch ‘Lancelot Compilation’ and the Medieval Tradition of Narrative Cycles, transl. Thea Summerfield. Cambridge, D.S. Brewer, 2003.

4 Geert H.M. Claassens & David F. Johnson (eds.), Dutch Romances III, Cambridge, D.S. Brewer, 2003, Arthurian Archives (Wrake van Ragisel, Ridder metter Mouwen, Lanceloet en het Hert met de witte voet, Walewein ende Keye, Torec). Dutch Romances II (Cambridge, 2000) offers an edition and translation by Geert Claassens & David Johnson of Ferguut.

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have played a part here, but, as the authors write, ‘this is a phenomenon that awaits further study’ (p. 33, n. 135).

The next three articles, by Bart Veldhoen, Ludo Jongen and Karina van Dalen-Oskam, discuss different aspects of the Walewein. Like Felicity Riddy before him, Bart Veldhoen compares a number of aspects shared by Walewein and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, such as succession symbolism and the significance of the chess set and the lady, arguing that, in spite of their great geographical and temporal distance, the two texts have much in common. Ludo Jongen regards the romance as an ‘anti-Grail text’; his contribution discusses the way the confession of the Red Knight in Walewein mirrors a scene in the Queste del Saint Graal in which Walewein refuses to show contrition and do penance. Karina van Dalen-Oskam concentrates on the chess set and chess symbolism. Unfortunately the last two articles begin by rehearsing the same basic facts about the romance: its two authors, the fact that is special and very fine, its date, the folklore elements and Aarne-Thomson, and a précis of the story, which is the more unnecessary as the Appendix has a six-page summary (p. 188-193).

The majority of the remaining nine articles discuss aspects of the Lancelot Compilation, largely in the order in which the romances in question occur in the Compilation. Frank Brandsma draws attention to the implications of signs in the margin of the sole surviving manuscript which appear to have been added to facilitate the aural reception of the text. The ‘exceptional quill wielder’ as Brandsma calls him (p. 70) superimposed these signs (sometimes words) on the pattern or ‘grid’ by means of which the text is organised. It would appear that the impetus to do this was occasioned by flaws in the text resulting from sloppy copying. Thus the incompetence of one scribe led not simply to corrections, but also to improvements in the written text and enhancements of its oral delivery. Brandsma does not claim to have said the last word on the subject, and ends by confessing that ‘the more I look at the corrector's work, the more elusive he seems to become’ (p. 86), but this is certainly one of the most intriguing and thorough articles in the collection.

Bart Besamusca's contribution focuses on the function of the damsel of Montesclare, the loathly lady who appears in Chrétien's Perceval, and, in the Compilation, in Perchevael and Torec. Besamusca argues that her appearance adds coherence to the Compilation. Rita Schlusemann discusses the reception in Germany of Middle Dutch texts in general and, in detail, the likelihood of the existence of a Middle Dutch Lancelot, now lost. In that story the blow of Lancelot's humiliating ride in the cart must have been softened by proclaiming him the best knight in the world and by having King Arthur, with his queen and many other knights, jumping on to the wagon as well. Traditions governing the production of translations at the Heidelberg court where the Karrensuite in which this episode occurs was produced, point to a Dutch source. Soetje Oppenhuis de Jong's article takes up the problems associated with the (relocation of Perchevael in the Lancelot Compilation and the figure of Acglovael, first discussed by Maartje Draak and Jan Willem Klein. She concludes: ‘We can see more clearly now what was done and in which order. What we cannot see (yet) is who was (or were) the brain(s) behind it: Velthem? The corrector? Scribe B? Or was there yet someone else?’ (p. 124). Or perhaps there were two phases of compilation, as she suggests, with some cogent arguments, in a note which might have been worked out in the main body of the article, and perhaps even two compilers. The bracketed (yet) in her concluding remark is evidence of a remarkable, if guarded, optimism in the face of so many questions. Her recently published book on the subject may offer more answers or suggestions for answers.⁵

The indigenous romance Moriaen is the subject of Norris Lacy's article. Here it is not matters of compilation, derivation or comparison that are at issue, instead the romance is considered as an independent entity. Lacy offers the reader an inventory of incongruities in Moriaen, story lines which are ultimately incompatible or fall ‘somewhere between unpersuasive and preposterous’ (p. 129). Moriaen, Lacy points out, is a text in disorder, and ‘it is only slightly hyperbolic to suggest that nothing works in

5 Soetje Ida Oppenhuis de Jong, De Middelnederlandse Perceval-Traditie. Inleiding en editie van de bewaarde fragmenten van een Middelnederlandse vertaling van de ‘Perceval’ of ‘Conte du Graal’ van Chrétien de Troyes, en de ‘Perchevael’ in de ‘Lancelotcompilatie’. Hilversum,Verloren, 2003, Middelnederlandse Lancelotromans 9.

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this romance’ (Lacy's italics; p. 132). In fact, it is little less than a ‘hermeneutic conundrum’. The usual approach - blaming the transmission process - is ultimately unhelpful: the lost original may have been better, but the text as it survives in the Lancelot Compilation can best be accepted as a puzzle ‘that the present state of our understanding will not permit us to solve’ (p. 134). It is a refreshing approach, and a warning that a defensive attitude towards medieval texts may easily cause us to close our eyes to imperfections. At the same time it should be noted here that recently a convincing effort towards solving the conundrum has been made by Bart Besamusca in his recent work The Book of Lancelot (p. 73-83). Geert Claassens' subject is the Queeste vanden Grale. He argues that the compiler made small, but telling textual changes, resulting in greater psychological depth of the characters, especially Lancelot and Guinevere, as well as a sense of delay before the downfall of Arthur's realm. Geert Pallemans' article on the Wrake van Ragisel follows, as he writes, from his dissertation on this text. Pallemans regards the Vengeance Raguidel, the source text of the Wrake, as a parody. According to Pallemans the translator, on whose text the surviving Wrake is based, removed some of the parodie elements which he considered subversive. Subsequently, the next person in line, i.e. the compiler of the Lancelot Compilation, recognized the original author's parodic intent, and as a result considered it an appropriate move to insert an episode which has much in common with fabliaux: Hoe Walewein wilde weten Vrouwen Gepens.

Marjolein Hogenbirk discusses Walewein ende Keye, a little studied romance in the compilation which is also the subject of her current research. In this romance Walewein is portrayed as the ‘most ideal and least human’ character of that name in Western European Arthurian romances. The article is a clear analysis of this often amusing text, and reveals the thematic analogues in it with reference to the opposition of humility and haughtiness. This author, like Frank Brandsma and Soetje Oppenhuis de Jong, ends with a question, signalling that, for all our analyses, much is still uncertain. What can the function of this romance have been? Hogenbirk suggests a didactic function: ‘while the evil Keye and Walewein's opponents serve as a warning, the humble Walewein should be imitated, because in all respects he is a perfect knight’ (p. 172). In view of the ultimately moralistic message of the text, and the overtly obvious presentation of Walewein as exemplary, this seems probable, but only insofar as all (medieval) literature is didactic. The final article in the collection, by Geert Claassens - it is his second article in the volume, in addition to the Introduction - discusses authorial interventions and narrative voice in Lanceloet en het Hert met de Witte Voet and the implications of this phenomenon for the Lancelot Compilation as a whole. Claassens ends on a definite note: ‘It stands to reason that it is the compiler who is responsible for the authorial interventions...’ and ‘I am convinced that in doing so he knew very well what he was doing’ (p. 185).

The collection of articles has much to offer the reader: a good introduction on Middle Dutch Arthurian literature, three articles showing very different approaches to the Roman van Walewein and nine others representing key issues in Lancelot Compilation research: questions of production, of the relationship to lost intermediate sources, of reception and presentation. In addition there are the useful Appendices, an extensive Bibliography and Index.

One aspect of this book was not clear to me. Were the various contributions written by their authors in English, and accepted with or without linguistic emendation, or in Dutch and translated, and if so, by whom? A couple of articles have notes referring to translation or correction, the majority do not. The question arose while trying to account for typos and spelling errors (especially in the Introduction) and a number of linguistic curiosities. This may be a professional aberration, but, apart from the fact that it is irritating to find manuscirpt and relagates and leant instead of lent (p. 26, 22, 27), such matters should be made clear. This having been said, the conclusion can only be that this is a good book which deserves a place on the shelves of libraries throughout Western Europe and the United States.

Adres van de auteur: Vanvitelliweg 35, nl-5624 kj Eindhoven.