#but they're probably hard to find now under all the fanart and shitposts

[gellavonhamster]

Hi! I know almost nothing about Arthuriana, except some few stories that we read ten years ago in Middle School in English class. I would want to know a little more about the historical context, the origins, the meanings and the orders of all those legends, but I don’t know where to begin. Do you study them in school/uni or do you research about them on your own? Thank you!

Hi! No, I've never really studied Arthuriana, though we touched upon it a little at university during some of our English Literature classes, but in very broad strokes. Plus our professor made us read the book she wrote on the similarities between Arthuriana and the Latvian epic Lāčplēsis (don't know about my classmates, but I read it - it was pretty interesting, but I still found it funny that she was essentially forcing people to read her book). Frankly speaking, I wouldn't say I do research about it now either - I just read whatever works I find available online, choosing them based on what I've heard about them and what links I find floating around on tumblr. Regarding the historical context and origins, some years ago I read a pretty comprehensive book that was like a summary of previous research on the historical origins of Arthuriana, but it was in Russian - "Меч короля Артура. Так рождалась легенда" (The Sword of King Arthur. So the Legend Was Born) by Vadim Erlikhman, so I don't think it will be of much use because it is hardly translated into English. It has a long bibliography which includes a lot of books and research works in English, but I don't know which of them are the most useful.

As to where to begin... it’s a difficult question, especially since a lot of these legends contradict each other more or less because they belong to different traditions. I think it helps if you already have an idea which characters or events in particular you would like to read about, because then you can start with the texts focused on them and then move to other characters or events if you decide that you enjoy these legends in general. @fuckyeaharthuriana has a lot of useful rec lists (links in blog description), including those sorted by character. I can also suggest some works that I enjoyed the most, but please bear in mind that I am far from being an expert - I read several texts last year in the wake of watching BBC Merlin and The Green Knight, and this year started devouring basically all texts I could find after reading Le Morte d'Arthur, but I haven't read the Vulgate, for example, and some other things that, I believe, are considered basics, while having read some more obscure texts that caught my attention but are not as fundamental. Anyway...

Yvain: Knight of the Lion by Chrétien de Troyes - this one has everything: adventures, love, friendship, active female characters (Lunete my best friend Lunete), an Animal Sidekick, and a happy ending after a lot of tribulations. The main character is Sir Yvain, son of King Uriens and Morgan Le Fay, and the story is about him falling in love with a widow of a knight he killed, managing to win her affection but then losing her trust and having to win it back while doing a bunch of heroic deeds on the way. Quite long but I found it a lot of fun.

The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell for Helping of King Arthur - I’m linking the translation I read, but there are many of them available online. It’s a short and fun romance in which a knight captures King Arthur and challenges him to find out what women desire the most or lose his head. His nephew Gawain decides to help him and ends up having to marry an ugly lady who helped him find the answer, but then it turns out that her ugliness is actually a curse, which the answer he discovered helps him undo. 

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight - I read it in translation by Bernard O’Donoghue, for the simple reason that it was the one I stumbled upon in a bookstore, but I can’t find it online. There are several other available, however; the one I’m linking is by Jessie Weston. With a movie recently being out, you probably know the gist of the plot: a green stranger arrives at king’s court and challenges Arthur’s knights to give him a blow of an axe and then, a year later, receive the same blow in return. So Gawain accepts the challenge and chops the Green Knight’s head off, but he puts the head back on, and now Gawain is due to lose his head in a year. As he rides off to meet his fate, he stays at a castle belonging to a married couple, where his honour is tested (and things get pretty gay). 

The “Arthurian” Portion of the Roman de Brut by Wace - this one is not one of my favourites, to be honest, even though the language is really beautiful in some parts, but I think it’s important. It tells about Arthur’s ancestors, Uther’s rise to power, Merlin’s origins (which I found the most interesting part), Arthur’s rise to power, various conquests and death. Mostly conquests, which is why I wasn’t too engrossed. 

Le Morte d’Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory (Volume 1, Volume 2) - this is one of those foundational works, a XV century attempt to put all the main Arthurian legends together. Arthur’s birth and the start of his reign, Lancelot and Guinevere, Tristan and Isolde, the quest for the Holy Grail, the fall of Camelot - it’s all here. There are various editions, but I don’t know which to suggest, because I made a questionable decision to read the original (the one I’m linking) which is not very easy to read because of the old language. 

Prose Tristan and Povest ‘o Trystchane - I love the Tristan and Isolde stories not so much because I like the main couple but because they’re usually a lot of fun. Shenanigans, wild adventures, horniness, the “everyone’s a little in love with everyone” vibes... My preferred version of all I’ve read is Tristan’s part of Le Morte d’Arthur, but these two are also cool. They’re pretty similar until the second one (the XVI Belarusian version) starts diverging greatly (there’s a whole subplot where Tristan, Isolde, and Guinevere travel to save Arthur from captivity, it’s wild).

Morien - a Dutch romance about a young Moorish knight who goes on a quest to find his biological father and ends up having some adventures with Gawain and Lancelot. I like it because searching for one’s father is such a... normal reason for a quest, something perfectly understandable to a modern person, unlike many of the more outlandish ideas that appear in some other romances.