Problem
French Medieval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France, trans. Eugene Mason (New York: E.P Dutton, 1911).
The assigned primary source for this week are two short stories by Marie de France.
Marie de France was a twelfth-century noblewomen and poet who produced a number of written works including a series of short stories in verse called lais. Modern scholars refer to this genera of fiction about the love between knights and ladies as "courtly romances." They are courtly because they focus on the social elite, who would have attended lordly courts. They are "romances" because rather than being written in Latin, they were written in the regional vernacular northern French dialect or "romance" of the period that had developed from Latin. They and other courtly romances of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries are significant as a new non-Latin literature produced primarily by lay people rather than clergy and express the concerns of these lay men and women.
Answer two of the following three questions.
i. What are the characteristics of "romantic love" as described in these two stories? Be sure to provide some examples to support your claims.
ii. Using these stories how would you characterize twelfth-century noble attitudes toward marriage? Is marriage presented as the means for realizing romantic love? How would you characterize twelfth-century noble attitudes towards sex? (Keep in mind that these stories were written by a noblewoman for an audience composed of the nobility.)
iii. With these stories in mind, how do you think fictional writings from the past can be used as historical evidence? For instance, do you feel that these stories reflect the realities of the twelfth century or do they serve to provide ideals to live by for their audience?
As part of your post, pose a question you had about the readings. Include it at the end of your post. Read the responses of at least four other students and reply to at least one of these posts. You must post a reply in order to receive full credit for the discussion. A reply can be an attempt to answer another student's question.