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From Eugene Vinaver, on the development of Romance literature in the high middle ages:
In the third quarter of the twelfth century, some ten or fifteen years after the disaster of the Second Crusade, a remarkable event occurred on the European literary scene.... A series of French verse romances produced at that time established a new literary genre which, together with the influence of early Provencal lyric poetry [i.e., courtly love], determined ... the forms of literature long after the close of the Middle AgesE[quoting W. P. Ker]. The tradition that preceded these romances, that of the heroic epic [like the chansons de geste], had for nearly a century inspired the poets writing in the langue doil. The romance writers turned away from it and at first borrowed their subjects from the legends of classical antiquity; but soon they discovered the realm of Arthurian knighthood Enot the pseudo-historical kingdom of the chronicles of Geoffrey of Monmouth and Wace, but the imaginary land of pure chivalry whose fame rested on the exploits of King Arthurs knights. Love interest and the pursuit of adventures unrelated to any common aim thus displaced the theme of the defense of Christendom, and the preoccupation with feudal warfare; and the new genre, breaking decisively with all varieties of the old epic tradition, made the same division between the heroic and the chivalric age.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 at 03:58 PM
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