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Chrétien's Symbolism and Cathedral Art
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
Few important literary passages have resisted clarification more persistently than the procession of the Holy Grail in Chretien's Perceval. Let us review his version very briefly.
Hunting in the forest one spring morning, Perceval encounters a troop of King Arthur's knights who inflame him with a desire for knighthood. Against his mother's wishes, for Perceval's father and brothers have all fallen in combat, the lad sets out for the court of King Arthur. Here he is taken for a fool. But he slays the Red Knight who had ridden off with the king's cup and dons the armor of his dead victim. Sojourning at the castle of an elderly knight, Gornemant, he is instructed in the use of arms and is advised to desist from asking questions and from quoting his mother at every turn. At Belrepaire, he is welcomed by Gornemant's niece, Blancheflor. His relations with her remain chaste, an important circumstance in Chrétien's development of the story. After overcoming her enemies in single combat, he travels on until, he reaches the fabulous Grail Castle of the lame Fisher King. His host, who had previously been maimed by a lance, cannot rise to welcome him, but Perceval is urged to take his place beside him. There soon ensues the strange and celebrated procession of the Holy Grail.
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1955
References
1 Sister M. Amelia Klenke, O.P., “The Blancheflor-Perceval Question,” RPh, vi (1952), 173–178. In addition, cf. : “Chrétien s'est diverti à renchérir sur la beauté de Blanchefleur; il assure qu'il n'a jamais dépeint objet plus ravissant (v. 1781 sq.). Cependant Perceval s'asseoit à côté d'elle, et n'ose dire mot, parce qu'il se souvient que son maître lui a recommandé de ne pas trop parler. Comme elle, de son côté, attend qu'il parle, ils ont l'air de deux muets, situation comique que Chrétien souligne d'une réflexion narquoise des assistants (v. 1838 sq.). Mais bientôt la jeune fille perd cette timidité:1a nuit, en secret, elle va rejoindre le beau jeune homme dans sa chambre, pleure, se fait consoler, et lui fait remarquer qu'elle est presque nue. … Lui, pourtant, dans son ardeur ignorante, il ne sait qu‘ébaucher les gestes de l'amour. Et ces jeux, sans plus, se renouvellent trois nuits de suite. Sim plesse” [italics mine]. (Albert Pauphilet, Le Legs du Moyen Age, Melun, 1950, pp. 197–199, and esp. p. 199.) So also Mario Roques: Perceval is “le simple roman d'une âme de choix qui va de la plus naïve et fruste ignorance jusqu‘à un haut degré de perfection humaine par l'effet de la nature, de la courtoisie et de la chevalerie” (Chrétien de Troyes, Perceval le Gallois ou le conte du Graal mis en français moderne par Lucien Foulet, préface de Mario Roques, Paris, 1947, pp. xx—xxi).
2 Wolfram von Eschenbach's “Parzival,” trans. Jessie L. Weston (London, 1894), p. 326.
3 See my “Liturgy and Allegory in Chrétien's Perceval,” Univ. of North Carolina Studies in Rom. Langs. and Lits., xiv (Chapel Hill, 1951), 10 ff.
4 Jean Marx's ponderous book, La Légende arthurienne et le graal (Paris, 1951), was reviewed by Emile Henriot in “Le graal et le saint-graal,” Le Monde (20 Feb. 1952). Among other things, Henriot says of it: “Voici le dernier en date, M. Jean Marx, professeur de sciences religieuses à l'Ecole des hautes études, qui aborde à son tour l'immense problème dans un gros livre captivant, mais dont l'éclairage nouveau ne semble devoir rendre que plus obscures les origines du sujet traité: la Légende arthurienne et le Graal.” See also the cautious review of Marx's book by Marcel Françon in FR, xxvi (1952), 152.
5 For a further analysis of these theories and bibliographical data, see Urban T. Holmes, Jr., History of Old French Literature (New York, 1948), pp. 288 ff.
6 Univ. of North Carolina Studies in Rom. Langs, and Lits., viii (Chapel Hill, 1948). This publication is a somewhat revised version of Holmes's article of the same title, in SP, xliv (1947), 453–476.
7 “Liturgy and Allegory,” pp. 23–24.
8 See my Three Saints' Lives by Nicholas Bozon (Franciscan Inst. Pubs., History Ser No. 1, St. Bonaventure, N. Y., 1947), pp. xli ff.
9 For a delightful popular account, see G. de Miré, “Conques et son trésor,” Réalités, Jan. 1953, pp. 46–53.
10 Literature through Art (New York, 1952), p. 29.
11 “Liturgy and Allegory,” passim, but esp. pp. 1–2, 11 ff.
12 “Sovereignty as the Principle of the Unity in Chrétien's Erec,” PMLA, lx (1945), 917–936.
13 Catholic Liturgics (Paterson, N. J., 1935), p. 232. Cf. also: “Calix hic sepulcrum, patena lapidem designat, qui sepulcrum clauserat,” Gemma animae i.47, in Migne, Patrol, lat., clxxii.
14 “Liturgy and Allegory,” passim.
15 Catholic Liturgics, p. 232.
16 Mme Lot-Borodine, “Les Apparitions du Christ aux messes de l'Estoire et de la Queste del Saint Graal,” Romania, lxxii (1951), 214.
17 Hatzfeld, pp. 12, 215.
18 See Holmes, New Interpretation, p. 13.
19 The Dominican Missal in Latin and in English, trans. Fr. Bruno Walkley, O.P., under the sponsorship of Fr. Bede Jarrett, O.P. (London, 1932), pp. 994–995.
20 Cf. Chrétien's phraseology in describing the light emanating from the Grail, supra, p. 223.
21 Editions des Deux Mondes, Paris, 1950.
22 Lucien Foulet (p. 151) translates the passage: “d'une seule hostie qu'on lui porte dans le graal ce saint homme soutient sa vie. Le graal est chose si sainte, et lui si pur esprit, qu'il ne faut à sa vie rien de plus que cette hostie qui vient dans ce vase” (italics mine). Gustave Cohen, Chrétien de Troyes (Paris, 1931), p. 430, says similarly: “qu'on lui apporte en ce graal” and “l'hostie qui dans le graal vient” (italics mine). See my article, “Cups, Dishes and the Holy Grail,” Catholic Educational Review, li, vi (June 1953), 404–410.
23 In this confession, there is no mention of any sin of the flesh; all such sins being “mortal,” Chrétien would have been bound to include them if Perceval's confession was not to be sacrilegious, i.e., if Perceval had committed any such sin. We may be sure that the poet, so meticulous in his handling of the liturgy, would not have forgotten or ignored any such sin had he considered his hero to be guilty of such. The Blancheflor-Perceval episode can be considered rightly only in the light of Christian liturgy, Christian allegory, spiritual evolution. See note 1 and, in Foulet's text (note 1), the note under druërie, p. 219: “‘Requérir la druerie d'une femme’,” lui demander d’être sa ‘drue,’ c'est-à-dire la dame de ses pensées, celle pour qui on cherche à acquérir honneur et gloire dans les combats.“
24 “Der Eingang zu Wolfram's Parzival,” Neo philologus, xxii (1936–37), 110–120, 171–185, esp. 181–185.