The Lancelot-Grail Cycle

Composed in Old French between about 1220 and 1240, the Lancelot-Grail Cycle is a group of five prose romances centered on the love affair between Lancelot and Guenevere. It consists of an immense central core, the Lancelot Proper, introduced by The History of the Holy Grail and The Story of Merlin and concluded by The Quest for the Holy Grail and The Death of Arthur. This volume brings together thirteen essays by noted scholars from the first symposium ever devoted exclusively to the Lancelot-Grail Cycle. Exploring the cycle's evolution across the literatures of medieval France, Italy, Spain, Catalonia, and England, the authors take a variety of approaches that highlight a broad range of cultural, social, historical, and political concerns and offer a comparative and interdisciplinary vision of this great romance. Given the current enthusiasm for the Lancelot-Grail Cycle, spurred in part by new editions of the original texts and also by the concurrent appearance of the first integral translation of the cycle into English, this volume should appeal to both scholars and amateurs of Arthurian literature.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Romance, Nonfiction, Fiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.