SUMMERS, KAREN CRADY, Ph.D. Reading Incest - The University ...

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be benevolent and virtuous, patterned on divine governing and ordering, and passed down
to knights and finally to the commons so that the land would live in harmony.
Benson argues that 15 th century chivalry deals with the “possible more often than
the marvelous, and frequently employs realistic details of action, manners, and speech.
The heroes engage in deeds greater than real men could have performed and to that extent
they do share with the old romances a sense of the unobtainable. To a surprising degree
fifteenth-century romance is a realistic genre, elevated in style but often mimetically true
to the aristocratic life of the time” (139). Malory’s matter-of-fact tone when relating the
tales accords with Benson’s claim, but there are certainly many incidents of the fantastic
in Malory’s “hole booke,” and Archibald and Edwards see Arthur’s story as an exception
to Benson’s categorization of 15 th century chivalric stories as more realistic than
supernatural (142). Arthur’s right to the throne is verified only by his ability to pull
Excalibur from the stone, which was put there by enchantment. Magical shields,
Merlin’s entrapment under a stone, and the mysterious Questing Beast are all marvels,
and decidedly unrealistic. In fact, Arthur’s kingdom can not stand once Merlin
disappears. Merlin’s magic is necessary for Arthur’s conception, for his prescience, and
for his ability to explicate the meanings of dreams and omens. Nonetheless, to create the
perfect chivalrous king, Malory must rely more upon recognizable occurrences than
purely supernatural ones, for his Arthur is above all a “Crysten” and good king yet a
flawed one, because incest and sorcery undermine Arthur’s reign.
In her unpublished dissertation Karen Cherewatuk examines medieval manuals on
chivalry and finds that in Morte d’Arthur, the tales demonstrate the