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6 - Romance in England, 1066–1400

from I - AFTER THE NORMAN CONQUEST

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

By
Rosalind Field
Edited by
David Wallace
David Wallace
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
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Summary

Ces gestes, qu’erent en engleis, Translates sunt en franceis

Waldef, 53–4

[These stories which were in English are [now] translated into French]

Thise olde gentil Britouns in hir dayes Of diverse aventures maden layes, Rymeyed in hir firste Briton tonge.

Chaucer, Franklins Prologue, 5.709–11.

Two hundred years of romance writing in England separate the Prologue to Waldef, written in the Anglo-Norman of post-Conquest England, from the Prologue of the Franklin, equipped with the smooth rhythms of Chaucerian English. The first claims knowledge of Old English sources, the second that it appropriates an ancient tale from the traditional lays of the Bretons. This chiastic movement can serve to illustrate the historical, generic and linguistic complexities of the topic addressed in this chapter.

The genre of romance is resistant to definition, nowhere more so than in its manifestation in medieval England. ‘Gestes’, if the term refers to epic narratives, can be seen as too heroic, the ‘layes’ of the Breton tradition too lyrical. It is not the purpose of this chapter to adopt any demarcation that excludes such important contributions to the narrative literature of the period; rather we will work with a recent definition that is also one of the simplest, ‘the principal secular literature of entertainment of the Middle Ages’. This usefully places the emphasis not on form or content, both shifting ground, but on the essentially recreational function of romance. The lure of romance is primarily the lure of the story and secondarily of the exotic setting or enviable achievement it describes. It is entertainment for an audience; some audiences may like to display their status, discrimination and moral rectitude through their choice of entertainment, some may prefer to escape from just such concerns; but a successful romance is one which gives pleasure, whether or not accompanied by information or instruction.

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The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature , pp. 152 - 176
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1999

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