Tristan et Iseut

Dr Helen Swift
St Hilda’s College
MT11, Wks 1-8.
 Tristan’s ‘otherness’
• Enchanted aspects:
– miraculous leap;
– invention of never-failing bow.
• Remarkable adaptation:
– courtly skills adapted to survival in forest;
– training of Husdent.
• Uncannily transferable skills:
– tools/skills of forest applied to post-forest life
 Folklore: narrative traditions
• Classical archetypes of heroic adventure:
– hero dispatched on impossible mission;
– combat against monster; reward of maiden;
– e.g. Theseus, Jason …
• Irish sagas of ill-fated love affairs:
– lovers fatally/magically united (geis);
– lovers forced to flee into wild;
– e.g. Diarmaid and Grainne
 Romance: narrative traditions
• Structure: discontinuity / juxtaposition
• Evolution: contemporary comparatives
– Chrétien de Troyes: romans de crise
e.g. Chevalier du lion (Yvain); Chevalier de la
charrette (Lancelot)
– Marie de France: awareness of biography
e.g. Lai du Chevrefeuille
– Tristan versions: amalgamating materials.
 Reading Béroul’s Tristan

• Syntagmatic and paradigmatic processes:

– syntagmatic = this and this and this and this…
= ‘horizontal’ axis
– paradigmatic = this or this or this or this …
= ‘vertical’ axis

• Beroul’s Tristan: e.g. puiot and tripot

 Tristan’s conduct at Mal Pas
• complete disguise / risk of exposure;
• flaunts his role as leper:
– plays on incongruity;
– ruthlessly extorts money;
– lashes out violently (?).
• courts recognition:
– Arthur and Dinas.

=> double logic: delight/dismay, serious/comic

‘Are we bothered?’: reasons not to fear
• Narrative conviction:
– Iseut’s cunning plan.
• God’s Providence:
– He’s on their side.
• Alternative logic of Béroul’s text..
– all’s well that ends well (flour on floor; letter);
– risk for risk’s sake …
 Tristan as trickster

• joyous risk-taker, but

guarantee of escape

• cyclical story pattern

• evacuates moral and

ethical judgments
Tristan: plural and diverse

• mythic hero?
• epic warrior?
• chivalric knight?
• romance lover?
or
foxy trickster ?
Plurality in characterization...

Next Week:
Iseut: naïve or knowing?