Arthurian Legends

storytellerknight:

lizard-is-writing:

Anonymous asked: “I’m working on something where I am twisting Arthurian legend and I was wondering, how accurate do I have to make it to myth? I was thinking I could have characters in modern times reflect how ‘history isn’t always told correctly’ as a way to excuse my changes (such as the years Arthur was killed or when Merlin fought in a battle that drove him mad). Will this upset readers, or is this plausible enough of an excuse to allow them to maintain suspension of disbelief? How much is too much change?”

The answer I’d give you as a reader is change as little as possible. As a writer, though I’d say your story comes first. Make it good. The best thing is maybe to reconcile the two opinions. I suggest trying to keep everything as accurate to the original tale as possible and in the places where you cannot, either figure out a way to reference the original truth while still making it work for your plot. 

Keep reading

As a member of the Arthurian fandom and someone who has read many, many retellings, reviewed many retellings, and regularly interacts with a fandom that has read and reviwed many, many retellings, the answer to this question is actually no. You will not upset readers. There is no line where the change is too much, and you don’t even have to excuse it.

Here’s the best kept secret of Arthurian mythology: there is no such thing as canon.

Take Merlin for instance. Merlin is first introduced by Geoffrey of Monmouth in the 11th century. Merlin is an amalgamatio between two characters – the Welsh warrior and mad prophet Myrddin, and Ambrosius. Ambrosius is a historical war-leader from the mid-5th century who likely led a Roman contigent of soldiers against Vortigern. In the 9th century Nennius adapts Ambrosius to a child with no father who Vortigern seeks out to sacrifice as a way to keep his castle from collapsing. Ambrosius instead shows Vortigern the two dragons fighting beneath the castle and Vortigern flees in fear.

Now, if this story sounds familiar, it’s because Geoffrey took it and made that Merlin’s backstory. So already, just looking into Merlin’s history as a character, you have a legends supported reason to not even include him in the story or change his name to Ambrosius (as many have done).

According to Geoffrey, Merlin is largely Uther’s advisor and does not appear at all as a member of Arthur’s court. Robort de Boron was the first to introduce the concept of Merlin taking Arthur to live with Ector. Robert also introduced the sword-in-the-stone tournament and had Merlin stay on as Arthur’s main advisor. This is also the introduction of Merlin’s imprisonment by the Lady of the Lake.

But it doesn’t always go that way. Didot Perceval has Merlin craft himself a bird cage near the Grail Castle and disappears into it, never to be seen again. Welsh Legends have Merlin survive in a glass fortress as the guardian of the Thirteen Treasures. Merlin as Arthur’s childhood tutor wasn’t introduced until the 16th century and didn’t really gain in popularity until T.H. White’s Sword in the Stone.

All of these things are part of Merlin’s canon. None of these things are Canon. You obviously can’t use all of them and you’re not even required to use any of them. As you can see, a time honored Arthurian tradition is ignoring what came before you and picking and choosing the aspects of the legend you need to tell the story you want to tell.

So with all that said, here’s my advice to anyone who wants to write Arthurian fiction.

1. Do your research.

I can tell when an author hasn’t done any research into the legends and are instead going purely off popular convention. Those stories are honestly more difficult to get through than ones that change lots of things. There’s always a shallowness there – a lack of understanding about why this story is so popular and why it’s been retold so many times and so many different ways over hundreds of years.

And honestly, it’s so much fun to see authors change the legend and make it their own while still keeping ties to the original. Anne Eliot Crompton’s Merlin’s Harp reimagines Meleagant (the villainous night who kidnaps Guinevere for his own gain) as a fairy otter who pushes Guinevere into the fairy lands for fun–not out of any malice or self-interest. It’s still the capture of Guinevere, but it’s new and fresh and unique to that story.

2. Don’t be lazy with your characters

By which I mean, don’t have them take action just because that action is what they did in the legend even though it makes no sense for this character in this story. Or the characters have no personality at all just their actions. Both these things will make for bad Arthurian retellings. The heart of any story is the characters and they have to be believable and their actions have to make sense from them. If your characters are leading you away from certain aspects of the legend, let them go. See where it takes you. Build believable characters and don’t chain them to the legend for the sake of the legend.

Persia Woolley’s use of the Guinevere/Lancelot “betrayal” had many of her characters acting counter to their established characteristics and otherwise her a strong and enjoyable book. The whole thing turns on a whole bunch of characters trusting the word of Morgan Le Fay, which none of them have reason to trust because she keeps trying to kill them. On the other hand, when she did her research Mary Stewart realized that Mordred’s betrayal of Arthur as presented by Geoffrey of Monmouth and Thomas Malory didn’t make a whole lot of sense and ended up rewriting the fall of Camelot as a series of miscommunications and acccidents instead of something malicious on Mordred’s part.

3. You don’t have to tell the whole story

So many authors seem to think that if yo’re going to tell an Arthurian story, it has to be the whole story of Arthur from his conception to his death. That’s a big ass story. And if that’s the story that calls to you, go for it. But don’t feel like that is a requirement. You could instead follow Gawain on the Green Knight trial or Percival and Galahad on the hunt for the Holy Grail. You could take one small moment from the Legend and flesh it out into it’s own story. You could find obsure, nearly unknown characters with obscure, nearly unknown stories and write about them. Flesh out their stories or give them new ones. You could create an entirely original character with entirely original adventures and write about them. You would not be the first (Hi Lancelot).

Phyllis Ann Karr takes a poisoning at a dinner party briefly mentioned in Malory and turns it into a murder mystery. Gerald Morris’ Squire’s Tales follow the adventures of Arthur’s knights and Arthur himself is largely absent from the story.

4. Don’t restrict yourself

Especially not with the setting. You don’t need to be historically accurate (although you can be if you want). Many of the most popular stories were written in the 15th century and have a distinctly renaissance setting. That is as valid as a historically accurate. So is a straight up fantasy setting. Or a modern one. Reincarnation, time travel, sci-fi space epic, etc.

No one can agree where Camelot is. Put it wherever the hell you want. Mary Stewart once moved Benoic three times in her book series and it was pretty much wherever she needed it to be. There is no timeline on events–especially since writers can’t even agree if they occured. No one is going to care if the Guinevere/Lancelot betrayal happens before or after the Grail Quest or how many years there are between Nimue locking Merlin up and Mordred’s betrayal.

Stories aren’t universally enjoyable and what works for one person might not work for another. But Arthurian mythology is really a living legend and it is still growing today. So please just tell the story you want to tell and don’t let the legend limit you.

All of this!

Honestly, I get more upset or bored when characters follow the ‘known actions’ without a reason outside the ‘that’s the common knowledge so it has to happen’ than when something different is considered.

lucrezianoin:

lizard-is-writing:

Anonymous asked: “I’m working on something where I am twisting Arthurian legend and I was wondering, how accurate do I have to make it to myth? I was thinking I could have characters in modern times reflect how ‘history isn’t always told correctly’ as a way to excuse my changes (such as the years Arthur was killed or when Merlin fought in a battle that drove him mad). Will this upset readers, or is this plausible enough of an excuse to allow them to maintain suspension of disbelief? How much is too much change?”

The answer I’d give you as a reader is change as little as possible. As a writer, though I’d say your story comes first. Make it good. The best thing is maybe to reconcile the two opinions. I suggest trying to keep everything as accurate to the original tale as possible and in the places where you cannot, either figure out a way to reference the original truth while still making it work for your plot. 

Keep reading

There is no original arthuian tale, or original book to stick to.

I will quote my favourite arturian non fiction quote ever:

Once a hero has become established, certain feats, characteristics, or adventures become irrevocably associated with him. […] The author is not, of course, obliged to present the sum total of Arthurian accretions in a single text. But he must be careful not to touch upon a readily identifiable episode or context unless he is prepared in some way to deal with his readers’ expectations of, and associations with, that material.
— (The Fall of Kings and Princes – Structure and Destruction in Arthurian Tragedy by Victoria Guerin)

I honestly think you can turn every character into everything you want, I might not personally like it (and many other people will have different preferences) but I don’t think you should stay with what everyone has and knows.
The things is: different people will know different sides of arthurian legends or will prefer different sides. I think it also depends on the kind of public you want to have. I wouldn’t recommend “Idylls of the Queen” (what I consider the most amazing arthurian novel) to someone who has zero knowledge of arthuriana but the “common knowledge”, not even because the author changed things (she really didn’t) but because she used characters and details that are not common knowledge.
While other novels might just retell the well known story and they might be less appealing for people who (like me) are very fond of arthuriana and love to read as much as possible about it.

So, my opinion is change everything you want! As long as you know that some people might not agree, that you might encounter criticism, as long as your changes have a reason to disupt completely the character (example: good character Mordred is a change from what everyone knows but books that take this road try to explain why and what happened to him). My personal opinion is just to not change the general idea of a character (“good king Arthur” for example) without an explanation of why that happened or a change of PoV that makes, in this example, “good king Arthur” good for some people, but a villain through other characters’ eyes.

Looking at the other answers from the fandom it seems like the consensus is Change what you want : D research and enjoy warping the characters and modifying the events!

Just wanted to say that because of a presentation, I won’t be able to organize the watching and chat tomorrow! But next week we will finish The Adventures of sir lancelot episodes!