Tristan and Isolde in art. "Tristan and Isolde": analysis

The tale of Tristan and Isolde (see its summary) was known in many versions in French, but many of them perished, and only small fragments of others survived. By comparing all the French editions of the novel about Tristan known to us, as well as their translations into other languages, it became possible to restore the plot of the oldest novel that has not reached us (the mid-12th century), to which all these editions go back.

Tristan and Isolde. Series

Its author quite accurately reproduced all the details of the Celtic story, preserving its tragic overtones, and only replaced almost everywhere the manifestations of Celtic morals and customs with features of French knightly life. From this material he created a poetic story, permeated with passionate feeling and thought, which amazed his contemporaries and caused a long series of imitations.

Its hero Tristan is tormented by the consciousness of the lawlessness of his love and the insult that he inflicts on his adoptive father, King Mark, endowed in the novel with traits of rare nobility and generosity. Mark marries Isolde only at the insistence of those close to him. After this, he is by no means prone to suspicion or jealousy towards Tristan, whom he continues to love as his own son.

Mark is forced to yield to the insistence of the informers-barons, who point out to him that his knightly and royal honor is suffering, and even threaten him with rebellion. However, Mark is always ready to forgive the guilty. Tristan constantly remembers this kindness of the king, and this makes his moral suffering even intensify.

The love of Tristan and Isolde seems to the author to be a misfortune for which the love potion is to blame. But at the same time, he does not hide his sympathy for this love, portraying in positive terms all those who contribute to it, and expressing obvious satisfaction over the failures or death of the enemies of those who love. The author is externally saved from contradiction by the motif of the fatal love potion. But it is clear that this motive serves only the purpose of masking his feelings, and the artistic images of the novel clearly speak of the true direction of his sympathies. The novel glorifies love, which is “stronger than death” and does not want to reckon with sanctimonious public opinion.

Both this first novel and other French novels about Tristan caused many imitations in most European countries– in Germany, England, Scandinavia, Spain, Italy and other countries. There are also known translations of them into Czech and Belarusian languages. Of all the adaptations, the most significant is the German novel by Godfrey of Strasbourg (early 13th century), which stands out for its subtle analysis emotional experiences heroes and a masterful description of knightly life.

It was Gottfried's Tristan that most contributed to the revival of poetic interest in this medieval subject in the 19th century. It served as the most important source for the famous opera Wagner"Tristan and Isolde" (1859).

Ilijeva Natalya Valbegovna- student of the faculty French language Moscow State Linguistic University.

Annotation: This work sets itself the task of tracing the development and reflection of the legend from the first evidence of its existence in works French writers: the Norman trouvère Béroul, whose novel has come down to us only in the form of a rather long passage and the Anglo-Norman Tom, whose poetic novel has been translated in full, but conveys only a few episodes of the once vast work. The combination of features of these two poems in the novel by Joseph Bedier will also be analyzed.

Keywords: European literature, legend, poem, chivalric romance, storyline, trouvères, philological analysis, French literature.

The medieval legend about the love of the young man Tristan of Leonois and the Queen of Cornwall, Isolde Blonde, is one of the most popular stories in Western European literature. Having arisen in the Celtic folk environment, the legend then gave rise to numerous literary fixations, first in Welsh, then in French, in adaptations from which it became part of all major European literatures, without passing through the Slavic ones.

Examining the novel “Tristan and Isolde,” we can say that this work is the embodiment of a number of features belonging to a chivalric romance.

Saint Samson Island;

The parallel between the battle of Tristan with Morold of Ireland and the battle of David with Goliath or the battle of Achilles with Hector (in addition, the description of the battle is an integral part of any chivalric romance);

Sail motif taken from the ancient Greek tale of Theseus.

Secondly, a description of Tristan's personality as a hero endowed with knightly qualities:

Knowing your place;

Hierarchy of ranks;

Knowledge of etiquette;

Excellent ability to find common language;

Horse fight;

Sword Mastery;

Hunting knowledge.

Thirdly, the availability fairy tale motifs in the work:

Morold of Ireland's three-fold demand to go to battle with him;

“For seven days, seven nights, Tristan quietly carried.”

Predetermination of fate is also clearly expressed in the novel:

Tristan's departure in a boat towards healing or death;

Mark's decision to marry the girl who owns the curls brought by the swallows.

And finally, despite the unusual circumstances of the emergence of feelings between Tristan and Isolde, the theme of love is at the center of the novel's storyline.

Speaking about the difference between the concept of love in “Tristan and Isolde” between Tom and Béroul, it should be noted that Tom’s Roman, preserved in fragments, tells the story of the tragically unchanged and hopeless love of a knight for the wife of his overlord and uncle (“almost father”) King Mark. A fatal passion, criminal in all respects, the cause and symbol of which is a love drink drunk by mistake, does not in any way affect the system of ethical values: both King Mark and Isolde Belokura, whom Tristan marries in order to overcome his love for Isolde Belokura, and both protagonists retain all high spiritual qualities, but at the same time suffer from an omnipotent feeling that irresistibly carries the heroes to death. Tom's version, usually called “courtly,” is in fact far from the ideals of courtly lyricism and chivalric romance: the lady in “The Romance of Tristan” is not an object of semi-sacred worship and does not inspire the hero to deeds in her honor. The center of gravity is shifted to the psychological torment that the heroes endure, connected by family and moral ties and endlessly, against their will, transgressing them.

The love of Tristan and Isolde is described somewhat differently in the so-called “epic” version of the plot, which includes Béroul’s “The Romance of Tristan.” He, explicitly focusing on the poetics of “gestures” with its formality and appeal to the listeners, portrays Mark as a weak king, dependent on rebellious barons. At the same time, the passion of lovers partially loses its fatal character (the effect of the love potion is limited to three years), acquiring, however, an intrinsic value that justifies it in the eyes of not only commoner characters - townspeople, palace servants, unborn knights - but also of divine providence, thanks to which they invariably avoid traps and exposure, including at “God’s court.” However, even such love, triumphant, almost ignorant of mental torment and not striving for death, does not fit into the system of courtly norms.

It is worth noting that when they talk about love in the novel about Tristan and Isolde, we are talking not only about feelings between a man and a woman, but also about love for their land, their people, and most importantly, for their relatives. In this case, the love between uncle and nephew, Mark and Tristan is implied.

To justify Tristan, the idea arises that he drank a magic potion, which helped to inflame the passion between Tristan and Isolde. On the one hand, this is the author’s rebellion against the foundations that have developed in feudal society: obedience to the heart, following feelings to the detriment of duty to one’s family, and on the other hand, the representation of love between a man and a woman as chemical reaction, which deprives them of reason: despite the fact that they do not want to hurt their loved ones, despite all the customs and traditions, their duty to those who sheltered and loved them, they cannot go against the passion that has forever taken possession of them.

As for Mark, he “was never able to drive either Isolde or Tristan out of his heart,” “there was no poison or witchcraft - only the nobility of his heart inspired him with love.” Although there was a moment in the novel that it was possible that Mark was subject to the magic of a love potion, these assumptions were immediately refuted:

“The storytellers claim that Brangien did not throw the jug of wine into the sea” and “as if King Mark drank a lot, and Isolde quietly poured out her share. But know this good people that these narrators spoiled and distorted the story. If they made up this lie, it was because they didn't understand great love, which Mark always had for the queen."

Thus, Mark's love is sacred, innocent, but the forbidden love between Tristan and Isolde is not. Being a noble knight, and Isolde a pious queen, they would never have betrayed the king’s love if not for a miracle potion that prevents them from following their duty. They try to resist their feelings, but they are beyond their control, because there is nothing stronger than magic.

But even before the herbal infusion, the young people liked each other. But then they were controlled by reason, not feelings. Tristan, without any regret, went to get Mark the Blonde Isolde, cleverly deceived her, and she instantly hated him. And only a potion could prevent their nobility.

Since Mark was not under the magic of the drink, despite his feelings, he could not forgive the betrayal, could not resist the hatred and envy towards his once beloved nephew. He sees it as his duty to execute the lovers, and would have done this if not for Tristan’s dexterity and intelligence. But these qualities of Tristan are nothing compared to God, fate, who were on Tristan’s side and will help him avoid execution. But luck did not accompany him for long, for it was not for nothing that his mother named him Tristan: “I gave birth in sadness, my first greetings to you are sad.”

Thus, the problem of choosing between duty and feeling looms before each of the heroes of the novel, but each acts in accordance with the circumstances that fate has prepared for them, because it is absolutely impossible to resist it.

However, as befits a chivalric romance, love is presented here as a symbol of the victory of good over evil. It has already been said that the theme of love in the novel is presented different ways. And, as it turned out, thanks to the machinations of fate (or despite them), love won. She defeated the enmity between Tristan and Mark, she defeated the machinations of Tristan’s ill-wishers, she defeated the envy of Isolde Belorukaya towards her rival, she defeated death. Despite the fact that the main characters suffered a fate, their love also won, death could not separate them: “at night, a thorn tree grew from Tristan’s grave, covered with green foliage, with strong branches and fragrant flowers, which, spreading across the chapel, went into the grave Isolde"

And again a reference to a chivalric romance: the idea that lovers remained together even after death is presented in not a single work, which can not always even be attributed to a chivalric romance: these are various kinds of tales, this is the story of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, this and “Notre Dame de Paris” by Victor Hugo.

The victory of love over death is also demonstrated in Mark's attitude towards the dead: it was he who ordered Tristan and Isolde to be buried together and forbade the cutting down of the thorns that grew between their graves.

Despite the fact that the theme of love in the novel about Tristan and Isolde is presented somewhat differently than in other chivalric novels (if only due to the lack of true harmony between feelings and reason), it is central to this work. No wonder Joseph Bedier wrote the following ending in his interpretation of the novel:

“Good people, glorious trouvères of bygone times, Berul and Thomas, and Eyolgart, and Maester Gottfried, told this story for all those who loved, not for others. Through me they send greetings to you, to all those who are yearning and happy, who are offended by love and who thirst for it, who are joyful and who are sad, to all those who love. Let them find here consolation in impermanence and injustice, in annoyances and adversities, in all the sufferings of love.”

In conclusion, it must be said that Tristan and Isolde is not a typical chivalric romance. In this work there are both similarities with this genre of literature and some deviations from the accepted canons. Moreover, it should be noted that there are at least two versions of the legend - epic and courtly - by Thomas and Béroul, as well as a novel by Joseph Bedier, which is a kind of combination of the above options. Each work is not without a subjective assessment of the author, which, for example, in Bedier’s novel is often supported by arguments.

It is difficult to say which of the works better reflects the content of the original source. Initially, legends were transmitted only orally; they were not recorded in any written sources. But even with the oral dissemination of the legend, each narrator added something of his own, somewhat distorting the plot.

One thing remains unchanged: love, no matter what it is, no matter how it is presented, it is always in the center. She justifies everything, any actions of the heroes. She overcomes all obstacles. All other features of a knightly romance depend on it: valor is of no use to a knight if his heart is not full of love for his beautiful lady. Love for their subjects contributes to the generosity of rulers and their desire to protect their people. Losing loved ones can hurt and kill more than any weapon.

Bibliography

1. Bedier J. Tristan and Isolde - M.: Wolfson Studio, Atticus Publishing Group LLC, 2011. – 148 p.

2. Mikhailov A.D. The legend of Tristan and Isolde and its completion. Studies in language and literature. L., 1973. Abstract to the work of J. Bedier “Tristan and Isolde [Electronic resource] - URL: http://libok.net/

3. Barkova A.L. Tristan and Isolde [Electronic resource] – URL: http://mith.ru/

4. Berul. A novel about Tristan. Per. from early French Linetskaya E.L. [Electronic resource] – URL: http://wysotsky.com/

5. Dictionaries and encyclopedias on Academician [Electronic resource] – URL: http://medieval_culture.academic.ru/

6. Volumes. A novel about Tristan [Electronic resource]: URL: http://wysotsky.com/

7. Tristan and Isolde: Notes [Electronic resource]: URL: http://fbit.ru/

Various versions of the novel about Tristan and Isolde began to appear in the late 60s of the 12th century. Around 1230, a prose French adaptation of the plot was made. Many knights of the Round Table had already appeared in it, and thus the legend of Tristan and Isolde was included in the general context of Arthurian legends. The prose novel was preserved in several dozen manuscripts and was first published in 1489. One of the later manuscripts (15th century) formed the basis of the publication prepared by one of the largest specialists in medieval French literature, Pierre Champion (1880-1942). Based on this edition (Le Roman de Tristan et Iseut. Traduction du roman en prose du quinzième siècle par Pierre Champion. Paris, 1938) a translation was made by Y. Stefanov, which was used in the retelling of the legend further:

Depending on the nationality of the researchers, Tristan’s homeland is considered to be either a French area on the border of Brittany and Normandy, near the city of Saint-Paul de Leon, or County Lothian in Scotland. Tristan's mother, Queen Eliabelle, died immediately after the birth of her son. Before her death, she gave her son a name: “My son, I really wanted to see you! And now I see the most beautiful creature ever born by a woman; but I have little joy from your beauty, for I am dying from the torment that I had to endure for your sake.” I came here, lamenting from sadness, my birth was sad, in sadness I gave birth to you, and for your sake it is sad for me to die. And since you were born out of sadness, it will be sad your name: as a sign of sadness, I name you Tristan" (in Latin "tristis" - "sad").

Tristan's father, King Meliaduc, having become a widow, married the daughter of the Nantes King Hoel, a beautiful but treacherous woman. The stepmother did not like Tristan. Tristan was barely 7 years old when his father died. Tristan's teacher Guvernal fled with the boy from the hatred of his stepmother to Gaul, to the court of King Pharamon. When Tristan grew up, he went into the service of his uncle Mark, king of Cornwall, on whom lay the annual tribute to the Irish king, established 200 years ago, of one hundred girls, one hundred boys who had reached fifteen years of age, and one hundred thoroughbred horses. Morhult, the brother of the Irish queen, arrived in Cornwall with an army to demand this tribute. To rid the kingdom of tribute, Tristan volunteered to fight Morkhult and defeated him, but was wounded by Morkhult's poisoned spear.

No one could cure Tristan and he asked to put him in a boat and send him to the sea: “if the Lord wills for me to drown, death will seem like a great consolation to me, for I have long been exhausted from suffering. And if I manage to recover, I will return to Cornwalls." “Tristan wandered through the sea for two weeks until his boat washed up on the shores of Ireland, not far from the castle of Hessedot. The Irish king and his wife, Morkhult’s sister, lived there. And their daughter, Isolde, lived with them. “And this Isolde was more beautiful all the women in the world, and in those days no one would have been found who would have surpassed her in the art of healing, for she knew all the herbs and their properties. And at that time she was fourteen years old" (Tristan was 15 years old at that time). Isolde cured Tristan, not knowing that he was the murderer of her uncle.

A snake settled in Ireland, devastating the country, and the king announced that whoever could defeat the snake would give everything he asked for, half of his kingdom and his daughter Isolde, if he wanted to take her. Tristan killed the snake, but was poisoned by its poison and Isolde healed Tristan again. Meanwhile, it was discovered that Tristan was Morkhult’s murderer. Tristan was expelled from Ireland and returned to King Mark. Mark's courtiers began to fear that after Mark's death the throne would pass to Tristan and convinced Mark to marry so that an heir to the throne would be born. King Mark, remembering Tristan’s words about Isolde’s beauty, decided to woo her. The Irish king agreed to reconcile with King Mark and marry his daughter Isolde to him.

Isolde's mother gave Tristan's tutor Guvernal and her maid Brangien a love potion to give to King Mark and Isolde on their wedding night. During the voyage, Tristan and Isolde played chess and became thirsty. The governor and Brangien mistakenly gave Tristan and Isolde a love potion. Seized by insane passion, Tristan and Isolde fell in love with each other for life and gave themselves to each other right on the ship.

On her wedding night with Mark, Isolde, in order to avoid being exposed as having lost her virginity before the wedding, swapped in complete darkness with Brangien (who was a virgin) on Mark’s bed. In the morning, Mark saw blood on the bed and did not understand that he had been deceived. Isolde spent that night with Tristan. Fearing Brangien, a witness and participant in the deception, Isolde ordered her to be taken to the forest and killed. The servants did not do this and only tied the maid to a tree. They told Isolde that they had killed Brangien, but seeing Isolde’s repentance, they told the truth and the maid was returned.

Tristan and Isolde met in secret, but were eventually exposed. Mark gave Isolde to the lepers so that they could rape her. However, Tristan's teacher Guvernal saved Isolde and handed her over to Tristan. Tristan, Governor, Isolde and her maid Lamida settled in an abandoned castle in the forest.

After some time, Mark found out where Tristan and Isolde lived and ordered Isolde to be returned and Tristan to be killed. The king's envoys found only one Isolde in the castle, and Tristan was hunting at that time. Isolde was returned to Mark.

Tristan was seriously wounded by one of Mark's servants. Brangien advised him to leave: “Go to Brittany, to the palace of King Hoel, who has a daughter named White-handed Isolde; she is so knowledgeable in the art of medicine that she will certainly heal you” [Tristan’s beloved was called White-haired Isolde, she should not be confused with White-handed Isolde ]. White-armed Isolde healed Tristan. “And he looked at this Isolde, and fell in love with her, and thought that if he could marry her, he would forget Isolde for her sake. And it seems to him that he can leave the other Isolde for many reasons, and first of all because "that she belonged contrary to law and reason: who, having heard about this, would not consider him a traitor and a villain? And he decided that it would be best for him to take this Isolde and leave that one." Tristan married White-armed Isolde: “if the other Isolde loved him, then this one loved him a hundred times more.”

"The night came when Tristan had to lie down with Isolde. Thoughts about another Isolde do not allow him to know her, but do not prevent him from hugging and kissing. And so Tristan lies next to Isolde, and both of them are naked, and the lamp burns so brightly that it can he sees her beauty. Her neck is tender and white, her eyes are black and cheerful, her eyebrows are steep and thin, her face is tender and clear. And Tristan hugs her and kisses her. But, remembering Isolde of Cornwall, he loses all desire to go further.
This Isolde is here, in front of him, but the other one, who remained in Cornwall and who is dearer to him than himself, does not allow him to commit treason. So Tristan lies with Isolde, his wife. And she, not knowing that there are other pleasures in the world than hugs and kisses, sleeps on his chest until the morning, when the ladies and maids come to visit them.”
Isolde Blonde, having learned about Tristan’s marriage, was greatly saddened and tried to commit suicide.

Tristan, deciding to see the Blonde Isolde, pretended to be crazy and came to Cornwall. Only the dog recognized Tristan. Isolde did not recognize Tristan, because... there was a scar on his face and his head was shaved. Only when he identified himself and showed her the ring that Isolde herself gave him.

Edward Burne-Jones. "Insanity" by Tristan

Tristan and Isolde met in secret for two months until they were discovered. Before separation, Isolde asked Tristan:
“My beloved and dear friend, if you happen to die before me or become mortally ill, order yourself to be put on a ship and brought here. And let half of the sails on that ship be black and half white. If you die or are about to die, let the black sails be hoisted on the forward mast; and if you are in good health, then there shall be white sails on the forward mast, and black ones on the back. And I will do the same, if I happen to die before you. And as soon as the ship enters the harbor , I will go there to meet my great sorrow or immeasurable joy, I will hug you and shower you with countless kisses, and then I will die to be buried with you. For if during life the bonds of our love were so strong, then it will not be possible for me to break them death. And know that if I die before you, I will do the same."
Tristan returned home to his wife. Soon he was wounded in the battle and no one could heal his wound. Then he sent a shipowner he knew to Isolde the Blonde, who, having learned about Tristan’s illness, ran away from Mark and boarded the ship. Tristan ordered his goddaughter to immediately notify him of the appearance of a ship with white and black sails. Tristan's wife found out about this and realized that Tristan loved someone else. When a ship with white sails on the front mast appeared in the distance, Tristan's wife told her goddaughter to stay on the pier, and she went to Tristan and said that a ship with black sails had appeared. Tristan, deciding that his beloved had not arrived, died. Isolde Blonde, who arrived, entered and saw the dead Tristan, lay down next to him and also died, not imagining life without her lover.

Jean Delville - Tristan and Isolde

Mark was given Tristan's suicide note addressed to him, in which he revealed that he fell in love with Isolde not of his own free will, but under the influence of a love potion. Mark became sad and burst into tears:
- Woe is me! Why didn't I find out about this earlier? Then I would have hidden from everyone that Tristan loves Isolde, and would not have pursued them. And now I have lost my nephew and my wife!
Tristan and Isolde were buried not far from each other. “From the grave of Tristan rose a beautiful thorn bush, green and lush-leaved, and, spreading across the chapel, grew into Isolde’s grave. The surrounding residents found out about this and informed King Mark. Three times the king ordered this bush to be cut, but every time the next day it appeared so as beautiful as ever."

The full text of the legend of Tristan and Isolde can be read.

PLOT

We tried to consider all known versions of the myth about Tristan and, after analyzing them, identify the main plot. Although it does not coincide in all details with famous work Richard Wagner, however, it helps to better understand the meaning of a number of symbols that appear within the plot.

Tristan is a young prince living at the court of his uncle, King Mark of Cornwall. In a terrible battle, he defeats Morolt ​​of Ireland, to whom Mark was supposed to give 100 girls annually as tribute. However, he himself is mortally wounded by a poisoned arrow. Tristan leaves the courtyard and, without oars, sails or rudder, taking only his lyre, sails away on a boat. Miraculously, he reaches the shores of Ireland, where he meets Isolde the Golden-haired, who masters the art of magic and healing, inherited from her mother. She heals his wound. Tristan pretends to be a certain Tantris, but Isolde recognizes him as the conqueror of Morolt, comparing the notch on Tristan’s sword with a metal fragment that she removed from the skull of the deceased Morolt.
Upon returning to the court of King Mark, Tristan is entrusted with a particularly important mission: using a golden hair dropped by a swallow to find the woman his uncle would like to marry. Tristan recognizes Isolde's golden hair. After many admirable feats, such as victory in a battle with a terrible snake-like monster that ravaged Ireland and terrified even the bravest knights, he wins a beautiful lady for his uncle.
On the way from Ireland to Cornwall, Isolde's maid accidentally confuses the magical drinks that the princess was carrying with her. Isolde, blinded by resentment, offers Tristan a drink that brings death, but thanks to the maid’s mistake, instead of poison, they both drink a magical balm of love that binds the young couple with a great immortal feeling and irresistible passion.
The wedding day of Isolde and Mark is approaching. However, the young queen and Tristan, torn by heartache and longing for each other, continue their hot love affair until the king exposes them. Further, each version of the legend of Tristan offers its own version of the denouement of this story.
According to one version, a certain knight of King Mark inflicts a mortal wound on Tristan, after which the hero retires to his family castle, awaiting death or the appearance of Isolde, who could save him again. And indeed, Isolde arrives on a boat. But she is pursued by King Mark and his knights. The denouement turns out to be bloody: everyone dies except King Mark, a silent witness to the drama. Saying goodbye to life, Tristan and Isolde sing a hymn to great immortal love, permeated with a high feeling that triumphs over death and turns out to be much stronger than pain and suffering.
According to another version, immediately after the betrayal is exposed, King Mark expels the lovers. They take refuge in the forest (or in a forest grotto), where they live in solitude. One day Mark finds them sleeping and sees that Tristan’s sword lies between them as a symbol of purity, innocence and chastity. The king forgives his wife and takes her with him. Tristan is sent to Armorica, where he marries the daughter of the local duke, Isolde Belorukaya. But the memory of his former great love does not allow Tristan to love his wife or even touch her.
While defending his friend, one day Tristan finds himself mortally wounded again. He sends his friends in search of Isolde Golden-haired - the only one who can cure him. The white sail on the boat that was sent to search for Isolde was supposed to mean that she was found, and the black sail meant that she could not be found. A boat returning from a trip appears on the horizon under a white sail, but Tristan’s wife, Isolde Belorukaya, in a fit of jealousy, tells her husband that the sail is black. This is how Tristan’s last hope dies, and with it life leaves his body. Isolde the Golden-haired appears, but too late. Seeing her lover dead, she lies down next to him and also dies.

CHARACTERS: NAMES AND CHARACTERISTICS

Tristan (sometimes Tristram, Tristant) is a name of Celtic origin. Tristan or Drostan is diminutive form the name Drost (or Drust), which was borne by some Pictish kings in the 7th-9th centuries. This name is also associated with the word "tristeza", meaning sadness and alluding to the fact that his mother died in childbirth, shortly after the death of his father. Tristan was the son of Rivalen, king of Lyonia (Loonois), and Blancheflore, sister of Mark of Cornwall.
Tristan is "a hero without equal, the pride of kingdoms and the refuge of glory." Tristan uses the name "Tantris" every time he gets to Ireland: when he first fights with Morolt, receives a mortal wound and is abandoned to the mercy of fate in a boat without oars, sails or rudder, and when he returns to win the hand of Isolde-Isea and give it to his uncle Mark. In both cases this name is fulfilled special meaning.
It is symbolic not only that the syllables in the name are swapped, but also that all of Tristan’s life values ​​change. He ceases to be a knight without fear and reproach and becomes like a man who is obsessed with a love affair leading to death, and is no longer able to control himself. He is no longer a fearless knight, but weak person, on the one hand, in need of the help of the sorceress Izea, on the other hand, deceiving her love and trust, planning to hand her over to another man.
Izea (Izeut, Izaut, Isolt, Isolde, Isotta) is another Celtic name, possibly going back to the Celtic word "essilt", meaning spruce, or to the Germanic names Ishild and Isvalda.
Mario Roso de Luna in his research goes even further and connects the name of Isolde with such names as Isa, Isis, Elsa, Eliza, Isabel, Isis-Abel, leaning towards the fact that our heroine symbolizes the sacred image of Isis - the pure Soul that gives life to all people. Isolde is the daughter of the Queen of Ireland and Morolt's niece (according to other versions, his fiancée or sister). She is a sorceress who masters the magical art of healing and resembles Medea from the myth of Jason and the Argonauts, as well as Ariadne from the myth of Theseus.
Isolt White-Handed is the daughter of Howell, King or Duke of Armorica or Little Britain. Most authors consider this character to be later; most likely it was simply added to original story myth.
Morolt ​​(Marhalt, Morhot, Armoldo, Morloth, Moroldo) - son-in-law of the king of Ireland, a man of gigantic stature, who annually goes to Cornwall to collect tribute - 100 girls. In Wagner's version of the myth, Morolt ​​is Izea's fiancé, who died in a duel with Tristan; his body was thrown on a desert island, and his head was hanged in the lands of Ireland.
"Mor" in Celtic means "sea", but also "high", "large". This is the famous monster that not only Tristan, but also Theseus had to defeat in Greek myth, symbolizing everything old, outdated and dying in humanity. He is opposed by the strength of the hero’s youth, the ability to perform great feats, create miracles and lead to new distances.
Mark (Maros, Marke, Marco, Mars, Mares) - King of Cornwall, Tristan's uncle and Isea's husband. According to Roso de Luna, it symbolizes karma, or the law of fate. He alone survives the dramatic ending. But all the events in the myth unfold around him, it is he who becomes the cause that gives rise to all the known consequences of this drama.
Brangweina (Brangel, Brengana, Brangena, Brangjena) is Izea's faithful servant, who, according to different versions, intentionally or accidentally switches the places of the drinks intended for Tristan and Izea. In Wagner's work, Brangwein is asked to serve Tristan and Izea a magical drink that brings death, but either out of fear or absent-mindedness, she serves them a magical drink that causes love. According to some sources, Brangweina replaces Izea in the wedding bed with Mark in order to hide the guilt of her mistress.

SYMBOLIC EPISODES

In the legend of Tristan one can find many similarities with the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. Like Theseus, Tristan must defeat a monster - the giant Morolt, demanding tribute in the form of young beautiful maidens, or the dragon, devastating the lands of Ireland. In some versions of the myth, the giant Mo-rolt and the dragon are clearly distinguished and are different characters, in others they are combined into one monstrous creature.
Following in the footsteps of Theseus, Tristan conquers Isea, but not for himself: Theseus gives Ariadne to Dionysus, and Tristan gives Isea to his uncle, King Mark.
At the end of the story, a ship with white sails signifies the return of Theseus (or the death of his father Aegeus) and the return of Isea, and with black sails it means death for both lovers. Sometimes it is not a sail that is spoken of, but a special flag: in Wagner’s work, Isolde’s boat approaches the shore with a flag on the mast, expressing “luminous joy, brighter than the light itself...”

STORIES FROM THE LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR

At one time, Wagner planned to combine the plots of “Tristan” and “Parsifal”: “I had already made a sketch of three acts in which I intended to use the entire plot of “Tristan” in its entirety. In the last act I introduced an episode, which I later deleted: the dying Tristan is visited by Parsifal, setting out in search of the Grail. The mortally wounded Tristan, still fighting and not giving up the ghost, although his hour had already struck, was identified in my soul with Amfortas, a character from the story of the Grail ... "
Amfortas - the king, the keeper of the Grail - was wounded by a magical spear, enchanted by one of the famous black magicians, and condemned to great suffering: as a result of witchcraft, his wound never healed. Something similar happens to Tristan, who is mortally wounded twice (or even three times); only Isolde can heal them. The factor of magic and witchcraft here is undeniable: Tristan is wounded by Morolt ​​or the dragon, and only Izea wields magical art, able to withstand the devastating effects of injury. The wounded Tristan loses his qualities as a valiant knight and turns into a Tantris, because he becomes a victim of witchcraft, black magic, and only the wise Izea knows what needs to be done to remove the terrible spell that brings death from him. The unexpected twist in the plot is reminiscent of some fragments of legends about ancient Atlantis. Seeing her dying lover, Izea makes the last sacrifice, performs the last great healing. She is no longer looking for a means that can bring Tristan back to life, but chooses the path of death as the only way salvation and transformation.
There is another similarity to the plot of the legend of King Arthur: Mark finds the lovers sleeping in the depths of the forest, with a sword placed between them. King Arthur witnessed a similar scene when he found Guinevere and Lancelot fleeing into the forest, unable to hide their love from each other any longer. Moreover, a Galician-Portuguese collection of poems notes that Tristan and Isea lived in a castle that was given to them by Lancelot. Then Tristan decides to take part in the search for the Grail and, setting out on the journey, in accordance with the tradition followed by young people looking for adventure, he takes with him a harp and a green shield, described in the chivalric romances of that time. Hence the names that were assigned to him: Knight of the green sword or Knight of the green shield. Tristan's death is described differently by different authors. There is the episode we mentioned with the sails. There is an option according to which Tristan was wounded by King Mark or one of the court knights, who discovered him with Izea in the palace gardens. There are other versions, including known variant Wagner. But most often it is Mark who holds in his hand a deadly poisoned sword or spear, sent by Morgana specifically to destroy the knight.

QUESTION ABOUT DRUGS

Leaving without discussion the plot of the love drink that the Queen of Ireland prepared for her daughter’s wedding, and the mistake due to which Tristan and Isolde drank it, let’s look for an explanation for this story.
To understand the meaning of the Greek myth of Theseus and the legend of Tristan, the same symbolic keys can be applied.
According to one of these approaches, Tristan symbolizes man, and Izea symbolizes his soul. Then it is only natural that they were united in bonds of love even before they drank the drug. But in life it often happens that various circumstances force a person to forget about his soul, deny its existence, or simply stop taking into account its needs and experiences. The result is an “alienation” from each other, which causes both parties to suffer. But the soul never gives up. Izea prefers death to betrayal of her beloved, believing that it is better to die together than to live in separation: she invites Tristan to drink the supposed drink of Reconciliation, which in fact turns out to be poison, that is, a drink that leads to death. But maybe this was not the only solution, maybe not only death can reconcile a person with his soul? A lucky mistake occurs: the drinks are switched and both drink the potion of Love. They are together again, they are reconciled by the great power of love. Not in order to die, but in order to live and overcome all life’s difficulties together. Here we look at the plot from a philosophical point of view. The philosophical views of the great Plato can be applied to many things concerning this myth.
Tristan is a man crucified between the world of feelings and the world of spirit, between the pleasures of earthly life and the craving for eternal beauty, for eternal heavenly Love, which can be achieved only through the death of the shadow sides of one’s personality, only through domination over them.
Tristan never feels guilty for his love, but he does feel guilty of the sin of pride, which strikes his heart: instead of fighting for his own immortality, he gives in to the thirst for power and earthly glory. And if this requires giving up his soul, he, of course, will sacrifice it without hesitation - this is how Tristan sacrifices Isolde, allowing her to marry Mark.
Tristan gains immortality only at the cost of his own death, which becomes for him redemption, liberation from all the filth of earthly life. From this moment his rebirth begins, his final and decisive transition from the kingdom of shadows and pain to the kingdom of light and happiness. Death is defeated by immortality. The troubadour's song gives way to a hymn of resurrection, the lyre and rose of love turn into a shining sword of life and death. Tristan finds his Grail.
This story also reflects the great doctrine of twin souls, for our heroes gradually achieve perfection far beyond ordinary earthly passion. Their love turns into complete mutual understanding, into a deep fusion with each other, into a mystical unity of souls, thanks to which each of them becomes an inseparable part of the other.

INSTEAD OF CONCLUSION

There are many symbols and symbolic clues intertwined in this story. Tristan represents all of humanity - young and heroic in spirit, capable of fighting, loving and understanding beauty. The wise Izea is an image of a caring guardian angel of humanity, embodied in the person of Tristan, an image symbolizing the eternal mysteries of existence, which always had two faces, containing two connecting opposites: mind and sex, life and death, love and war. The duality of “mind - gender” originates in ancient esoteric traditions that tell about a turning point, a critical moment in history, through which a person received a spark of reason. Man and woman (in courtly literature- knight and lady) for the first time had to experience the pain of separation, in which at the same time there was something attractive. However, the newly emerging higher mind was not yet able to comprehend the meaning of what was happening. Since then, love has been perceived through sexual attraction, as well as through the pain and suffering that accompanies it. But such a perception differs significantly from the pure, strong, idealistic feeling of great, eternal heavenly Love, which can be fully experienced only thanks to the Higher Mind awakened in a person.
We will try to explain other pairs of opposites: “life - death”, “love - war” based on the philosophical teaching about Logoi, which in their triple aspect influence the human condition. Tristan draws his experience from the Higher Mind - a form characteristic of the Third Logos. He is a knight with the intelligence to reap glory in the world of form, a winner in many battles, but he does not yet know the real War; he is a gallant gentleman and a seducer of beautiful ladies, but he does not yet know true love; he is a troubadour and a refined musician, but does not yet know real Beauty. He senses Izea's presence, but still does not have the wisdom to recognize her as his own soul.
It is death that brings him to the next step, it is death that opens the doors for him leading to the Second Logos - to Energy-Life, Love-Wisdom. The death of his bodily shell leads him to understand the great mystery of the energy of Life, in which lie the vital juices that nourish the entire universe, in which lies the cause of Immortality: through Death, Life is understood, and through Death, ultimately, Love is understood. His Intelligence turns into Wisdom. And only from this moment can he win the great war, the great battle that the thousand-year-old Bhagavad Gita describes, in the battle for finding his own soul, for finding himself.
It is at this moment that the musician and lover is transformed into a wise man, now he knows that Art and Love are two parts of one eternal beauty, inseparable from each other.
One more step - and he lives in the ecstasy of Death for the sake of Love. This state gives him new vision, opens the eyes of the soul, brings understanding:
Beauty is the same as goodness and justice.
Reason is only victories and triumphs in the earthly world, far from the soul.
Form is the music of earthly sounds.
Energy is life and knowledge of the death of forms.
Love is wisdom, art and beauty, earned in the war to find oneself.
Law is beauty, kindness and justice.
Will is overcoming all trials, sublimation of desire.
Tristan personifies the perfect, ideal model of the Path, called by the Neoplatonist Plotinus “ascent to Truth.”
Tristan is a lover and a musician, but earthly passions turn his love into a red rose with bloody thorns, and his lyre into a sword that can mortally wound. And suddenly he enters the world of Ideas. The musician and lover can already understand and see. He has already made the journey, passing through dangerous waters, protecting himself with his shield, following his soul. He has already reached the door of the new man, new form life.
This is the path of a true musician: from forms - to Ideas, from desire - to Will, from a warrior - to Man.
The essence of this path was best expressed by Richard Wagner, who described the experiences and experiences of love, which always unites what, due to our ignorance, is subject to separation. His words show the entire path of Tristan and Isolde, initially immersed in an insatiable wave of desire, which, born from a simple, timid recognition, grows and gains strength... First sighs in solitude, then hope, then pleasure and regret, joy and suffering... The wave grows, reaching its peak, to the point of frantic pain, until it finds a saving gap through which all the great and strong feelings of the heart pour out to dissolve in the ocean of endless pleasure of true Love: “Even such intoxication leads to nothing. For the heart , unable to resist, completely indulges in passion and, overwhelmed by unsatisfied desire, again loses strength... For it does not understand that every satisfied desire is only the seed of a new, even more greedy... That the whirlwind of passion ultimately leads to the inevitable , complete exhaustion of strength. And when it all ends, into the soul, tormented by whirlwinds of desires, realizing that it remains devastated again, a premonition of another, higher pleasure creeps in - the sweetness of death and non-existence, final redemption, achievable only in that wonderful kingdom, which is all the more It moves away from us, the more we strive to penetrate there.
Can this be called death? Or is this the hidden kingdom of the Mystery, which gave the seeds of love, from which grew the vine and ivy, closely intertwined and entwining the grave of Tristan and Isolde, as the legend says?

The original article is on the website of the magazine "New Acropolis".

a) Plot history

Origin - Celtic (Drustan and Essilt). We find parallels to the motifs of the novel in the legends of the ancient East, ancient times, Caucasus, etc. But this legend came to the poetry of feudal Europe in a Celtic design, with Celtic names, with characteristic everyday features. This legend arose in the region of Ireland and Celticized Scotland and was first historically associated with the name of the Pictish prince Drostan. From there it moved to Wales and Cornwalls, where it acquired a number of new features. In the 12th century. it became known to Anglo-Norman jugglers, one of whom, around 1140, translated it into a French novel (“prototype”), which has not reached us, but served as a source for all (or almost all) of its further literary adaptations.

Directly going back to the “prototype” are: 1) the intermediate link we have lost, which gave rise to - a) the French novel by Béroul (c. 1180, only fragments have survived) and b) the German novel by Eilhart von Oberge (c. 1190); 2) the French novel by Thomas (c. 1170), which gave rise to: a) the German novel by Godfrey of Strasbourg (early 13th century), b) the short English poem “Sir Tristrem” (late 13th century) and c) the Scandinavian saga of T. ( 1126); 3) the episodic French poem "The Madness of Tristan", known in two versions (about 1170); 4) a French prose novel about T. (c. 1230), etc. In turn, later editions go back to the listed French and German editions - Italian, Spanish, Czech, etc., up to the Belarusian story “About Tryshchan” and Izhota."

Plot - tragic love Isolde, wife of the Cornish king, to her husband's nephew. First processed French poets, including Berulem and Toma (70s of the 12th century). The latter has enhanced the psychological development of characters, emphasizing the conflict between the feelings of the heroes and the feudal and moral duty weighing on them. Book of Tom at the beginning of the 13th century. revised by the Alsatian Godfrey of Strasbourg.

b). Main versions, significance of Bedier's reconstruction

By comparing derivative versions, a number of researchers (Bedier, Golter, etc.) restored the content and design of the “prototype” in its main features. It told in detail the story of the youth of T., a Breton prince, who, having been orphaned early and disinherited, came to the court of his uncle, the Cornish king Mark, who carefully raised him and intended, due to his childlessness, to make him his successor. Young T. provides his new homeland performed a great service by killing in single combat the Irish giant Morolt, who was exacting a living tribute from Cornwall. Himself seriously wounded by Morolt's poisoned weapon, Tristan gets into the boat and sails at random in search of healing, which he receives in Ireland from Princess Isolde, skilled in healing. Later, when the vassals force Mark to marry in order to obtain a legitimate heir, T. voluntarily looks for a bride for him and brings I. But on the way, he mistakenly drinks a love drink with her, which her mother gave her to ensure lasting love between her and her husband. From now on, T. and I. are connected by a love as strong as life and death. A series of secret meetings take place between them, but they are finally exposed and convicted. They run and wander in the forest for a long time. Then Mark forgives them and returns I. to the court, but tells T. to leave. T. leaves for Brittany and there, captivated by the similarity of names, marries another I.-Belorukaya, however, true to his feelings for the first I., he does not get close to his wife. Mortally wounded in one battle, he sends a messenger to his I. with a plea to come and heal him again. They agreed that if the messenger managed to bring I., a white sail would be displayed on his ship, otherwise a black one. T.'s jealous wife, having found out about this, tells the maid to say that a ship with a black sail has appeared. T. dies immediately. I. goes ashore, lies down next to T.’s body and dies too. They are buried in two adjacent graves, and the plants that grow from them overnight are intertwined.

The author of the "prototype" extremely developed the Celtic legend in terms of plot, adding to it a number of additional features, taken from various sources - from two Celtic legends (T.'s voyage for healing), from ancient literature (Morolt ​​the Minotaur and the motif of sails - from the legend about Theseus), from local or eastern tales of the novelistic type (the cunning of lovers). He moved the action into a contemporary setting, incorporating chivalric customs, concepts, and institutions and, for the most part, rationalizing fairy-tale and magical elements.

But its main innovation is the original concept of the relationship between the three main characters. T. is constantly tormented by the consciousness of his violation of his triple duty towards Mark - his adoptive father, benefactor and overlord (the idea of ​​vassal fidelity). This feeling is aggravated by the generosity of Mark, who does not seek revenge and would be ready to give in to I., but defends his rights only in the name of the feudal concept of the prestige of the king and the honor of his husband.

This conflict between the personal, free feeling of lovers and the social and moral norms of the era, permeating the entire work, reflects the deep contradictions in knightly society and its worldview. Portraying the love of T. and I. with ardent sympathy and portraying in sharply negative tones everyone who wants to interfere with their happiness, the author does not dare to openly protest against the prevailing concepts and institutions and “justifies” the love of his heroes by the fatal effect of the drink. Nevertheless, objectively, his novel turns out to be a deep criticism of Old Testament feudal norms and concepts.

Various versions of the novel, primarily poetic (among them are the French novels of Béroul and Thomas, which are far from completely preserved, and the extensive novel written in German by Godfrey of Strasbourg), began to appear in the late 60s of the 12th century. Around 1230, a prose French adaptation of the plot was made. Many knights of the Round Table had already appeared in it, and thus the legend of Tristan and Isolde was included in the general context of Arthurian legends. The prose novel survives in several dozen manuscripts and was first published in 1489.

This social content of the “prototype” in the form of an artistically developed tragic concept passed to a greater or lesser extent into all subsequent treatments of the plot and ensured its exceptional popularity until the Renaissance. In later times it was also developed many times by poets in lyrical, narrative and dramatic forms, especially in the 19th century. The largest adaptations of it here are Wagner's opera "T. and I." (1864; after Gottfried of Strasbourg) and compositions J. Bedier "Novel about T. and I.", basically reproducing the content and general character of the “prototype”. Joseph Bedier, following the reconstruction of the novel, performed the same operation with the legend as a whole. He called what he was looking for a “prototype” (or “archetype”). It must be said that Bedier explained some points in the novel that were presented very briefly, confusingly or illogically in the legend. For example, he included the motif of a love drink that Tristan and Isolde drink on the ship (instead of Tristan and Mark). This explains the further behavior of the heroes.

From its very inception, the chivalrous courtly novel was a literary phenomenon that had a fairly bright social connotation. It was addressed to a certain circle of people, and certainly not to the peasant or merchant class. So, he glorified friendship, brotherhood and mutual assistance - but only knights. He called for spiritual nobility, but at the same time subtly and consistently emphasized that only the inhabitants of castles could possess these qualities. However, “The Romance of Tristan and Isolde” goes beyond the predetermined “social framework”. It was addressed to representatives of various classes.

main topic This work is a bright, all-consuming love, before which even death is powerless. There are many moments in the novel that captivate with their realistic authenticity: the relationship between peasants and feudal lords, descriptions of medieval castles and their everyday life, depictions of details of knightly morals. The experiences of the main characters are shown quite realistically. Here there is a desire for psychologism, an interest in the logic of the development of certain human characters, and this applies even to minor characters.

But at the same time, the novel is characterized by a combination of realistic elements with purely fantastic, fabulous features. Thus, Tristan had to fight not only with armored opponents, but also with a fire-breathing dragon. Tristan's fiery love for Isolde, his uncle's fiancée, which arose during their joint sea voyage, is explained by the fact that both of them mistakenly drank a magic drink that arouses mutual feelings of love. This drink was intended for Isolde and King Mark, they were supposed to drink it on their wedding day.

In many places in the novel it is emphasized that Queen Isolde is a girl of strict moral rules, for whom feeling for a long time means a lot. So, not yet being the bride of King Mark, she learned that Tristan had killed her uncle Morkhult, who had come to the lands of King Mark demanding tribute, in battle. She demands severe punishment for Tristan. But he performs a series of brilliant feats aimed at the benefit of his homeland, the kingdom of Ireland, and Isolde softens, for the good of the fatherland is above all. Here, for the first time in courtly literature, a theme is outlined that many years later will be developed by classic writers (the theme of love and duty, if I understand correctly).

But the sense of duty to the family comes into conflict with the feeling of love. Ultimately, Isolde is unable to resist her heartfelt inclination. If the reasons for the heroine’s feelings are motivated by fairy-tale reasons, then its further development is again distinguished by great realistic authenticity: suffering married woman, loving one, but forced to be the wife of another, are shown quite convincingly.

The love of Tristan and Isolde is a tragic love. They both have to endure many misadventures, and in the name of their feelings they both die. In the subtext of the novel, the idea clearly emerges that outdated feudal norms and rules, disfiguring and destroying natural human feelings, have no prospects for further development. The idea was quite bold for its time, hence the great popularity of this novel among various segments of society.

“The Romance of Tristan and Isolde” is highly poetic, and it undoubtedly has its origins in oral history. folk art, where, in particular, great attention focuses on the relationship between man and nature. Either she seems to sympathize with human experiences, or she condemns them, especially if we're talking about about lies or deceit.

There are no lengthy descriptions of nature in the novel: its specificity is such that plot collisions and the psychological experiences of the heroes associated with them come first. The sea, the water element, occupies a prominent place in the novel. At the very beginning of the novel, the seriously ill Tristan entrusts his fate to the sea, as a friend and impartial judge. He asks to be loaded into the boat and pushed away from the shore. The sea, in his deep conviction, never betrays or deceives; it will take him exactly where he needs to go. On the ship, Tristan and Isolde drink a love potion. Isolde hurries across the sea waves on a ship under white sails to the dying Tristan.

A prominent place in the novel belongs to the symbolism of certain images or everyday situations. The following episode is quite typical: after the death of Tristan and Isolde they were buried in the same chapel. A thorn bush grew from Tristan’s grave, the branches of which reached Isolde’s grave, gave roots and grew into it. This bush and these branches were pruned several times, and several times they grew again. The subtext of the symbolic image of love: know how to appreciate this high feeling both in a powerful knight and in a humble artisan, and in a peasant walking behind the plow.

From Journ.ru:

1) Plot history. The novel belongs to the Breton cycle. And some of the novels in this cycle were based on Celtic legends. Parallels to the novel in the Irish sagas: The expulsion of the sons of Usnecht, the Persecution of Diarmind and Grainne.

2) Versions of the novel The Celtic legend of Tristan and Isolde was known in a large number of adaptations in French, but many of them were completely lost, and only small fragments of others survived. By comparing all the fully and partially known French editions of the novel, as well as their translations into other languages, it turned out to be possible to restore the plot and general character of the most ancient French language that has not reached us. the novel of the mid-12th century, to which all these editions go back. Which was successfully accomplished by the Frenchman. scientist Bedier (he lived in the XIX-XX century. Vannikova asked not to call him a trouvère or a troubadour.) The most famous versions are the poetic versions of the French Béroul and Thomas, the extensive novel by Godfrey of Strasbourg n. XIII (German, you understand). A prose French adaptation was saddled around 1230. The Knights of the Round Table appeared in it, and thus the novel was included in the circle of Arthurian novels.

3) Composition. In romances of chivalry, the composition is usually linear; events follow one another. Here the chain breaks + symmetry of the episodes. Each episode at the beginning of the novel corresponds to mirror reflection in darker tones: the story of the birth of T. a story about death; sail of Morol-da (victory, rejoicing) sail of Isolde (deliberate deception, death), the Dragon’s poison, from which I.’s wound from a poisoned weapon heals, but I. is not nearby, etc.

4) Concept of love and nature of conflict. Love is presented here as a disease, a destructive force over which human power has no control (this is an ancient mythological concept). This contradicts the courtly understanding of love. Death, by the way, also has no power over her: two trees grow from the graves and intertwine their branches. The conflict between duty and feeling (a real tragedy of the classicists! True, in the textbook this is not called a dog, but public morality. Judge for yourself what is closer to you.): T. should not love Isolde, because she is the wife of his uncle, who raised him and he loves him like his own son, and trusts him in everything (including getting Isolde). And Isolde shouldn’t love T. either, because she’s married. The author’s attitude towards this conflict is ambivalent: on the one hand, he recognizes the correctness of morality (or duty), forcing T. to suffer from guilt, on the other hand, he sympathizes with her, portraying in positive terms everything that contributes to this love.

Retelling:

King Mark reigned in Cornwall. One day he was attacked by enemies and his friend, the king (of the county, kingdom, who knows) Loonua Rivalen, went to help him. And he served Mark so faithfully that he decided to marry him to his beautiful sister Blanchefleur, with whom Rivalen was head over heels in love.

However, as soon as he got married, he learned that his old enemy, Duke Morgan, had attacked his lands. Rivalen equipped a ship and, together with his pregnant wife, sailed to his kingdom. He left his wife in the care of his marshal Roald, and he himself ran off to fight.

During the battle, Morgan killed Rivalen. Blanchefleur was terribly upset, and Roald calmed her down. Soon she had a son and she named him Tristan (from the French Triste - sad), because. “he was born in sorrow.” And then she died. Tristan was taken in by Roald. At this time, Morgan and his army surrounded their castle, and Roald had to surrender. To prevent Morgan from killing Tristan, Roald married him off as his own son and raised him with the rest of his sons.

When the boy was 7 years old, Roald gave him to the care of the stableman Gorvenal. Gorvenal taught Tristan to wield weapons, keep his word, help the weak, play the harp, sing, and hunt. Everyone around him admired little Tristanche, and Roald loved him like a son.

One day, evil Norwegian merchants lured poor little Tristancheg onto their ship and took him away as prey. But nature rebelled against this, and a storm occurred that drove the ship in an unknown direction for 8 days and 8 nights.

After this, the sailors saw a shore in the reefs, on which their ship would inevitably crash. They somehow realized that Tristan was to blame for everything, because... the sea resisted his abduction. The sailors put him in a boat and sent him to the shore. The storm subsided, the sailors sailed away, and Tristancheg moored to the sandy shore.

Tristan climbed out onto the ground and saw an endless forest in front of him. Then he heard the sound of a hunting horn and the next moment, right in front of him, the hunters brutally stabbed the poor deer to death. Tristan didn’t like what they did to the deer and he decided to help them %) he tore the skin off the deer, tore off the tongue, that’s all. The hunters admired his skill. They ask him where he is from and whose son he is. Tristan replies that he is the son of a merchant and would like to become a hunter too. The hunters take Tristan to Mark's castle (this was the island where his parents got married). Mark throws a party and invites Tristan. Tristan plays the harp and sings there, and everyone admires the fact that he, the son of a merchant, can do so many things.

Tristan remains in Mark's castle. Serves him as a singer and hunter. “And over the course of three years, mutual love grew in their hearts.” This is where the blue line “Tristan and Mark” should begin, but no =(At this time, Roald went in search of Tristan and sailed to Cornwall. He showed Mark the carbuncle that he gave to his sister Blanchefleur as a marriage gift. In general, they found out that Tristan is nephew of Mark. Mark knighted Tristan, he went to his kingdom, expelled and killed Morgan, and began to own his rightful lands. But his conscience tormented him: he decided to give his possessions to Roald, and return to Mark himself, for “his body belonged to Mark" (understand it as you wish). Tristan returns to Cornwall, and everyone there is in sadness, because the Irish king is gathering an army against Cornwall because Mark stopped paying him tribute (he had to send him young men and women into slaves). The Irish giant Morold arrives in Cornwall and says that Mark has the last chance to fulfill the will of the Irish king. Morold offers to fight with any warrior of Mark one on one on the island. Tristan agrees. Each of them sails to the island on his own boat, but Morold ties his boat, and Tristan pushes it away from the shore with his foot. When Morold asks why he did this, Tristan replies that only one of them will return and one boat will be enough for him. They fought for a long time. Finally, at noon, Morold's boat appeared on the horizon. And Tristan stood in the boat, with two raised swords. General rejoicing. Morold's corpse was sent to Ireland, where he was mourned by his family, including his niece Isolde. They all cursed Tristan. And in Cornwall it turned out that Morold had wounded Tristan with a poisoned spear, and he was getting worse day by day. Tristan asked to be put in a boat along with a harp and sent adrift. For 7 days and 7 nights the sea carried him, but finally, but finally, he found himself near the shore. He was picked up by fishermen and given to Isolde's care. Isolde healed him, Tristan realized where he was and urgently ran back to Mark. There were several barons at Mark's court who hated Tristan. Mark was childless and they knew that he would bequeath his entire kingdom to Tristan. And they began to incite other barons against Tristan, calling him a sorcerer (for he could not defeat Morold, recover from his wounds, etc.). As a result, they convinced the barons and they began to demand that Mark marry. Mark resisted for a long time. One day two swallows flew into his room and one had a long golden hair in its beak. Mark told his barons that he would only marry the one to whom this hair belonged. Tristan, seeing the hair, remembered the golden-haired Isolde and promised Mark to find a princess with such hair. Tristan equipped the ship and ordered the helmsman to sail to the shores of Ireland. He shuddered because... knew that after the death of Morold, the king of Ireland ordered the capture of all Cornish ships and the hanging of the scoundrels. Sailing to Ireland, he passed himself and the helmsman off as English merchants. One day Tristan heard a terrible howl and asked a girl passing by who was roaring like that. She replied that this is a terrible monster that comes to the city gates and does not let anyone in and does not let anyone out until they give him a girl to eat. The King of Ireland announced that he would marry his daughter Isolde to someone who could defeat this monster. Many knights tried, but died in the battle. Tristan defeated the monster, cut off its tongue, but it turned out to be poisoned and our dear Trestancheg fell without any signs of life. It must be said that Isolde had one admirer who sought her hand. Every morning he ambushed him and wanted to kill the monster, but fear overcame him and he ran away. Seeing the murdered monster, he cut off its head and took it to the king of Ireland, demanding Isolde's hand. The king did not believe it, but invited him 3 days later to the castle to prove his heroism. Isolde did not believe this coward, and went to the monster’s lair. There she found Tristan and her servants carried him to the castle. Isolde’s mother comes to Tristan’s chambers and says that he must prove his heroism in a duel with the imaginary winner of the monster, and then he will receive her daughter’s hand. Isolde treats Tristan, rubs him with all sorts of ointments. Finds his sword and sees jagged marks on it. She takes out a fragment of the sword with which Morold was killed from the casket, puts it on Tristan’s sword and sees that they are coming together. Then she ran to Tristan’s chambers, raised her sword over him and promised to kill him immediately. He tells her that she has the right to kill him, because... saved his life twice. The first time he pretended to be a merchant, and now. He is trying to prove to her that the fight with Morold was fair, and besides, he killed the monster for her sake. Isolde asks why he tried to get her, Tristan shows her the golden hair brought by the swallows, Isolde throws away the sword and kisses Tristan. In 2 days everyone gathers for a duel. The coward who allegedly killed the dragon, seeing Tristan, immediately admits to lying. When the audience learns that the winner is Tristan, their enemy who killed Morold, they begin to grumble. But Tristan declares that in order to establish peace between the kingdoms, King Mark of Cornwall will marry Isolde. Isolde was offended that Tristan, having obtained her, neglected her. When the time came to sail to Cornwall, Isolde's mother prepared a love potion, gave it to Isolde's maid, and ordered her to pour the potion into the cups of Mark and Isolde before their wedding night. On the way to Cornwall, the sailors decided to stop on one of the islands. Only Tristan, Isolde and the maid remained on the ship. It was hot and they were thirsty, so they asked the maid for wine. She took out a jug, not knowing that there was a love potion in it, and gave it to Tristan and Isolde. When Brangien, Isolde's mother's servant, saw what had happened, she threw the jug overboard and began to lament. Well, Tristan and Isolde had fun money and, it seems, they did everything they could. Soon they sailed to Cornwall and Mark took Isolde as his wife. On their wedding night, Brangien, for the sake of her mistress, went to Mark’s room, and Isolde went to Tristan. Mark didn't notice anything. In general, this is how they lived. None of those close to her noticed anything strange, and Isolde continued to sleep with Tristan. But Isolde was afraid that Brangien might betray them and started a betrayal. She called two slaves and promised them freedom if they took Brangien into the forest and killed her. They did so, but took pity on her and only tied her to a tree. Instead, they killed the puppy and cut out its tongue. When they returned to Isolde and stuck out their tongues at her (supposedly the Brangiens), she began to call them murderers, and said that she could never order such a thing to them. Isolde promised to tell everyone that they killed her, but then the frightened slaves confessed that Brangien was alive. She was returned to the castle, she and Isolde hugged, and everything became wonderful again. The barons who hated Tristan found out about his love for the queen and told Mark about everything. But he didn’t believe it, believing that they were simply jealous of Tristan. However, he still remembered what they told him, and began to involuntarily follow Tristan and Isolde. But Brangien noticed this and warned T. and I. Mark called Tristan to him and, telling him about the machinations of the barons, asked him to leave the castle for a while. Tristan realized that he could not go far and settled in a nearby city. Both Tristan and Isolde grieved terribly. As a result, Brangien decided to help them. She came to Tristan and taught him how to get into the castle. He sawed off tree branches and sent them down the river that flowed past the castle. Isolde saw the branches and made her way into the garden, where she met with T. At this time, Brangien distracted Mark and the barons. But the barons found out where Isolde was disappearing and went to the dwarf wizard Frosin. Frosin suggested that the barons and the king organize a hunt and, as if by chance, go out to T. and I. When they found themselves in the forest, Frosin suggested that the king climb the tallest pine tree. And so, the king sits on a pine tree, and our Trestancheg makes his way into the garden. Throws branches into the water and sees the reflection of the king. But he can no longer stop the branches, and soon Isolde appears in the garden. She also sees the king's reflection in the water. They act out a scene where Tristan asks Isolde why the king hates him and drives him out of the castle. The king believed them and calmed down. Tristan returns to the castle. The barons again find him with Isolde and go to ask Mark to kick Tristan out. Again they invite the dwarf Frosin, who tells Mark what to do. He offers to send Tristan as a messenger to another kingdom and see how Tristan goes to say goodbye to Isolde. Evening came, the king and Tristan went to bed (they slept in the same room, and the queen in the same room). At night, Tristan saw the dwarf covering the floor with flour so that Tristan's footprints would be visible when he went to the queen. The king and the dwarf came out, and Tristan decided to jump from his bed to the king's bed. The day before, he was wounded by a wild boar in the forest, and during a jump the wound opened and blood began to flow. The king comes in and sees blood on his bed. He says: “That’s it, Trestancheg, don’t persuade me, tomorrow you will die!” Tristan asks for mercy from the queen. The barons tie them both up. Mark orders the fire to be lit. The bound Tristan is led out of the castle. The horseman Dinas, the “glorious seneschal,” rushes after them and orders Tristan to be untied (for it was not proper for him to go tied up). Tristan sees a chapel near the shore and asks the guards to go there to pray. He jumps out of the chapel window straight onto the rocks, but God saves him and he lands softly on a rock. On the shore he meets Gorvenal, who gives him a sword and armor. Isolde stands in front of the fire, but then some sick man appears and offers Mark another way to punish her (so that she suffers longer). Mark agrees. The leper asks Mark to give them the queen so that they can have fun with her. The sick take Isolde away, but Tristan attacks them and wins back the queen. Tristan and Isolde settle in the forest. One day they came across the hut of the hermit Ogrin, who begged them for a long time to repent. By the way, Tristan still has a dog in the castle, which stopped eating as soon as its owner disappeared. The dog was untied and took Tristan's trail. But Mark’s warriors did not dare to enter the thicket of the forest. Tristan couldn't figure out what to do with the dog, because... because of her barking, they and Isolde might be found. As a result, Tristan trained the dog so that it hunted without barking. One day one of the barons snuck into the castle and Gorvenal, who lived with T.&I. killed him. Since then, no one dared to enter their forest. One day a forester came across their hut and found T. and I sleeping there. He ran and informed Mark about this. They got to the hut, Mark went inside and saw that there was a sword between T. and I., and this was a sign of chastity, etc. He realized that he could not kill them, but decided to make sure that they understood that he was here. He left the mittens given to him by Isolde and exchanged wedding rings, and also exchanged Tristan’s sword for his own. When T. and I. woke up, they realized what had happened and decided to flee to Wales. They ran away, and their conscience began to torment them. That they are guilty before Mark, and before each other. And they decided to return to the hermit Orgin. Tristan asked Orgin to reconcile him and Mark, in return he would return his wife to the king. Orgin wrote a message to Mark on behalf of Tristan, and the latter went with this message to the castle. He left it outside Mark's room and ran away.

Mark passes the letter he received from Tristan to the chaplain, who reads a message to those gathered, in which Tristan cunningly deflects all crimes from himself - they say, he did not kidnap Isolde, but freed his queen from the hands of lepers, and disappeared from under the convoy, jumping from the church with rocks so that you can drink some water and not die under Mark’s hot hand; Tristan says that now he is happy to give Mark his wife (I used it - I didn’t like it, “cashback”, in general), and those who will bring a blizzard and vilify Tristan or Isolde, he is ready to win according to knightly traditions in a legal battle (in in general, “you have to answer for the market”). None of the rams decide to risk their lives and all are happy to take the queen back; however, they advise sending Tristan out of the country to somewhere far away (to Siberia, for example, to the uranium mines). Mark orders a message to be written and nailed near the forest, expressing his ardent love for Tristan and his consent to the deal.

Having received the note, Tristan began to say goodbye to Isolde, and the couple exchanged gifts - Isolde gets Tristan’s pitiful mongrel named Hysden, and Tristan receives Isolde’s gold and jasper ring (here it is, an honest and open market!), which, they persuade, will serve as a sign - if Isolde sees this ring on someone, it will mean that he is Tristan’s messenger. Meanwhile, while the doves are cooing, the old hermit Ogrin walks through the boutiques so that the money accumulated over many years of hermit and beggarly life is enough to buy luxurious fur coats and other trinkets for Isolde.

Three days later, as agreed, Tristan hands Isolde over to Mark and goes into hiding, allegedly leaving the country, in fact, just in case, at Isolde’s request, he hides in the house of a friend of the forester Orry and pretends to be a brownie for conspiracy.

After some time, the villainous barons cannot sleep at night, and a sudden itching in some part of the body forces them to start whispering to Mark again that something bad happened to Isolde, she cohabited with some guy for several months, and now the mattress is warming up in the royal bed again. They propose to test Isolde using the latest achievement of modern technology, a medieval-style lie detector - the red-hot iron test. Mark invites Isolde to engage in this entertaining masochism, and she agrees, since she has already been frankly tortured by the barons’ slander, and the guarantors of her honor will be none other than the star international scale, the dream of slender girls and fattened matrons, the sex symbol of the last 3 centuries, he is also King Arthur, as well as several of his peers. The performance is scheduled in 10 days, and tickets for it are selling like hot cakes with kittens.

Isolde sends her errand boy PERINIS to say hello to Tristan, and also ask him to be nearby on the day of the inspection, and somewhere dressed in a stylish homeless man’s suit, Tristan agrees; PERINIS, on the way back, stumbles upon the same forester who at one time rented out the safe house of Tristan and Isolde to one of the bars, and to celebrate, the young man accidentally stabs the informer and, probably, wanting to inform him to the clinic, also accidentally drops him into a wolf pit filled with stakes.

Ten days later, on the shore of the island, on which the unpleasant but necessary procedure will take place, both parties gather - Mark with his retinue and Arthur, surrounded by peers and admirers; as luck would have it, just at this moment the sailors run out of ladders, and in order to go ashore, Isolde has to ask one pilgrim, standing and staring on the shore, to pick her up from the ship and carry her to the shore; which is what Tristan, dressed in a homeless man’s suit from the latest spring-summer collection from Pucci and Gibbon, does, unrecognized by anyone except Isolde. When the ritual begins, Isolde swears that no one touched her body except her beloved husband Mark and that other pilgrim, actually Tristan, after which she grabs an iron ingot heated in the fire with her hand, walks 10 steps and throws it down, dropping it at the curious spectator sitting below. why the air begins to smell of burnt meat; after the incident, not a single burn remains on Isolde’s hands, and everyone admits that she told the truth, which means her honor has been whitewashed (they didn’t know about such a good material as asbestos), everyone returns home, dissatisfied with the happy ending.

Meanwhile, Tristan, in turn, developed an itch, albeit in a different place, somewhere on the left side of his chest, and he makes his way through the usual holes in fences and through vegetable gardens to the royal little house, where he regularly meets and builds an animal with two backs with Isolde, each time, freely hiding from the royal garden, running into several traps along the way, set by the king to protect him from stray dragons. However, after a while, the barons begin to suspect something, complain to Mark, but he does not want to listen, then they, on the advice of the gardener who constantly bumps into Tristan and Isolde, decide to lock one of them in the attic of the royal bedroom, so that from there they can engage in voyeurism, spying on While the couple is dating, a joyful opportunity falls to Baron GONDOiNU; The next day, Tristan, who was apparently awakened early in the morning by someone's car alarm screeching under the window, goes to Isolde a little early and on the way he sees GONDOiNA galloping towards the coveted attic, decides to finish him off, but then he sees Di-ethylene galloping nearby (Denoalena), whose head he cuts off with his sword out of his natural inclination towards cruelty. Arriving at the garden, he meets with Isolde, who notices the vile pervert GONDOiNA, and asks Tristan to “show off his talent as an archer,” after which Tristan, without hesitation, points his epic bow, equipped with optical sight and a silencer, and hits the enthusiastically peeping baron with an arrow right in the eye, without damaging the animal’s skin. After which the couple is persuaded to finally separate for the 47th time, Tristan reminds Isolde of the identification mark - the ring - and, fortunately, still leaves Mark's island.

During his travels, Tristan serves with Duke Gilen, from whom, as a reward for killing a certain giant (wasn’t it Pantagruel, the bastard, killed him?) he receives a mutant dog of psychedelic colors with the cute name Petit-Crap (Petit-Cru), received by the Duke as a farewell gift from one of the past passions - a fairy, which comes complete with a magic rattle around the neck, as soon as you ring and stroke the animal, all the hardships and sorrows are forgotten (these are the unusual properties of the unusual dog and rattle; by the way, very similar to state of drug euphoria). Tristan sends the reward to Isolde, who, after playing with the tchotchke and the animal for a while, first throws into the water a unique rattle, worth no less than a fortune at antique auctions, saying that if Tristan refused in her favor from peace from misfortunes, then she will refuse, and he wants to send the dog after him, but then he takes pity on the creature.

Touring the world as a visiting buffoon and hero for one hour, Tristan accomplishes many feats, including, once in Brittany, he becomes friends with Valocordin (Caerdin), the son of the local king Hoel, whose castle was attacked by the treacherous Raviolle (Riol), who wanted to marry Hoel's daughter, the namesake of Tristan's beloved, Isolde, nicknamed, so as not to be confused, in contrast to Mark's wife, the fair-haired Isolde, the white-handed Isolde (yeah, and no one, of course, was confused!). Tristan, having made his way into the castle through the sewer passages together with Valocordin, makes daring night raids on Raviolle's convoys, and after a while heroically fights together with Hoel's army against the aggressor's army, smashing it to smithereens. In gratitude for Tristan, the craftswoman, craftswoman, student and Komsomol member White-Handed Isolde is given away, but he disgraces a man’s honor by not touching his wife either on the first or subsequent nights, pitifully excusing himself with vows of celibacy. Only Valocordin, his confidant (a beautiful word, it smells like something ancient Greek and the translation of Zhukovsky and Gnedich!) Tristan tells his whole sorrowful story from the beginning, seasoning it with fables and anecdotes, so that his friend does not die of boredom, like you, those who is reading this story now, dear venereals and gouty people (oh, this isn’t Rabelais? Sorry). Kaerdin decides that the insidious Tristan is behaving inappropriately, having basely and basely deceived the hopes of his sister, Isolde, after which he grabs Tristan, exhausted by depression, and takes him to Tintagel, the capital and residence of King Mark, having previously sent the merchant Dynius (Dinas) with jasper ring to Isolde, who, noticing the ring, transmitted through the merchant Tristan the plan of the palace and the schedule of excursions of the royal motorcade for the next month with all stops. In Tintagel and its environs, Tristan and Valocordin are trying to secretly force an intimate relationship on Isolde, guarded by the only survivor of the four baron villains, Andryusha (Andret), who, having read about Tristan's marriage to another Isolde from the gossip column in the Avalon Times, sends Tristan to all four directions of the world, but, realizing that she was jealous in vain, she begins to wear a hair shirt (something like a bulletproof vest, but it only fits on a naked body and pricks like a hedgehog suffering from baldness). Tristan is sad, and then, pretending to be a holy fool and, inspired by the love madness of Don Quixote, he pretends to go crazy and, dressed in the now familiar costume of a homeless person and smearing his face with makeup, goes to Tintagel, where, unscrupulously taking advantage of the position of the holy fool, he abuses his official powers and comes straight to the palace, where he tells the king, without batting an eyelid, that he is Tristan, that he and Isolde, and almost her mother, were spit on the carousel, but everyone, including the barons and Isolde present, refuse mistaking the holy fool for Tristan. Only the old bag of fleas, Husden, recognizes the owner, and for some time afterward Tristan continues to visit, unrecognized by anyone, the princess’s bedroom, who recognizes him and, after some moral hesitation and checking Tristan’s authenticity using DNA analysis, gives herself up to his rakes hands. However, after a while, apparently, Tristan gets bored again with the white-handed Isolde and, in order to add variety to his personal life, he gives up the costume of the holy fool and returns to Brittany to his lawful wife, the white-handed Isolde, with whom, however, he continues to maliciously fail to fulfill his marital duty.

Returning to his castle, Tristan goes to the aid of Valocordin, who in a tavern drunkenly grapples with Baron Bedalisov (Bedalis), beats seven in one fell swoop, but receives a blow with a poisoned spear in a knife fight and begins to wither by leaps and bounds. Knowing that only the experienced pharmacist Isolde Belokuraya can cure him of a dangerous virus brought in by an undisinfected spear, Tristan sends Valocordin after her, providing her with a ring, but the request is overheard through the wall, apparently by Tristan’s legal wife, who owns spy bugs, and lights up like napalm with jealousy. Valocordin kidnaps Isolde, who came out for a walk in the meadow, killing the last of the villainous barons, Andryusha, who was guarding the queen with an oar. On the way, Valocordin's ship is captured by a storm, and the ship barely sails to Tristan's house (yes, right there, although along coastline it is strictly forbidden to build castles, as this is fraught with collapses and the castle gradually moving to the bottom of the sea), and on the mast of the ship hangs, as in the myth of Theseus, a white sail, not a black one, which means that Isolde is on board; However, still unable to find a fire extinguisher for her jealousy, the white-handed Isolde assures Tristan, who is already putting on his skis to move them, that the sail is black (perhaps banal color blindness is to blame). Tristan, out of frustration, sharply moves his skis, gives up, plays with the box, and after finishing these meaningless activities, he dies calmly, but in agony. White-Handed Isolde is upset, but more upset is White-Handed Isolde, who goes into bed with a dead man right in front of his lawful wife and goes in the same direction as him - apparently, to hell. The corpses are placed in coffins made of precious stones by order of the sailor immediately upon receipt of the joyful telegram, which is paid for, of course, from the treasury; but they are buried separately, but in the morning it turns out that some joker planted a mutant thorn bush in Tristan’s grave, which leaned over Isolde’s grave standing at a great distance in search of new minerals (the plant definitely did not have enough of the decaying Tristan), but was called three times the gardener with pruning shears, pruning the plant, could not do anything - the blackthorn grew up overnight. Mark, who appreciated the rare botanical species of the plant, forbade cutting the mutant.

15. Chrétien de Troyes’ novel “Yvain, or the Knight with the Lion”

Chretien de Troyes is a poet of the second half of the 12th century who lived for a long time at the court of Marie of Champagne. The creator of the Arthurian novel, who gave the best examples of this genre. He used Celtic legends as raw material and put a completely different meaning into it. The plots of his numerous works have firmly entered the arsenal of European literature. The frame of Arthur's court served him only as a backdrop against which he unfolded pictures of the life of a completely contemporary knightly society, posing and resolving significant issues of that time. Therefore, problems come before exciting adventures. Famous works: “Erec and Enida”, “Lancelot, or the knight of the cart”, “Yvain, or the knight with the lion”.

"Yvain, or the Knight with the Lion." The plot and characters of the novel connect it with the British cycle about King Arthur, Seneschal Kay, Queen Guenievre, knights Yvaine, Lancelot and others. An important feature of the world in which the heroes live and act is the interweaving of realistic and fantastic elements. From the descriptions of tournaments, crowded hunts, and sieges, one can get an idea of ​​the life of the inhabitants of medieval cities and castles, its festivity; at the same time, the miraculous is encountered at every step in the novel (all nature is enchanted and inhabited mysterious creatures) and is transmitted through the everyday, the ordinary. The world created by the fantasy of Chrétien de Troyes is the embodiment of chivalry, and the actions of the heroes living in this world are aimed at accomplishing a feat, an “adventure”. At the same time, it is not love that pushes the knight on an “adventure,” although love for a lady plays a very important role in the novel, because the ability to love is an indispensable quality of a real knight - he is driven by a passion for adventure, during which he hones military skills, cultivates will, demonstrates courage. At the same time, in the novel “Yvain” Chrétien showed that the feat in itself is meaningless, that “adventures” must certainly be internally full of meaning and purposeful: this is the protection of a slandered lady, the salvation of a friend’s relatives, the deliverance of a girl from the fire. Yvain's nobility and self-denial are allegorically emphasized in the novel by his friendship with the lion, the king of beasts, whose salvation is decisive in the formation of the hero's character. And it is significant that it is not military achievements, but useful, purposeful actions that lead the hero to moral perfection, making him a true knight, not only brave and dexterous, but also possessing spiritual breadth and nobility.

The plot develops rapidly, events occur sequentially. Complicated linear composition. This means that, for example, at Arthur’s feast, Calogrenan talks about what happened earlier, about the events of the past. But there are few such episodes in the novel; in general, everything happens one after another.

Attention should be paid to the peculiarity of the conflict characteristic of a chivalric romance. Love and duty collide. Chrétien poses the question: is love compatible with chivalric deeds? As you can see, problems arise. On the one hand, Londina lets her husband go on wanderings. But she gives him exactly a year, not a day more, or she will stop loving him. On the other hand, Ywain is influenced by his friends, Gawain, who easily parted with his beloved Lunette. But Yvain goes through all the difficulties and in the end he is rewarded - he is a famous knight, and his wife forgives him. This means that a knight without a feat is nothing, but the feats must be worthwhile. Not like Yvain's cousin Calogrenan, who got himself into trouble out of idle curiosity, but like Yvain, who stood up for those in need.

In this novel, Chrétien continues the concept of love that he began in Erec and Enid, but love triumphed there as a simple human feeling devoid of courtliness. Here Chretien went further, he compromises - both exploits and love are needed. Courtliness should not be expressed in winning the heart of a beautiful lady. A beloved is one thing, exploits are another thing. Feats must have meaning and be filled with valor and nobility. Yvain is inconsolable when his love rejects him. But he sees his guilt and does not try to regain his beloved’s favor by performing heroics. On the contrary, he travels incognito, hiding his real name, because he is ashamed of his wrongdoing.

In the novel "Tristan and Isolde" problems of love and morality collide. Tristan does not want to defile his uncle Mark, but he cannot resist the power of the love potion. If it were not for the drink, there would be no love. In the novel “Yvain, or the Knight and the Lion,” the problems of love and duty are also faced, but there is no third person here, i.e. Yvain just needs to choose: exploits or love? There is no such tragedy here, although sometimes I. gets into trouble, there is still no such hopelessness as in “Tristan and Isolde.” And when Yvaine tells Lunette, as she sits in the chapel to be burned at the stake, that he is the most unfortunate man in the world, it doesn’t sound very convincing.

Summary novel:

Feast in the chambers of King Arthur. Everyone has drunk, Arthur wants to go to bed, his wife won’t let him in - they are guests after all - he falls asleep right at the table. The queen is immediately surrounded by male company to entertain her with conversations. The following stand out: Calogrenan (no need to ask which two words...), Yvain (his cousin), Gawain (also a knight, Yvain’s best friend) and Sagremor, Kay-seneschal (this is one person, henceforth simply Kay). For some reason, Kalogrenan decided to tell about his shame. He tells the story of how, in pursuit of adventure, he galloped into the Broceliande Forest, where he first spent the night in a castle with a hospitable host and his beautiful daughter, then met a giant shepherd who told him that there was a wonderful spring in the forest. There is a chapel under a century-old pine tree, an ice spring is boiling, and if you remove the golden ladle from the pine tree and pour a stone from the spring (in the same place), Armageddon will begin - a storm, trees uprooted, etc. Kalogrenan, don’t be a fool, galloped to the pine tree, a storm began, he was glad that he was alive... and then a knight galloped up. He cursed dirtyly and hit Calogrenan in the neck. Those. they fought, the knight knocked K. off his horse, took the animal and armor. Calogrenan finished his story, the queen praised him, Arthur sobered up and woke up, Kay began to mock, Yvain decided to avenge his cousin. And while Arthur was gathering his retinue to set off, about a third of the novel passed. I. was afraid that someone else would defeat K.’s offender and therefore hurried as best he could. Forest - castle - shepherd - stream - storm - knight - duel (“Evain hit with a sword so that the sword is in the brain, as if in dough, The forehead is cut with the helmet together. The brain is on the armor, like dirt.”) But the enemy did not die immediately - the horse carried him to his castle. And behind him - he needs proof of revenge. In the castle there is a door-axe, which cuts I.’s horse in half and deprives his boots of spurs. He himself is alive, but locked up. Waiting for death. A girl appears, as it turns out, she knows I. and is grateful to him for protecting her when she was just starting her court career. She gives him an invisibility ring and hides it in her bedroom on the bed (no dirt). They search for I. for a long time, unsuccessfully, they carry a dead man past him (Eskladosa - named 1 time), he sees either the widow or the bride of the murdered man and falls in love with her. The savior girl’s name is Lunetta, she sees I.’s feelings and talks to the mistress (along the lines of Londina de Londuc, which is also mentioned 1 time) about the fact that she needs a protector. She forgives I. because she understands that he defended himself, and there are legends about his valor. They get married. Then Arthur finally reaches the stream, and I comes running to meet the storm. and fights the mocker Kay. Everyone is happy, feast. But then Gawain incites I. to leave his wife so as not to turn sour - he is a knight! The wife lets I. go, but for exactly one year, day after day, otherwise, she says, that’s it. He, of course, doesn’t have time, remembers the date after the fact. (was supposed to return on December 27, remembers in August). Then a messenger comes from the lady - that’s it, it’s over. I. goes crazy, wanders through the forests, eats raw meat. One day, one of his female friends finds him in the forest, naked and unconscious. He applies the balm, I. is adequate again. He sees the battle between a lion and a snake and, deciding that “he who is poisonous is criminal,” he kills the snake. Lev has been with him ever since. I. comes to the spring, suddenly loses consciousness, falls, the sword on top cuts the chain mail and slightly wounds I. Leo decided that I. had died, pulls the sword out of the wound with his teeth, sticks it into a pine tree and wants to commit suicide with a running start. Thank God, while the lion was stalling, I. came to his senses. And he determined that Lunetta, whom his wife accused of treason, was sitting in the chapel. On the day when L. was put on the fire, I. and his lion scattered her three offenders and left. Both were wounded, they were treated in some castle, where I. dragged a lion in his arms. Then they wandered, I. accomplished many feats, such as: they protected a lady and returned her possessions, but refused marriage, and saved Gawain’s relatives from the giant. The fame of the “knight with the lion” throughout Brittany. Then it happened that two sisters, whose father had died, turned to A. to share the inheritance. The eldest took Gawain as her protector and wanted to take everything. The youngest went to look for the “knight with a lion” (no one knew that it was I.). On the way, he accomplished another feat, freeing the girls captives of the cursed castle from two “Satanails” and devils. Gawain and I. fought, fought for a day on equal terms, then I. asked G. to tell him his name, and when he heard that this was his best friend, he threw down his weapon. They spent a long time figuring out who won. And Arthur decided the matter, asking, “Where is the deceiver who wants to take away her sister’s inheritance?” The eldest responded, the king caught her in a lie. But I. does not stay with Arthur, he goes to the spring, and out of grief, waters the stone from a ladle. In the castle, his beloved is trembling with fear, and out of fear she swears to Lunette that she will forgive the knight with the lion, who has problems “with some lady,” if he protects her. L. runs after Yvain, the lady is furious, but she swore, so she had to forgive. Happy end. (I read from lib.ru, there is a translation by Mikushevich, written in iambic tetrameter, very in simple language– like a hybrid of Pushkin’s fairy tales and Filatov’s Tale about Fedot the Strelets)

REVIVAL

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