The Dynamics of Dumbing: The Case of Merlin

Retellings of traditional stories have always been an important type of children's literature. Such stories are fundamental to creating a child's personal and social identity, as well as a sense of continuity with the past. But when these potentially powerful stories are retold badly or shallowly to a generation of children, they lose their power to transform, to, as Jane Yolen says, "touch the true magic inside us all" ("America's Cinderella" 23). I have chosen the example of King Arthur's Merlin, a figure embedded as deeply as any in Western literary, folk, and mythic traditions, to explore the implications of the dumbing of children's literature.

The figure of Merlin has a rich medieval legacy. He has his origins in Myrddin of Welsh legend, a sixth-century bard presumed to have the gift of prophecy. He is the "child without a father" (though in some versions is begotten by a devil or an incubus), and it is only through his mother's virtue that his dark, supernatural gifts can be turned to good. In earliest tradition he is associated with the Anglo-Saxon king, Vortigern, and later with the legendary King Arthur. In the most familiar medieval version, that of Sir Thomas Malory, it is Merlin who orchestrates much of Arthur's power.

Merlin assumes many shapes, guises, and roles, He is an enchanter, a magician, a prophet, and poet in the mythic Arthurian world. He is a "shifter, a trickster, joker, arbiter of value and of meaning" (Bloch 2), with special knowledge of the past and future. Associated with the devil yet in the service of God, a wild child/man inhabiting the forest yet a bringer of culture, a military strategist and master manipulator yet a mediator and peacemaker—he is a paradox.

This illusive and elusive figure continues to fascinate, as attested by such modern renditions as those depicted in T. H. White's Once and Future King, the Mary Stewart Arthurian tales, Marion Zimmer Bradley's best-selling Mists of Avalon, and the film Excalibur, to name a few. In addition, such figures as Gandalf in Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring and Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars are certainly derivative. Out of this abundance of retellings, I have chosen four works to discuss that point to Merlin's unique importance in Arthurian legend: two children's picture books, Carol Heyer's problematic Excalibur and Hudson Talbott's more successful King Arthur: The Sword in the Stone, Disney's cartoon version of Sword in the Stone, and Jane Yolen's remarkable Merlin's Booke. As King Arthur's mentor and friend—in many ways his very creator—Merlin has a profound impact, for the values, attitudes, and ideological paradigms he transmits to Arthur in each of these works are also transmitted to the children who are reading or watching the stories.

Although more beautiful and more skillful retellings of Arthurian legend may exist, Heyer's Excalibur and Talbott's King Arthur: The Sword in the Stone pair well for a number of reasons. Each book is written and illustrated by one person, providing a unified conception. Both are based on episodes borrowed from Sir Thomas Malory's fifteenth-century Morte d'Arthur. Both also portray the youthful Arthur, with the action intended to signal a transformation from innocence to a more mature understanding of the source of his power. In both, acquisition of the sword is the rite of passage that marks this transformation and the sword becomes the supreme symbol of masculine power and aristocratic prominence. Finally, interaction with Merlin is crucial in both stories, for this enigmatic figure orchestrates the action and steers his charge to different lessons. Before we look at Merlin's role, however, we need to examine the nature of Arthur's transformation at the heart of each story.

In Excalibur Carol Heyer recasts the episode in which Arthur receives the famous sword from the Lady of the Lake. In King Arthur: The Sword in the Stone, Hudson Talbott narrates the well-known story of Arthur's pulling the sword, destined...