King Arthur and the Myth of History by Laurie A. Finke, Martin B. Shichtman (review)

STUDIES IN THE AGE OF CHAUCER interested in medieval views of sanctity and gender as well as by students of medieval English theater. Ruth Nisse University of Nebraska–Lincoln Laurie A. Finke and Martin B. Shichtman. King Arthur and the Myth of History. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004. Pp. xiii, 262. $59.95. King Arthur and the Myth of History reads Arthurian pseudohistory through poststructuralist and postcolonial theory, focusing on three periods of cultural upheaval—twelfth-century Britain, the Wars of the Roses, and the period of twentieth-century fascism. The authors state that the book is the result of twenty years of teaching, and it provides a fascinating measure of the changes in perception and approach to Arthurian literature over that time. The core of the book is a strong and theoretically inclusive examination of the tradition of Arthurian historiography from Geoffrey to Hardyng and Malory. Chronicle histories are indeed ‘‘disciplinary orphans’’ and this study persuasively challenges disciplinary boundaries between history and literature, fact and fiction. Approaching medieval historiography in its own terms by investigating the ways in which Arthurian legend was accepted as history opens up the spectrum of Arthurian writing from the historical through to the fantastical . The authors offer a telling challenge to current thinking about medieval national identity with an analysis of the problematic semantic range of medieval legal and political terminology. Other convincing readings are of Merlin as Bloch’s ‘‘powerful image of the writer,’’ of the patron-client relationships in the trading of history as symbolic capital, and of the effects of primogeniture on historical narrative and gender roles. The chapter on Hardyng’s Chronicle faces the question of what may be learned from ‘‘a serious consideration of such bad history’’; the answer being an in-depth account of the use of history to create legitimacy for a shaky regime. An equally careful analysis of Caxton’s Malory demonstrates how his preface negotiates the tricky propaganda potential of Arthurian history. But the concern with Arthur as a signifier of feudal-dynastic expansion leads to a selectivity of material that may be PAGE 290 290 ................. 16094$ CH17 11-01-10 14:05:03 PS REVIEWS disappointing for readers of the literature—at times the authors seem to be envisaging a static iconic Arthur, as in the Nine Worthies tapestry, rather than the central figure of a narrative sequence leading ineluctably to betrayal and death, and there is little acknowledgment that the best writers of the Arthurian legend go beyond the sycophantic service of current rulers. It is an approach that also requires an understanding of the historical and cultural context that chimes with postcolonial theory and modern constructions of identity. While it is recognized that the material is often resistant, the discussion here shows that we have yet to find a way to describe the cultural and political scene in the three centuries following the Conquest. Wace, a Jerseyman, is not himself AngloNorman , nor is there any evidence for the claim that he was of mixed birth. He is not a ‘‘French historian writing English history’’ (103), but a Norman historian writing British history; the differences are significant . The post-Conquest English are English, not ‘‘Saxon,’’ and it seems regressive to call Layamon ‘‘a Saxon priest’’ or, worse, a ‘‘minor AngloSaxon poet’’; moreover, that the Anglo-Normans also considered themselves English from at least the reign of Henry I creates further resistance when it comes to trying to distinguish between different ethnic groups. Wider use of recent work by historians like Hugh Thomas, John Gillingham, and Rees Davies would solve some of the problems apparent here with identifying labels. There is also a tendency to adopt the later conflation of British and English history when discussing these early texts. Writers including Layamon are constructing the ‘‘Brut’’ tradition , which may be the history of England but is not the history of the English; Arthur is not called an English king until the Auchinleck ‘‘Arthour and Merlin.’’ The most engaged and provocative chapter in this study is the final one with its claim that a fascist aesthetic is the ‘‘darkness at the heart’’ of Arthurian history, evident in the romanticized self-image of Nazis and...