Arthurian Challenge--Go!

By -
Hello, fellow Arthurians!  I am so excited about this year's challenge.  We are going to have a lot of fun! 


Please comment and tell me what you are going to read first, or what you are excited about.

I think I want to start with some Chretien de Troyes--it's a long time since I read Lancelot.  I've just read a couple of the really old chronicles (Nennius and Gildas), so now I'm going to go for some fanciful adventure.  I'm also going to start reading Arthur's Britain, which is quite a long book and I'm sure will go slowly.

The Knight of the Cart (Lancelot!)

Comments

  1. Ruth @ with freedom and booksJanuary 1, 2014 at 11:03 AM

    My first one will be the one you suggested, The Four Arthurian Romances, which I am very excited about. I won't be able to start it until after January, however, because I have my hands full with three right now.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJanuary 2, 2014 at 7:12 PM

    I will begin with Once and Future King since one of y Goodreads groups are conveniently reading it too. Then I will be indulging in some older stuff, like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, or Le Morte D'Arthur.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJanuary 5, 2014 at 5:44 PM

    My copy of Chretien De Troyes' Arthurian Romances arrived this morning so I'll start with that one. Thanks again for hosting! I'm looking forward to this challenge.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

I'd love to know what you think, so please comment!

Popular posts from this blog

Dewey Readathon post

By -
Image
Good morning!  I am not actually awake yet, because it's 5am and I need my sleep, and I will be mostly unable to join in the readathon until this afternoon.  But here is the post where I will make updates. I'm supposed to answer these questions: 1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?  Sunny California!  Emphasis on the "sunny"--after a nice cool spring it's in the 90s now.  I live in the rural northern part above Sacramento that everyone forgets about--we hold 2% of the total population of California. 2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?  It's a smorgasbord of delight!  I don't even know. 3) Which snack are you most looking forward to?  ...you think I'm well-prepared, don't you?  I have a bag of sunflower seeds/Craisins/almond M&Ms, and I'm thinking quite seriously about treating myself to Indian food tonight.  That's all I've got. 4) Tell us a little something about yourself!
Read more

The Four Ages of Poetry

By -
Image
  "The Four Ages of Poetry," by Thomas Love Peacock I am becoming fond of Thomas Love Peacock.  Besides his unbeatable name, he was a lot of fun.  Peacock was a minor literary figure of the early 19th century; he tried his hand at poetry but mainly succeeded in satire.  I read his short novel Nightmare Abbey last year, but at the time I didn't know that the young hero of the story, Scythrop, was modeled on Peacock's good friend Percy Shelley.  He and Shelley were quite close and Peacock was the executor of Shelley's will. Thomas Love Peacock Percy Bysshe Shelley "The Four Ages of Poetry," a tongue-in-cheek essay on the history and development of poetry, was published in 1820 in a new magazine called Literary Miscellany , which promptly died.  It would probably have been completely obscure and unknown--it nearly is anyway--but for Shelley.  Peacock sent a copy to his friend, who I guess didn't really have much of a sense of
Read more

James-A-Day: A Warning to the Curious

By -
Image
Isn't this a great drawing? Oh boy, I think this is a great story!  It must be one of the most famous MRJ tales.  Two scholarly gentlemen are taking a seaside holiday at Seaburgh (a lightly disguised Aldeburgh, in Suffolk), and meet another, younger man who is strangely anxious and relieved to have a bit of company.  This fellow is named Paxton and he has a weird tale to tell; he heard a local legend about ancient crowns buried on the coast to protect England from invasion.  Two are lost, but he managed to figure out where the third crown would be and actually discovered it.  Now he is haunted by the crown's guardian, and he must put the crown back.  Even so, he knows he has committed an unforgivable crime and he'll have to pay. I just love ancient legends like this, so I hunted around a little for information about the crowns.  Did James make it up or does it have roots in reality?  I'm having a hard time finding solid information, actually; I might need to go
Read more