Alfred Trübner Nutt

“ They pass away and others succeed them, but she remains ever young and fair. So long as the thirst of man for the ideal endures, her spell will not be weakened, her charm will not be lessened. But each generation works out this Quest in its own spirit. This much may be predicted with some confidence: henceforth, whosoever would do full justice to the legend must take pattern by Wolfram von Eschenbach rather than by any of his rivals; he must deal with human needs and human longings; his ideal must be the widening of human good and human joy. ”

“ Celtic tradition is not only rich and varied beyond all others in this respect, it often thus secures its chief artistic effects. The talismans of Celtic romance, the fairy branch of Cormac, the Ga-bulg of Cuchullain, the sounding-hammer of Fionn, the treasures of the Boar Trwyth after which Prince Kilhwch sought, the glaives of light of the living folk-tale, have one and all a weird, fantastic, half-human existence, which haunts and thrills the imagination. ”

“ In the tone of their feelings towards her, in the character of their intercourse with her, they were closer akin to Oisin and Neave, to Cuchullain and Fand, than to Siegfried and Brunhild, or to Roland and Aude. Even where the love-story passes wholly among mortals, the woman’s rôle is more accentuated than in the Teutonic sagas. She is no mere lay-figure upon a fire-bound rock like Brunhild or Menglad, ready, when the destined hero appears, to fall straightway into his arms. ”

“ Brons questions him before they sit down to meat. The mystic procession is formed by squire with lance bleeding, damsel with silver dish, squire with the vessel holding our Lord’s blood. On the morrow the hero sees no one, and finds all the doors open. At his second visit there is no mention of difficulty in finding the castle. This time the King rises to greet him; they talk of many things and then sit down to meat. Grail and worthy relics pass, and the hero asks who is served by the vessel which the squire holds in his hands. ”

“ Nothing seemed impossible to a generation which knew of toils and quests greater than any minstrel had sung, which had beheld in the East sights as wondrous and fearful as any the jongleur could tell of. Moreover, the age was that of Knight Errantry, and of that phase of love in which every Knight must qualify himself for the reception of his lady’s favours by the performance of some feat of skill and daring. Such an age and such men demanded a special literature, and they found it in adaptations of Celtic tales. ”

“ Full of anger he prepares to throw the chessmen into the castle moat—suddenly a damsel shows herself and reproaches him. He will abstain if she comes to him. She consents, and after her squires and maidens have disarmed Perceval he joins her. Overcome by her beauty he requests her love. She will grant it him if he capture the white stag of the wood. She lends him her hound, and recommends him to take the utmost care of it. Perceval chases the stag, captures it, and, having cut off its head, starts back. But meanwhile an old woman has carried off the hound. ”

“ But Perceval will tell of this, so I must say no more; it is a great shame to tell beforehand what is in a good tale. When the good knight shall come who found the court three times you shall hear me tell of Grail and lance, and of him who lay in the bier, of the sword, of the grief and swooning of all beholders. ”

“ The artist’s instinct, rather than the scholar’s respect for the oldest form of the story, led him to practically restore Perceval to his rightful place as hero of the quest. His fortunes we can follow with an interest that passing shadow, Galahad, wholly fails to evoke. Nor, as may easily be seen, is the fundamental conception of the twelfth century romance to the Laureate’s taste. Arthur is his ideal of manhood, and Arthur’s energies are practical and human in aim and in execution. ”

“ Heart-wounded by the shaft of passion, he feels Amfortas’ torture thrill through him. The pain of the physical wound is his, but far more, the agony of the sinner who has been unworthy his high trust, and who, soiled by carnal sin, must yet daily come in contact with the Grail, symbol of the highest purity and holiness. The strength which comes of the new-born knowledge enables him to resist sensual longing, and thereby to release both Kundry and Amfortas.
In the latest version of the Perceval Quest, as in the Galahad Quest, the ideal of chastity is thus paramount. ”

“ All night Perceval thinks of the lance and of the Grail, and in the morning, on waking, finds neither man nor woman. He sets forth to seek some one, but in vain, and is greatly distressed. (12) He finds a damsel weeping bitterly, who, seeing him, cries out: “Percevaux le Gallois, be accursed, unhappier art thou than ever, having been in the house of the rich Fisher King, and not having asked concerning the Grail. Thy Lord hates thee; and ’tis wonder the earth do not open beneath thee.” Had he not seen Grail and lance pass? ”

“ Strife against Him, doubt of Him, is the highest sin. But humility and repentance may expiate it, and he who thus repents may be chosen by God for the Grail Kingship, the summit of earthly holiness. Peace of soul and all earthly power are the chosen one’s; alone, unlawful desire and the company of sinners are denied him by the Grail.
How is this leading conception worked out? The framework and the march of incidents are the same as in the Conte du Graal. ”

“ In Heinrich’s version, as elsewhere in these romances, different story types can be distinguished, different conceptions are harmonised. Many, indeed, are both the early conceptions and the varying shapes in which they embodied themselves, to be traced in the complex mass of the romances. That a kinsman is bound to avenge a blood feud, and that until he does so his kin may suffer from ailment or enchantment and their land be under a curse; that the otherworld is a land of feasting and joyousness and all fair things; that it contains magic treasures which he who is bold may win ”

“ Could not framework and incidents of the Celtic tales be retained, and yet, raised to a loftier, wider level, become a fit vehicle for philosophic thought and moral exhortation? One side of popular tradition figured the hero as wresting the talismans from the otherworld powers for the benefit of his fellow men. Could not this form of the myth be made to yield a human, practical conception of the Quest and Winning of the Holy Grail?
We are luckily not reduced to conjecture in this matter. A work largely fulfilling these hypothetical requirements exists in the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach. ”

“ But a story, to live, must appeal to moral as well as to æsthetic emotions. In the folk-mind this story sets forth, dimly though it may be, that search for the highest human felicity which is likewise a theme of the Grail romances. What better picture of this quest could be found than the old mythic symbol of the awakening of life and increase beneath the kiss of the sun-god. The hero of the folk-tale makes his way through the briars and tangle of the forest that he may restore to the deserted castle life and plenty ”

“ Fionn and his comrades follow a giant, on his shoulders an iron fork with a pig screeching between the prongs, behind him a damsel scourging him. They follow them to a house wherein is an aged hoary-headed man and a beautiful maid, a rough giant cooking the hog, and an old man having twelve eyes in his head, a white-haired ram, and a hag clad in dark ash coloured garment. ”

“ What influence Wolfram’s poem, with its practical, human enthusiasm, its true and noble sexual morality, might have had on English literature is an interesting speculation. It would have appealed, one would think, to our race with its utilitarian ethical instinct, with its lofty ideal of wedded love. The true man, Parzival, should, in the fitness of things, be the English hero of the Quest, rather than the visionary ascetic Galahad. ”

“ The character of the principal hero is in consonancy with this aim, wholly remote from the life of man on earth. A shadowy perfection at the outset, he remains a shadowy perfection throughout, a bloodless and unreal creature, as fit when he first appears upon the scene as when he quits it, to accomplish a quest, purposeless, inasmuch as it only removes him from a world in which he has neither part nor share. Such human interest as there is in the [Pg 240] story is supplied by Lancelot, who takes over many of the adventures of Perceval or Gawain in the Conte du Graal. ”

“ All such literature derives ultimately from an early, wholly animistic stage of culture. Small marvel, then, if in the hero-tales of every race there figure wonder-working talismans and bespelled weapons, if almost every great saga has, as part of its dramatis personæ, objects belonging to what we should now call the inanimate world. Upon these a species of life is conferred, most often by power of magic, but at times, it would seem, in virtue of the older conception which held all things to be endowed with like life. ”

“ It may, or may not, be considered to the advantage of the folk-tale that, unlike the mediæval romance, it deals neither in mysticism nor in asceticism. The sin and atonement of the Great Fool are such as the popular mind can grasp; he is an example of human weakness and human strength. The woman he loves is no temptress, no representative of the evil principle—on the contrary, she is ever by his side to counsel and to cheer him. ”

“ If we rid our minds of the idea that there is a Grail legend, a definite fixed sequence of incidents, we need not be discouraged if we fail to find a prototype for it in Celtic tradition or elsewhere. We shall be prepared to examine every incident of which the Grail is a feature upon its own merits, and satisfied if we can find analogies to this or that one. And by so doing we are more likely to discover the how and why of the development of the legends as we find them in the romances. ”

“ After praying in a chapel, in which he beholds a light on the altar quenched by a black hand, he rides through Brittany and Normandy, and comes to a castle where, owing to his armour, he is at first hailed as lord. In one of the rooms stands a bier, whereon lies a knight, cross and broken sword upon his body, his left hand bleeding. A crowned knight enters and goes to battle with Gauvain; canons and clerks come and perform the Vigil of the Dead; whilst at table Gauvain sees the rich Grail serving out bread and wine to the knights. ”

“ From out a world of human endeavour, human motive, we have stepped into one wholly ascetic and symbolical. The love of man for woman only appears in the guise of forbidden desire; the aims and needs of this world are not even thought of. Every incident has been remoulded in accord with Christian tradition. Wagner fully accepts the sacramental nature of the Grail, and the Grail feast is with him a faithful reproduction of the Last Supper. ”

“ Other damsels then show themselves, disarm and tend the hero, and lead him through a splendid hall into a still more splendid one, wherein a hundred fair and courteous maidens, all of like age and mien, and richly dressed, rise at his approach and hail him as lord. ”