The Romance of Tristan and Iseult by
Joseph Bédier.
The story of Tristan and Iseult was
known to me because it was a bedtime story of mine. It's a tale which
belongs both to the French and the British as part of their
confusing entwined history due to the huge amount of ships which
crossed the channel in both directions. I grew up believing it went a
little differently than Monsieur Bédier here relates it, but I am
satisfied and confused in new ways now that I've read the original
translation.
Historical opinions on religion, filial
piety, woman's roles, disease and racism aside, this story perplexes
me because of the narrators deep sympathy for the characters. Perhaps
I do not know about French stories, and perhaps this, like Le
Morte d'Arthur, is merely the fashion, but I cannot reconcile the
story that has survived until today with the sensibilities of those
days.
Tristan is a blessed son of kings, and
after a childhood spent in hiding, he returns to the lands of his
uncle, King Mark, and becomes the Lancelot to his Arthur. Tristan
cannot be defeated, in music, in combat, he is champion and is
cherished and loved by all but four barons whose jealously or
chivalry bring them to unfold some wicked plots against him.
Mark is a bachelor and when pressed to
sire an heir, he mocks his counsel by taking a golden hair a sparrow
has brought across the Irish Sea and requesting its owner to become
his wife. Tristan, loyal to Mark to a fault, declares he shall find
the maiden, and returns to Ireland - he'd been wounded by an Irishman
and nursed back to health, unknowingly, by the woman who was his
foe's sister. This is the woman he has a mind to find, as her fair
hair was possibly the same gold as the hair the sparrows brought.
Iseult's mother brews a potion once
Tristan is to take her back to Cornwall, and charges Branigen,
Iseult's hand maiden, to make sure that Mark and Iseult drink it on
their wedding night, so as to fall into a life long love. When a
heatwave on the ship overtakes them, the potion is found, Tristian
and Iseult quench their thirst with it, drinking their love, and
their death. This is a sentiment often repeated in the tale, 'they
drank their death', and certainly places the entire romance in a
tragic light. For a while, they love on the sly. There is even a
mention of Branigen, in her loyalty, taking Iseult's place in the
wedding bed.
I will admit that in a story so
entwined with God's implied will, that I have difficulty reconciling
half completed ideas of what is moral and what is christian, with
these myths embedded in the story and the tragedy itself. Religion
isn't quite mythology for me, and I don't believe many atheists even
view religion the same way they view some pagan belief they were
never raised in. It's hard to reconcile something which represents an
ancestral state with the present day.
It might surprise you that my favorite
characters were those without a story: the narrator, who may not be a
character aside from that part of Joseph Bédier which was projected
into the story with his own opinions on events; Branigen and King
Mark, who perhaps, unknowingly, have their own love story; if not
with each other, I'd like to know about the family that Branigen left
behind in Ireland; my favorite of all, Iseult of the White Hands, the
fair princess of France whom Tristan marries after a long seperation
from Iseult the Fair. Her trechery, as it may be called, is lightly
forgiven by Joseph Bédier, and she herself atones for it, but I find
it completed her character. She was a combination of Juliet and Lady
Macbeth. She carried a dagger and used it on herself. She drank the
poison she intended to give someone else. If I were directing the
movie, I would make her the narrator, and leave Joseph Bédier to one
side.
Tristan and Iseult is a poor story,
critically, and it isn't complete for me. I don't sympathise with the
lovers as much as I should, and I can't understand how their
reprieves, said to be granted by God, are Christian. I think it says
more about the narrator and the author being God, which is something
my contemporary readers may find a common problem. Today we would
call 'God's will' contrivance, laziness on some part to make the plot
the action and the characters passive.
Using the phrase, 'God's will' isn't
the problem, or even bringing God into the mix isn't so bad, but I
really have difficulty seeing the Christian worth in all the things
that God supposedly did in their favor. Was there a lesson that God
was trying to teach them? Was God trying to offer them respite before
their certain deaths? Apparently readers agreed with the Christian
themes back then and for many ? years after. How about you? If you're
familiar with the story, from the Wagnerian opera or James Franco's
movie, or if you've also read the book, let me know, I'm open for any
interpretation.
