Tristan and Iseult
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Tristan and Iseult, as told by Thomas of Britain and Beroul in the 12th century and reworked by Gottfried of Strasbourg and others, including Wagner.
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Tristan and Iseult, one of the most popular stories of the Middle Ages. From roots in Celtic myth, it passed into written form in Britain a century after the Norman Conquest and almost immediately spread throughout northern Europe. It tells of a Cornish knight and an Irish queen, Tristan and Iseult, who accidentally drink a love potion, at the same time, on the same boat, travelling to Cornwall. She is due to marry Tristan's king, Mark. Tristan and Iseult seemed ideally matched and their love was heroic, but could that excuse their adultery, in the minds of medieval listeners, particularly when the Church was so clear they were wrong?
With
Laura Ashe
Associate Professor of English at Worcester College, University of Oxford
Juliette Wood
Associate Lecturer in the School of Welsh at Cardiff University
And
Mark Chinca
Reader in Medieval German Literature at the University of Cambridge
Producer: Simon Tillotson.
Last on
LINKS AND FURTHER READING
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READING LIST:
Laura Ashe (ed.), Early Fiction in England: From Geoffrey of Monmouth to Chaucer (Penguin, 2015)
Beroul (trans. Alan Fedrick), The Romance of Tristan (Penguin, 1978)
Rachel Bromwich, A. O. H. Jarman, Brynley F. Roberts (eds.), The Arthur of the Welsh: The Arthurian legend in Medieval Welsh literature (first published 1991; University of Wales Press, 2008), especially ‘The Tristan of the Welsh’ by Rachel Bromwich
Glyn S. Burgess & Karen Pratt (eds.), The Arthur of the French: The Arthurian Legend in Medieval French and Occitan Literature (University of Wales Press, 2006), especially, ‘The Tristan Legend in Old French Verse’ by Tony Hunt & Geoffrey Bromiley
Mark Chinca, Gottfried von Strassburg: Tristan (Cambridge University Press, 1997)
Marie de France (trans. Glyn S. Burgess), The Lais of Marie de France (Penguin, 1999)
Helen Fulton (ed.), A Companion to Arthurian Literature (Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), especially ‘The Matter of Britain on the Continent and the Legend of Tristan and Iseult in France, Italy and Spain’
W. H. Jackson & Silvia Ranawake (eds.), The Arthur of the Germans: The Arthurian Legend in Medieval German and Dutch Literature (University of Wales Press, 2000), especially ‘Tristan Narratives from the High to the Late Middle Ages’ by Mark Chinca
Gottfried von Strassburg (ed. A. T. Hatto), Tristan with the ‘Tristran’ of Thomas (Penguin, 1967)
Joan Tasker Grimbert (ed.), Tristan and Isolde: A Casebook (first published 1995; Routledge, 2002)
Credits
| Role | Contributor |
|---|---|
| Presenter | Melvyn Bragg |
| Interviewed Guest | Laura Ashe |
| Interviewed Guest | Juliette Wood |
| Interviewed Guest | Mark Chinca |
| Producer | Simon Tillotson |
Broadcasts
- Thu 31 Dec 2015 09:00Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio 4
- Thu 31 Dec 2015 21:30Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio 4
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