September 05, 2022
Malory
No one is certain who wrote “Le Morte d’Arthur“ but the best bet is Sir Thomas Malory, a mid-15th century knight and rogue’s rogue. I am famously sensitive and too much of a gentleman to summarize his crimes here but an English nobleman and knight named Malory died in 1471. He was jailed frequently and certainly had time to write. My version (Modern Library, 1999) is nearly 1000 pages long. Its editor Elizabeth Bryan wrote in the introduction that though he “may have been a scoundrel, Malory was also, it seems clear, a man of ideals who believed in courage and loyalty, and who mourned the passing of chivalry.”
Page 1 from the original manuscript of ‘Le Morte d’Arthur’ published in 1485.
Posted by JD Hull at September 5, 2022 07:16 PM