Реферат: Synopsis For The Once And Future King

Saxons were just beginning to settle down when your father the Conqueror arrived

with his pack of Normans, and that is where we are today. Robin Wood was a

Saxon partizan.”

The general viewpoint of an idealized twelfth century imagined in the fifteenth is greatly

accentuated by White’s many references to actual kings as “legendary.” It is Arthur’s

destiny, with a nudge from Merlyn, to try to right the hideous legacy left by his father

Uther by quelling Force Majeure, or Fort Mayne, by replacing the philosophy of Might as

Right by a rudimentary justice which will take its most tragic significance when Arthur

explains to Guenever and Lancelot that if Mordred accuses them of treachery he, the king,

under his new code, will be unable to intercede in their behalf.

Into Arthur’s lifetime-from his idyllic childhood in the Castle Sauvage, his union with

Morgause, his marriage to Guenever, his mounting of the Grail Quest, and all the events

leading up to the final tragedy-White has compressed much of the actual history of almost

three hundred years, the centuries of the High Middle Ages. White’s technique is

beautifully visualized by Shakespeare in Henry V (a play which White himself said he

detested):

For ’tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings, Carrying them here and there,

jumping o’er times, Turning th’ accomplishment of many years Into an hourglass .

. . (Henry V, Pro. Q1.28-31.)

The figure of Merlyn stands independent of White’s time-scheme. He has been born in the

future (”the only way to get second sight”) and is living backwards. His recollection goes

“back” to at least the mid nineteen-thirties, for he criticizes Arthur’s enthusiasm for war

with reference to Hitler. Through the brilliant device of Merlyn, White is able to make

use of ironic and humorous historical insights from the fifteenth through the

mid-twentieth century.

Anachronisms

TOAFK is full of anachronisms, allusions, and personal recollection. By envisioning for

Arthur’s story an idealized century imagined from Malory’s fifteenth century, White was

opening the door wide for all kinds of anachronisms. However, if one thinks of the time