Concetti Chiave
- The medieval romance, flourishing in the 12th and early 13th centuries, focuses on knights, romantic love, and supernatural incidents, often depicting an idealized life.
- The narrative of "The Death of King Arthur" encompasses legendary tales of King Arthur's life and demise, including the stories of Queen Guinevere and Sir Lancelot.
- Romance is a genre characterized by its portrayal of extravagant characters and exotic places, often incorporating supernatural events, with notable examples like the Arthurian Legends.
- The novel, emerging in the 18th century, contrasts romance by presenting realistic depictions of life, with "Robinson Crusoe" by D. Defoe marking its rise in 1719.
- While both romance and novel are prose genres, romance is rooted in fantasy and the novel in realism, with significant differences in their historical development and thematic focus.
Origins of the Medieval romance
The medieval romance flourished in the 12th and early 13th century. Its main subject is the deeds of knights and it portrays and idealized or fantastic vision of life dealing with fighting, romantic love and supernatural incidents. It expressed the French aristocratic society; in fact the word "romance" derives from the French, the language used to write it.
The death of King Arthur
It tells a number of stories about legendary kings and knights. The book opens with the story of king's Arthur birth brought about by the magic Merlin and It ends with the deaths of Arthur and his Queen Guinevere and of Sir Lancelot, the best knight and the queen's lover.
Romance
It is a literary genre which developed in the 12th and 13th centuries. It generally goes into detail of extravagant characters, strange exotic places, supernatural incidents with the use of a flowing and musical prose. Among them we can remember the Arthurian Legends.
They were about the knights of the round table, like Lancelot, Bedivere, Kay, Gawain, Gareth, Gaheris, Agravain, Tristan, Palamedes, Mordred, Percival and Galahad, Merlin the wizard and the Saint Graal (the chalice from which Jesus drank in his last dinner before being crucified) that needed to be found.
Other stories intertwine with this main quest: the love story between Lancelot and Guinevere; the fight against Mordred, Arthur’s son but traitor of the kingdom; the influences of Fairy Morgana and the Lady of the Lake on the fate.
Novel
It is a literary genre which developed in the 18th century in England presenting a picture of real life written in prose. It arose in 1719 in England with "Robinson Crusoe" by D. Defoe.
The novel is about Robinson Crusoe, a 21 years old bourgeoise, who found himself in a desert island because of a hurricane that made his ship to sink. At first, Robinson was astonished but then he trusted his strength and started to create his possibilities to survive, at first, and then to rule. As a matter of fact, he wanted to reproduce in the island the kingdom of England, he wanted to continue what he had left behind in terms of politic, traditions and culture.
It was also a way to rebuilt himself, his personality and his role in the world. Soon he became the “absolute ruler” of the island although he was alone.
Things changed when Robinson saved a cannibal that named Friday in honour of the day in which they met. But, this link led Friday to absorb, day by day, the English culture while his own identity was vanishing in a sort of process of indirect colonialism.
At the end, Robinson and Friday reached to return to England, only to find out the Robinson’s early investments were thriving.
Differences between romance and novel
Both Romance and Novel are literary genres written in prose. But while the Romance developed in the 12th and 13th centuries, the Novel developed later, in the 18th century.Moreover while the Romance deals with extravagant characters, strange exotic places and supernatural elements, the Novel presents a picture of real life.
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