Date of Award

7-1973

Degree Type

Master's Essay - Restricted

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Literatures, Languages, and Cultures

Abstract

Cf all the poems written during the great flowering of letters in Germany during the turn of the thirteenth century, none has been as controversial in its interpretation as the Tristan of Gottfried von Staussburg. Twentieth-century critics have usually held that it is the story of "Two Lovers against the World." They often take Tristan and Isolde and place them in the milieu of modern Romantic revolutionaries. It is almost axiomatic that the society of man is flawed or evil. Love either helps one ''fight the system" or become a recluse cut off from society, thereby becoming purified of society's evil. Kuna Franke puts it: "He [Gottfried] represents Tristan and Isolde as martyrs of the inner life and outcasts of souless convention - this shows ... what an empty form chivalric morals have become to[the poet," He goes on to say that the "elemental passion'' breaks up the stodgy, corrupt society and that Tristan and Isolde become the saviors of true chivalric virtue. Forty years later , this attitude still prevailed with critics. August Closs tells us that "Frau Minne uplifts us by her magic power." Friedrich Heer agrees, saying, "The empire of love consists wholly in the relationship of the two lovers, who disdain all that God, the World, and the social order can offer or deny them." Other Arthurian scholars, Such as R.S. Loomis and W.T.H Jackson, also join this crowd.

Comments

An Essay Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts. Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Download

Share

COinS