La Matiere de bretagne
LA MATIÈRE DE BRETAGNE
La "Matière de Bretagne", ou littérature arthurienne ("cycle arthurien"), ne concerne en fait que très peu notre Bretagne armoricaine. C'est la Grande-Bretagne (l'île de Bretagne), où prennent place la plupart des aventures qu'elle rapporte, qui est en cause, même si l'on a tenté, et ce dès le XIème siècle, de la localiser en Armorique, essentiellement dans la forêt de Paimpont (Brocéliande) et même si certains épisodes, notamment ceux concernant Lancelot, se situent effectivement sur le continent. Il n'en reste pas moins que c'est sur le territoire français qu'elle a été en grande partie composée, en s'inspirant probablement de traditions et de modèles locaux.
Cette désignation a été utilisée par les auteurs à partir du XIIème siècle pour distinguer leurs œuvres des récits relevant de la "matière antique" (les adaptations françaises de romans de l'Antiquité : Roman de Thèbes, Roman de Troie, Enéas ..), et des épopées mettant en scène des héros français (les chansons de geste : Chanson de Roland, Renaud de Montauban, Geste de Guillaume d'Orange ...). Elle regroupe, en littérature, l'ensemble des œuvres qui rapportent les aventures légendaires du roi Arthur, de ses chevaliers et de leurs familiers. On y trouve des histoires merveilleuses se déroulant dans de profondes forêts et faisant intervenir un ensemble original de personnages : chevaliers errants, pucelles, ermites .. Les textes produits dans cette veine ont été écrits entre les Xème et XVème siècles. Ils recouvrent donc une période de six siècles.
Il convient aussi de souligner qu'il ne s'agit pas là d'une création purement littéraire, mais que les auteurs du XIIème siècle notamment ont, de toute évidence, été inspirés par des traditions populaires transmises de génération en génération qui, comme l'attente du retour du roi Arthur, faisaient l'objet de véritables croyances.
Apparaissant au Xème siècle avec Nennius qui écrit l'histoire des Bretons de Grande-Bretagne (Historia Brittonum) et qui met en scène un certain Arthur, chef de guerre (dux bellorum) des tribus celtes de Domnonée, elle se répand sur le continent comme motif d'inspiration non seulement pour les lettrés mais aussi pour la sculpture (l'archivolte de la cathédrale de Modène) et les arts graphiques, témoins de la vogue considérable qu'elle connaît. Encouragée notamment par la cour d'Henri II Plantagenêt et d'Aliénor d'Aquitaine, qui ont la prétention de régner sur toute l'Europe occidentale et qui veulent l'opposer aux épopées que les Capétiens consacrent à Charlemagne, elle prend son essor au XIIème siècle, avec Chrétien de Troyes, et elle continue de se développer grâce à des auteurs comme Robert de Boron, Wolfram Von Eschenbach qui compose un Parzival dont s'inspirera Wagner, et de nombreux anonymes.
Plusieurs thèmes s'y rencontrent, à la charnière entre le souvenir des anciennes croyances et le développement du christianisme. L'action est supposée se référer aux temps barbares où les tribus celtes étaient soumises à d'incessantes luttes et devaient se défendre contre les envahisseurs. Mais le cadre en est une société médiévale idéalisée, qui s'ouvre à la courtoisie ; il est un thème autour duquel les autres s'organisent : celui de la Table Ronde, qui se réfère à une situation très ancienne : la réunion des guerriers autour du feu central dans la hutte gauloise.
On constate peu à peu la christianisation des thèmes, avec la quête du saint Graal : Arthur devient un "roi très chrétien". Mais en même temps remonte à la surface la dichotomie entre Ancienne Loi et Nouvelle Loi. Et par là-même s'affirme, par-delà l'œuvre de christianisation, la prégnance des vieilles croyances. N'est-ce pas ainsi qu'on peut voir resurgir dans Perlesvaux (branche V, chap XIII), au XIIIème siècle, sous les traits d'un "roi qui ne croit pas en Dieu", "méchant et cruel", un certain Gurgaran qui pourrait bien incarner l'ancien dieu Gargantua et en être une première attestation littéraire ? Et dans ce même roman (branche X, chap XXXVI), Guenièvre - celle qui, seule femme siégeant régulièrement à la cour du roi Arthur parmi tous les chevaliers, représente la souveraineté - est nommément rattachée au paganisme : après sa mort, son "plus proche parent", Madaglan, vient réclamer à Arthur la restitution de la Table Ronde, à moins qu'il n'abjure sa foi et épouse sa sœur, la reine Jandrée.
matière de Bretagne et romans bretons
matière de Bretagne et romans bretons
On donne le nom de « matière de Bretagne » à un ensemble de légendes et de chansons, diffusées à l'origine par des jongleurs gallois et armoricains, et qui alimentèrent, entre 1150 et 1250 environ, un certain nombre de romans appelés romans bretons.
Cette matière se caractérise par la présence de thèmes merveilleux qui trahissent un fond païen et un mysticisme proprement celtique.
La matière de Bretagne connut une fortune littéraire considérable après la publication en français de l'Historia regum Britanniae de Geoffroy de Monmouth, qui rendit populaires, avant 1150, des personnages comme le roi Arthur et Merlin l'Enchanteur. Les romans bretons font, avec les romans antiques (la « matière de Rome »), partie d'un ensemble qui se distingue de la chanson de geste (la « matière de France ») par l'emploi de l'octosyllabe à rimes plates, puis de la prose, et par une inspiration qui cesse d'être nationale.
Les cycles
On compte trois grands cycles de romans bretons.
Le premier comprend les lais, inspirés par le répertoire des jongleurs bretons, notamment les lais de Marie de France, écrits vers 1175. À ce premier cycle, consacré à l'amour, se rattachent également tous les romans inspirés par le personnage de Tristan, d'où son nom de cycle Tristan.
Le deuxième cycle a pour figure centrale Arthur ou Artus, roi légendaire de Bretagne, entouré de sa cour de chevaliers : c'est le cycle de la Table ronde, centré sur la notion d'« aventures », de prouesses chevaleresques. Le Roman de Brut (1155) de Wace est le premier roman à présenter les personnages et le décor féerique de ce cycle. Mais c'est Chrétien de Troyes qui a rendu célèbre la matière de Bretagne avec des récits qui seront imités dans toute l'Europe : Érec et Énide (v. 1162), Cligès (v. 1164), Yvain ou le Chevalier au Lion (v. 1170) et surtout Lancelot ou le Chevalier à la Charrette (v. 1168, terminé par Godefroy de Lagny). Toutes les aventures des chevaliers, dont Lancelot est le type (son dévouement à sa dame, femme du roi Arthur, étant absolu), sont placées sous le signe de l'amour courtois. On sent ici l'influence des troubadours, bien que la description des aventures garde, par rapport au cycle Tristan, une place prédominante. On peut distinguer les romans biographiques, où les prouesses du héros sont décrites totalement entre sa première apparition à la cour et son retour final, et les romans épisodiques, généralement plus brefs, ne racontant qu'un épisode mais en y mêlant plusieurs aventures. À la première catégorie, qui se caractérise par la complication de l'intrigue et le souci de la forme, appartiennent le Guinglain de Renaud de Baujeu, Méraugis de Portleguez de Raoul de Houdenc (avant 1228), Beaudous de Robert de Blois (v. 1250) ; à la seconde, la Vengeance Raguidel de Raoul de Houdenc.
Le cycle du Graal, enfin, s'ouvre sur l'énorme poème de Perceval (63 000 vers), commencé par Chrétien de Troyes vers 1182. Il se distingue du précédent cycle par une inspiration nettement mystique. Il ne s'agit plus ici d'aventures et d'amour courtois, mais de quête et d'amour divin. Dans la suite du Perceval, composée par plusieurs auteurs, dont Wauchier de Denain, cette tendance mystique ira en s'accentuant : on y apprend la nature du Graal, vase sacré où fut recueilli le sang du Christ et qui va faire l'objet d'une interminable quête pour les chevaliers de la Table ronde. Dans le Roman du Saint-Graal de Robert de Boron et la vulgate du Lancelot en prose, composée vers 1225, le thème central est celui de la pureté. Ni Perceval ni Lancelot, malgré leur bravoure, ne peuvent mener la Quête à son terme. Seul Galaad, fils de Lancelot, grâce à sa chasteté, parviendra à voir le Graal avant de mourir. Le cycle du Graal s'achève, dans la Mort du roi Arthur (1230-1235), sur la destruction de la Table ronde, avec la mort du roi et des principaux chevaliers.
The Isle of Avalon, most famous as the final resting place of Arthur in many stories and legends, has neither a fixed location nor a fixed description throughout the literary canon of Arthuriana. Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britanniae (c. 1136) is the oldest extant work including references to Avalon. He calls it Insula Avallonis, refers to the island's alleged healing powers, and claims that Arthur’s sword was forged there. Geoffrey also refers to Avalon in his Vita Merlini as the “Isle of Apples” (Insula Pomorum), an epithet rooted in Celtic, Greek, and Scandinavian mythological traditions in which apples frequently possess magical properties. In both the Historia and Vita, Arthur is transported to Avalon after being mortally wounded, in hopes that he will be healed on the isle (in the Vita Merlini by none other than Morgan le Fay, who is benevolent in earlier Arthurian legends). Support for the theory of Avalon’s Celtic origins stems in part from the folkloric tradition surrounding the Isle of Arran, located in the Firth of Clyde. It has been frequently likened to the island of Emhain Abhlach (“Emhain of the Apple Trees”), a place associated with the Irish sea god Manannan. As Mike Dixon Kennedy suggests in Arthurian Myth and Legend, Geoffrey was likely inspired by the extant Celtic tradition of such a place. It should be pointed out, however, that no conclusive evidence can be found that directly traces the influence of Celtic mythology and legend to the genesis of Avalon and its literary tradition; while speculations abound and are, in many cases, well defended and researched, they cannot be proven. Regardless, Avalon is consistently represented as a mysterious and otherworldly place, even after being associated with Glastonbury in the twelfth century (a connection inspired by the “discovery” of Arthur’s remains there).
The rulers of Avalon differ according to the text in question. Morgan le Fay is, by far, most frequently identified as the ruler of the isle. In addition to appearing in Geoffrey’s Vita (but not, interestingly, in the Historia), she appears in Chrétien de Troye’s romances Eric and Enide and Yvain. In both, she is a healer and mistress of Avalon, though in Eric and Enide, the actual ruler of Avalon is said to be Guinguemar, and Morgan is simply referred to as his lover and later as a powerful healer. In this tale, Morgan calls the Perilous Vale – The Valley of No Return – her home, a location which might be a reference to Avalon. William of Malmesbury, however, states that Avalloch rules Avalon with his daughters, and Morgan is not mentioned at all by him. While rulership of the Isle is given little emphasis in later texts, Morgan is often tied to the place in some way, most typically by being one of those who brings Arthur to Avalon for healing after the battle of Camlann.
The Isle Avalon is, in fact, frequently presented (in medieval and modern texts alike) as a place of healing, particularly as the place where Arthur is taken after his mortal wounding. Initially, Avalon’s role seems to be one of preservation — though his wound is mortal, he will live as long as he remains on the Isle; in some cases his stay in Avalon must be permanent, while in other cases he need only remain in Avalon until his wounds are healed. In the Vita, for instance, Morgan tells Arthur upon his arrival that he will need to stay for a long time for his wounds to be properly healed. In later medieval Arthurian works, writers imply that Avalon is his permanent resting place, perhaps his place of death and burial. Thomas Malory in his Morte D'Arthur leaves room for either possibility in his description of Arthur’s departure:
“Now put me into that barge,” seyde the kynge.
And so he ded sofftely, and there [re]sceyved hym three ladyes
with grete mournyng. And so they sette he[m d]owne, and in one
of their lappis kyng Arthure layde hys hede. And than the quene seyde,
“A, my dere brothir! Why [ha]ve ye taryed so longe frome me?
Alas, thys wounde on youre hede hath caught overmuch coulde!"
And anone they rowed fromward the londe, and sir Bedyvere
behylde all tho ladyes go frowarde hym. Than sir Bedwere cryed
and seyde,
“A, my lorde Arthur, what shall becom of me, now ye go frome
me and leve me here alone amonge myne enemyes?”
“Comforte thyselff,” seyde the kynge, “and do as well as thou
mayste, for in me ys no truste for to truste in. For I must into the
vale of Avylyon to hele me of my grevous wounde. And if thou
here nevermore of me, pray for my soule!”
But ever the quene and ladyes wepte and shryked, that hit was
pité to hyre. And as sone as sir Bedwere had loste the
syght of the barge he wepte and wayled, and so toke the foreste
and wente all that nyght. (Malory, ed. Vinaver, p. 716)
As mentioned earlier, a tradition of Arthur’s death and burial at Avalon surfaced well before Malory, in no small part due to the alleged discovery of Arthur and Gwenevere’s remains at Glastonbury Abbey in the twelfth century. This area of England is still associated with the mythic isle; the flooding of the countryside during the summer used to create islands out of many of the higher hills. Roger of Coggeshall in his Chronicon Anglicanum (c. 1220) simply states that Arthur's body was found at Glastonbury which was formerly known as Avalon, the Isle of Apples. Gerald of Wales, writing in the late 12th century, argued against fantastic speculations about Arthur's remains in both his Liber de Principis Instructione (c. 1196) and his Speculum Ecclesiae (c. 1216). He asserts in the former that though " legends had fabricated something fantastical about his demise (that he had not suffered death, and was conveyed, as if by a spirit, to a distant place), his body was discovered at Glastonbury" (Liber, Sutton). In the latter, he speaks even more forcibly against the legends of Arthur's journey to Avalon, stating that "tales are regularly reported and fabricated about King Arthur and his uncertain end, with the British peoples even now contending foolishly that he is still alive" (Speculum, Sutton).
Despite Gerald's efforts to disavow the mythologizing of Avalon, the tradition of the Isle as the final resting place of Arthur and as a place of otherworldly mystery extends into the Arthurian "renaissance" of the 19th century, where many references to Avalon continue to be found. Many poems were written about Avalon during this time, several of which evoke the isle as an idyllic, healing place of eternal beauty. American poet Madison Julius Cawein, for instance, wrote a series of poems ("Unanointed" [1901], "Uncalled" [1902] and "Avalon" [1909]) in which the isle is consistently described in such terms. In "Uncalled," the poet imagines that he can see the beautiful Avalon but knows that it cannot be reached in this life. Other nineteenth-century poems that center on Avalon refer to it as the final resting place of Arthur. William Morris's "Near Avalon" is one such work, as is J. Arthur Blaikie's poem "Arthur in Avalon." Morris's imagistic poem describes the barge that carries Arthur to Avalon, and maintains, for all of its detail, a sense of the unknowable; the many details have an air of significance, but the reader is not necessarily aware of what they mean. Blaikie's poem was inspired by James T. Archer's painting, "La Mort d'Arthur"; it depicts the dying Arthur and the vigil kept by the four Queens who bore him on the barge to Avalon. Another poem of this period that evokes Avalon as Arthur's place of repose is Sally Bridges "Avilion" (1864), a dream-vision that includes a richly detailed account of the poet's metaphysical journey to the isle.
This interest in Avalon continued into the twentieth and twenty-first centuries due, undoubtedly, to the continued interest in the legends of Arthur in general. The idea of Avalon so popular in the 19th century has extended into these more recent literary traditions, though (as is the case with nearly all aspects of the Arthurian legend) authors continue to reinterpret and reinvent its popular modes of representation. Authors from Margaret Atwood ("Avalon Revisited" [1955]) to Salmon Rushdie ("Crusoe" [1990]) have evoked the idyllic landscape of Avalon, as have various singer/songwriters; both Cindy Lauper ("Sisters of Avalon" from the eponymous 1997 album) and Van Morrison ("Avalon of the Heart" from the 1990 album Enlightenment) have written songs about Avalon, both of which play on modern interpolations of the Avalon legend; Lauper's evokes some of the later twentieth-century representations of the Isle as a place of feminine strength, while Morrison's is thematically similar to the nineteenth-century poets such as Cawein, viewing Avalon as an internal spiritual goal.
Of all of the reinterpretations and evocations of Avalon, few have wielded as much influence in the late twentieth century as Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon. Bradley plays with the tradition of Glastonbury-as-Avalon, describing a mystical divide between Christian and Pagan worlds, one in which Avalon exists in the same physical space as the Christian Abbey, though neither is more than peripherally aware of the other. In this work, the Isle is permanently inhabited by a company of priestesses and novices who wish to preserve the pagan traditions of Britain. The physical superimposition of Glastonbury Abbey upon Avalon indicates the waxing influence of Christianity and the waning power of the pagan religion. As the novel progresses, and as Christianity gains dominance, the magical mist around the isle continues to thicken, making it increasingly difficult for anyone except the initiated to find or enter into it.
Avalon has also been adopted and adapted by neo-pagan communities, some of which are more or less directly influenced by Bradley's work. "Officers of Avalon," is an online support group for neo-pagans in emergency services (website: http://www.officersofavalon.com). The Avalon Witchcamp and The Avalon East Pagan Gathering (in the UK and Nova Scotia respectively) are gatherings devoted to the communal celebrations of neo-pagans. The Avalonian Tradition is an entire branch of neo-paganism in and of itself. Jhenah Telyndru is the founder and "Morgen" of The Sisterhood of Avalon and Academic Dean of the Avalonian Theological Seminary, and has written several treatises on the tradition. On the Sisterhood of Avalon website (http://www.sisterhoodofavalon.org/), Telyndru denies any direct influence of Bradley's The Mists of Avalon, though there are numerous similarities between their respective works. Telyndru asserts, in the website's section entitled "The Avalonian Tradition," that
The power of Avalon, and indeed, the entire Arthurian legend, is not a fancy of days gone by. We need only look around us to find ample proof of its relevancy. Tales of Arthur, Morgan Le Fay and Merlin fill today's bookshelves. Psychologists, fantasy writers, Celtic scholars and personal growth proponents have all gained insight from this mythic cycle. There are many Wiccan and Pagan groups which draw heavily from the realm of Arthur and find a path of spiritual growth symbolized in the Quest for the Grail and the Code of Chivalry.
This organization is only one of many Avalonian groups, several of which apparently draw their authority from their location in Glastonbury a place that has become a virtual neo-pagan community in and of itself.
The name "Avalon" also appears frequently in popular culture, sometimes clearly evoking the Arthurian tradition directly, while at other times being used only as a name that evokes the mysterious. These references range from cars (Toyota's Avalon models, http://www.toyota.com/Avalon/), to nightclubs (Avalon, in Sacramento, CA), to nudist colonies (Avalon, of West Virginia, featuring as its logo a nude figure curled up like an apple). Some play more substantially with the literary tradition of Avalon than others, but most of these appropriations seem to be more casual (though intriguing) evocations than anything else.
Avalon, as this brief chronological survey demonstrates, has been treated to a rich (if at times strange) and multifaceted development over the centuries. From the early portrayals as a mysterious place of supernatural qualities, to the wide-reaching array of modern permutations and adaptations, Avalon remains an ephemeral and mythic location that continues to inspire creative reinvention.
