ABSTRACT
Any interpretation of Chretien de Troyes' Conte du Graal' is marred from the beginning by uncertainties regarding the originality of the structural composition of the extant versions of the romance. It has even been argued, in some instances, that the bipartite structure of the Conte du Graal reflects dual authorship, with the part devoted to Gauvain-seen by some as a frivolous magnification of the protagonist's chivalric qualities-being an appendix by a later hand.? Moreover, the fact that the romance remains unfinished has led some to speculate that Chretien thus intended to mystify the reader with the particular facts surrounding the incompletion of the romance in order to underscore more poignantly some of the themes taken up in the narrative. Wherever the truth may lie, these uncertainties have not been resolved to date, and we must therefore work from the assumption that the general lines of the story reflect, at least to some degree, Chretien's or iginal plan in composing the romance. Since the question of the originality of the bi-partite structure comprising the individual adventures of Perceval and Gauvain has been taken up effectively in a number of previous analyses, this chapter will focus on the manner in which it appears that Chretien intended us to interpret the central themes and motifs of the romance as they occur in Perceval's narrative. In any event , the part of the romance devoted to the adventures of Gauvain continues in the same vein as Chretien's previous romances, in which Gauvain's moral and social effectiveness as an Arthurian knight has been diminished by Chretien's use of parody and strategic rhetorical devices. Whether entirely due to Chretien's hand, or that ofanother medieval author, Gauvain's adventures in the Conte du Graal provide a useful counterpoint to Perceval's quest-the search for the meaning of the lance and grail at the Fisher King's castle-which the author presents as a kind of mystical
hermeneutics. Any doubt as to Chretien's authorship of the two narratives of the Conte du Graal is partially diminished by the common theme which links the two protagonist's quests: that of maternal filiation and the two heroes'-as well as King Arthur's-failure to preserve their maternal lineage. To my knowledge, there has been no previous scholarship which analyzes the two themes of maternal death found in both parts of the romance, nor which attempts to interpret the precise symbolic significance of the 'mother' figure in the Conte du Graal. In the scene depicting Gauvain's adventures at the Castle of La Roche del Ch ampguin, in which he discovers his mother, who has presumably been dead for over twenty years, and King Arthur's mother as well-dead for an even longer period of time-Gauvain is forced to confront the reality of his forsaken maternal lineage, much as Perceval is to confront his guilt in having forsaken his mother. Yet despite this conflation of the theme of a 'forsaken maternal lineage' in the dual narratives , the overall effect of their juxtaposition serves to emphasize the difference between the protagonists' respective quests ; the strictly social value of Gauvain's quest thus magnifYing the spiritual purpose of Perceval's. In effect, the authorial originality of Gauvain's adventures is essentially irrelevant, to the extent that the traditional depiction of the chivalric values of King Arthur's nephew provides the reader with a kind of contrapuntal image of Perceval's spiritual quest .
