Complete Malory articles by leading Malory scholar on issues relating to the text and sources of the Morte Darthur.During the last thirty years, the study of Malory's text and sources has given rise to hotly contested issues and spectacular discoveries, as well as fundamental questions about the nature of his Morte Darthurand how we should read it. The debate has given rise to hotly contested issues and spectacular discoveries, even requiring forensic examination of the unique manuscript of Malory's great book; it has also thrown fresh light on Malory's art, politics, revisions, tastes, reading, knowledge of Europe, and sense of history. Professor Peter Field is a leading authority on these questions, and the essays collected here, revised and updated for this edition, are of great importance for an understanding of Malory. A new study considers the relative authoirty of the Winchester and Caxton texts.P.J.C. FIELD is Professor of English Emeritus at the University of Wales, Bangor.

The most comprehensive consideration of the competing arguments for Malory's identitu yet undertaken.`A tour de force of historical scholarship and detective work - so good it sets the mind racing.'LITERARY REVIEWMalory's stories of King Arthur and the Round Table have been widely read for centuries, but their author's own life has been as variously reported as that of any Arthurian knight. The first serious attempts to identify him were made in the 1890s, but the man who then seemed most likely to have written the book was later found to have been accused of attempted murder, rape, extortion, and sacrilegious robbery and to have spent ten years or more in prison.Could this be reconciled with the authorship of the most famous chivalric romance in English? Other candidates for authorship were proposed but there was little consensus.This book gives the most comprehensive consideration of the competing arguments yet undertaken. It is a fascinating piece of detective work followed by a full account of the life of the man identified as theMalory. Close consideration of individual documents, many of whichwere entirely unknown in 1966, when the last book on Malory's life appeared, makes possible a fuller and more convincing story than has ever been told before.Professor P.J.C. FIELD teaches in the Department of English at theUniversity of Wales, Bangor.

P. J. C. Field, the world's preeminent Malory specialist, has wisely chosen to offer here Malory's seventh and eighth tales, recounting the decline and end of Camelot. The authoritative text is accompanied by indispensable notes and preceded by a remarkably thorough and learned--but never obscure--Introduction sufficient to prepare students and other readers to profit fully from the texts. This book is ideal for those coming to Malory for the first time and a distinct pleasure for those who already know him well. --Norris J. Lacy, E. E. Sparks Professor of French and Medieval Studies, Penn State University

A new edition of Malory's Morte Darthur based on the Winchester and other source manuscripts.CHOICE Outstanding Academic TitleMalory completed his Morte Darthur in 1469-70. The two earliest surviving witnesses, the Winchester manuscript and Caxton's printed edition, were both produced within the next sixteen years. The manuscript was soon lost, but its rediscovery in 1934 revealed that these two texts had striking differences. Eighty years of scholarship in a variety of disciplines has discovered a good deal about who changed whatand why: the Caxton, for instance, tends to be very unreliable in the last few lines of particular kinds of pages. These discoveries should make it possible to produce an edition of Malory's book that comes closer than ever before to what Malory intended to write. The present edition aims to do that, basing itself on the Winchester manuscript, but treating it merely as the most important piece of evidence for what Malory intended, and the default text where no other reading can be shown to be more probable.P.J.C. Field is Professor of English at Bangor University.

Complete Malory articles by leading Malory scholar on issues relating to the text and sources of the Morte Darthur.During the last thirty years, the study of Malory's text and sources has given rise to hotly contested issues and spectacular discoveries, as well as fundamental questions about the nature of his Morte Darthurand how we should read it. The debate has given rise to hotly contested issues and spectacular discoveries, even requiring forensic examination of the unique manuscript of Malory's great book; it has also thrown fresh light on Malory's art, politics, revisions, tastes, reading, knowledge of Europe, and sense of history. Professor Peter Field is a leading authority on these questions, and the essays collected here, revised and updated for this edition, are of great importance for an understanding of Malory. A new study considers the relative authoirty of the Winchester and Caxton texts.P.J.C. FIELD is Professor of English Emeritus at the University of Wales, Bangor.

The most comprehensive consideration of the competing arguments for Malory's identitu yet undertaken.`A tour de force of historical scholarship and detective work - so good it sets the mind racing.'LITERARY REVIEWMalory's stories of King Arthur and the Round Table have been widely read for centuries, but their author's own life has been as variously reported as that of any Arthurian knight. The first serious attempts to identify him were made in the 1890s, but the man who then seemed most likely to have written the book was later found to have been accused of attempted murder, rape, extortion, and sacrilegious robbery and to have spent ten years or more in prison.Could this be reconciled with the authorship of the most famous chivalric romance in English? Other candidates for authorship were proposed but there was little consensus.This book gives the most comprehensive consideration of the competing arguments yet undertaken. It is a fascinating piece of detective work followed by a full account of the life of the man identified as theMalory. Close consideration of individual documents, many of whichwere entirely unknown in 1966, when the last book on Malory's life appeared, makes possible a fuller and more convincing story than has ever been told before.Professor P.J.C. FIELD teaches in the Department of English at theUniversity of Wales, Bangor.

P. J. C. Field, the world's preeminent Malory specialist, has wisely chosen to offer here Malory's seventh and eighth tales, recounting the decline and end of Camelot. The authoritative text is accompanied by indispensable notes and preceded by a remarkably thorough and learned--but never obscure--Introduction sufficient to prepare students and other readers to profit fully from the texts. This book is ideal for those coming to Malory for the first time and a distinct pleasure for those who already know him well. --Norris J. Lacy, E. E. Sparks Professor of French and Medieval Studies, Penn State University

A new edition of Malory's Morte Darthur based on the Winchester and other source manuscripts.CHOICE Outstanding Academic TitleMalory completed his Morte Darthur in 1469-70. The two earliest surviving witnesses, the Winchester manuscript and Caxton's printed edition, were both produced within the next sixteen years. The manuscript was soon lost, but its rediscovery in 1934 revealed that these two texts had striking differences. Eighty years of scholarship in a variety of disciplines has discovered a good deal about who changed whatand why: the Caxton, for instance, tends to be very unreliable in the last few lines of particular kinds of pages. These discoveries should make it possible to produce an edition of Malory's book that comes closer than ever before to what Malory intended to write. The present edition aims to do that, basing itself on the Winchester manuscript, but treating it merely as the most important piece of evidence for what Malory intended, and the default text where no other reading can be shown to be more probable.P.J.C. Field is Professor of English at Bangor University.