On Votaries, I am examining fairy tales and folklore. So far, I have addressed Aesop, African-American tales, Hans Christian Andersen, Arabian Nights, and, now, King Arthur.
On Romance & Manga, I have discussed Andersen in manga and Arabian Nights in manga.
Related fairy tale posts will also tackle archetypes and classic characters.
Here I discuss the attraction of the villain or anti-hero, Modred (spelled as both "Modred" and "Mordred").
Despite reading the play version of Camelot numerous times, I never cared much about Guinevere and Launcelot. As I mention on Votaries, the possible reality of the Arthurian legend fascinated me. Not the feminist-druid stuff which I think is dreary; I mean, the real Dark Ages stuff with that wacky monk, Gildas proclaiming doom all over the place only nobody is listening, and there're all these Saxons moving in and, really, there probably weren't any major wars, just a few skirmishes, and it's very possible that the skirmishes were the Celts fighting each other, NOT fighting the Saxons. Because the Romans had left by this point, so the Saxons basically had free-loader rights to that "green and scepter'd isle."
Then, as an undergraduate, I developed a real liking for the other
(older) Arthurian legends: Gawain and the Green Knight and Gawain and
the Loathly Lady (Wife of Bath stuff).
I developed a distaste for Launcelot early on. It isn't just that he has an affair with Guinevere; it's that he whines
about it. The whole Lady of Shalott fiasco is Launcelot feeling sorry
for himself all over the place. He forgets who he is and falls in love
with this other chick (the Lady) and then remembers who he is and
decides to go back to the (married) woman, Guinevere, and then the Lady
kills herself and instead of Launcelot saying, "Them's the breaks" or
"Boy, I was a jerk," he gets all mopey and goes off to try to redeem
himself and really, it is exactly like the Titanic and
you, the audience, wishing desperately that Billy Zane would shoot the
protagonists just to stop them from angsting so much.
I much prefer Mordred. And interestingly enough, I'm not alone. A lot of
YA books have been written in favor of Mordred or from Mordred's point
of view: the Book of Mordred by Vivian Vande Velde; The Winter Prince by Elizabeth Wein, for example.
I think there are two reasons Mordred fascinates us Mordredites:
(1) Mordred is much more ambiguous than any of the other
Camelot/Arthurian legend characters. And he is placed, plot-wise, in the
position of being the character who outs the well-liked but corrupt
"good" guys.
Basically, Mordred is Spike.
And ambiguity is interesting. I think it is no error of human nature that the most popular Star Trek characters are those characters who are struggling to define themselves: Data, Seven of Nine, the Doctor, Spock.
We are more interested in people who haven't figured themselves out
completely yet than people who have--after all, most of us fall into
category one rather than category two.
(2) If you root for Mordred, you inevitably don't root (that much) for Launcelot, and Launcelot is such a great guy to hate. Launcelot is the quintessential spoiled kid who goes off to college or prep school or wherever and gets into trouble with some other spoiled kids. He may even be the ringleader, but it will never be clear; he will never own responsibility. And then they all get into trouble, and the other kids may even get expelled, but Launcelot goes and cries and says how SORRY he is and how he never meant it to get out of hand and isn't it too awful and it wouldn't have gone so badly if it hadn't been for that other guy (who told on them).
Modred cuts through a lot of this bull.
I've written two Mordred stories: "Merciless" and "Seriously."
In both, he is not dissimilar to Vivian Vande Velde's portrayal of
Mordred as extremely tight-lipped. (My Mordred is less heroic.) If I
remember correctly, Wein's Mordred is seriously dysfunctional and
kidnaps his half-brother. But he is still the protagonist.
So reason #3 for being a Mordredite must be: he supplies so much great material!
