Song of Roland by Anonymous
{ Books & Learning }
February 27, 2007
What I was looking for was something to help me sleep on Sunday night, and what better than a 12th-century French epic chivalrous poem about a noble lord who gets killed in a battle? Yawn. What I got was something that shocked my sense of things, even though I knew the past was brutal. This intolerant, racist, gory and propagandistic work gave stark insight into the thread of intolerance that’s with us still today. Women show up just long enough to drop dead of grief when their betrothed dies, gloriously, in battle. The infidels are swarthy, dark pagans who are, to be fair, occasionally described as wise–they would be good, the author contends, if they would just accept the truth of Christianity.
Lots of death and battle. Every major character’s sword has a name, which is cute to my 21st-century eye but somewhat phallocentric, no?
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Most historical works do highlight how many areas of society have completely failed to evolve.
It reminds me of a line at the end of Spamalot, when a (recently outed) Sir Lancelot is married to Prince Herbert, and Patsy says to the audience, “You know what? 1000 years from now, this will STILL be controversial”
As for named swords, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. I’m as sexually obsessed as anyone, but even I feel people love to read phallic and other references into things when they aren’t really there. I mean, yeah, sticking a sword in someone CAN be an innuendo, but then again, well, that’s what you do with a sword. On the other hand, the movie “300″ has totally turned me gay.