Category Archives: Middle Ages: 14th-15th Century

Gawain: Green Knight leaves and King Arthur reacts

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About the scene and clip:
The Green Knight has just picked up his head and left the hall. King Arthur manages to respond to this astounding—and disturbing—marvel in a kingly and cheerful manner, and the Christmas feast begins.

About the work:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, one of the best loved works of medieval literature, is an anonymous Middle English romance of the 14th century. The style is “alliterative”: each poetic line is dominated by a certain letter sound that is repeated.

The story: At Christmas, a strange, huge, all-green knight arrives at King Arthur’s court. He challenges all present to an exchange of blows with his great axe. Gawain accepts, and cuts off the knight’s head—but the green man does not die! Rather, he picks up his head and, before riding away, reminds Gawain that in a year it will be his turn to receive his blow. Gawain, in his dutiful quest for the Green Knight, encounters many adventures—in particular, at a castle where he has an exchange of gifts with the lord, and where the lady attempts repeatedly to seduce the virtuous and honorable Gawain. He finally finds the Green Knight—in a surprising conclusion to the romance.

About the genre:
Medieval romances are typically long narratives of love and adventure in which an aristocratic hero (or occasionally a heroine) proves himself in combat and courtship. Medieval romance arose in France and Anglo-Norman England in the 12th century and spread through Western and even Eastern Europe. Many early romances tell the stories of knights and ladies at King Arthur’s court. In the 12th and 13th centuries, romances are composed in verse (typically octosyllabic rhymed couplets), and are commonly performed aloud from memory by minstrels; romances are also sometimes read aloud. In the 13th century, some romances begin to be written in prose; public and private readings become more frequent.

About the edition/translation:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, tr. Brian Stone, Penguin, 2nd ed., London, 1974, I: 21, pp. 38ff. One edition of this frequently-edited work is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, ed. J. R. R. Tolkien and E. V. Gordon, 2nd ed. revised by Norman Davis, Oxford, Clarendon, 1968.

About the performer/ensemble:
Colleen Smith is a Drama student in the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2009).

About the production:
This performance was created for “Acting Medieval Literature,” taught by Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz in spring 2009. It was videoed in the classroom by a fellow student.

Gawain: Lady attempts to seduce Gawain

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About the scene and clip:
The lady of the castle begins her attempt to seduce Sir Gawain. The performer plays both parts.

About the work:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, one of the best loved works of medieval literature, is an anonymous Middle English romance of the 14th century. The style is “alliterative”: each poetic line is dominated by a certain letter sound that is repeated.

The story: At Christmas, a strange, huge, all-green knight arrives at King Arthur’s court. He challenges all present to an exchange of blows with his great axe. Gawain accepts, and cuts off the knight’s head—but the green man does not die! Rather, he picks up his head and, before riding away, reminds Gawain that in a year it will be his turn to receive his blow. Gawain, in his dutiful quest for the Green Knight, encounters many adventures—in particular, at a castle where he has an exchange of gifts with the lord, and where the lady attempts repeatedly to seduce the virtuous and honorable Gawain. He finally finds the Green Knight—in a surprising conclusion to the romance.

About the genre:
Medieval romances are typically long narratives of love and adventure in which an aristocratic hero (or occasionally a heroine) proves himself in combat and courtship. Medieval romance arose in France and Anglo-Norman England in the 12th century and spread through Western and even Eastern Europe. Many early romances tell the stories of knights and ladies at King Arthur’s court. In the 12th and 13th centuries, romances are composed in verse (typically octosyllabic rhymed couplets), and are commonly performed aloud from memory by minstrels; romances are also sometimes read aloud. In the 13th century, some romances begin to be written in prose; public and private readings become more frequent.

About the edition/translation:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, tr. Brian Stone, Penguin, 2nd ed., London, 1974, III: 48, pp 66ff. One edition of this frequently-edited work is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, ed. J. R. R. Tolkien and E. V. Gordon, 2nd ed. revised by Norman Davis, Oxford, Clarendon, 1968.

About the performer/ensemble:
Andrew Long is a Drama student in CAP 21 at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, with a minor in Spanish literature and culture in the College of Arts and Science (2008).

About the production:
This performance was created for the course “Acting Medieval Literature,” taught by Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz at New York University in fall 2004.

Three Women: The Musical

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About the scene and clip:
Six performers (with modest costume elements) take turns telling the Three Women of Paris. They animate and modernize it by inserting appropriate songs from recent American musicals, to piano accompaniment.

About the work:
This fabliau tells about three women who go out drinking together. They have a grand time eating and drinking—but they get so drunk that they pass out naked in the street. Taken for dead, they are mourned by their husbands and are buried in the Cemetery of the Innocents. But the women revive and, filthy and covered with worms, they crawl out of their graves and head home. To some degree, this fabliau is a parody of a resurrection miracle.

About the genre:
Fabliaux are short comic tales. This narrative genre was extremely popular in the 13th and 14th centuries in France and elsewhere in Europe (Chaucer’s Miller’s Tale is a sophisticated fabliau). Fabliaux almost invariably deal with the passions of lust, gluttony, avarice–and with attempts to trick or deceive others. Characters are typically bourgeois, clerks and monks, or peasants–and often women. The treatment is comic or satirical, but fabliaux vary considerably. Some are extremely vulgar in language and treatment, inviting crude gestures in performance. Other fabliaux are based on puns or wordplay. Many have a moral at the end and some have ethical overtones throughout. A few fabliaux are refined and courtly in language and themes. Many fabliaux are anonymous, but a few are by known poets. Performance styles and strategies for the fabliaux probably varied considerably in the Middle Ages, according to the subject matter and characters, the poet, the performer(s), the occasion, and the kind of audience present.

About the edition/translation:
Abridged from Gallic Salt, ed./trans Robert L. Harrison, Berkeley, CA, University of California Press, 1974, pp. 398-417.

About the performer/ensemble:
Chris Chianesi, Katie Gassert, Rebecca Greenberg, Kevin Metzger, Jacob Richard, and Jennifer Seifter are all Drama students in the CAP 21 Studio at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. The pianist, Andrew Long, is a Drama student in the CAP 21 Studio, with a minor in Spanish literature and culture in the College of Arts and Science (2008).

About the production:
This performance was created for the course “Acting Medieval Literature,” taught by Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz at New York University in spring 2008. It took place at the Maison Française at an event called “Making It Real 2008” in April 2008; it was videoed by Gina Guadagnino.

Tam Lin: Unaccompanied song

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About the scene and clip:
A solo performer sings the full version of Child ballad 39A unaccompanied.

About the work:
Tam Lin is number 39 of 305 English and Scottish ballads collected by Francis James Child in the late 19th century. Child collected 14 variations of the Tam Lin ballad; 39A he considered to be the oldest variation, although the inherent oral tradition of the ballad makes it impossible to date it with accuracy. The earliest printed reference to the ballad comes from an anonymous 1549 tract titled The Complaynt of Scotlande: vyth ane Exortatione to the Thre Estaits to be vigilante in the Deffens of their Public veil. The ballad is referred to as one of the “ancient” tales told in Scotland.

There are clues to the age of the ballad in the language used. For example, Janet is described as wearing a “kirtle,” a garment that was popularly worn in Scotland from the 14th through 16th centuries. The expression “syne,” meaning “directly after,” fell out of use in the mid 15th century, as did the term “aboon” for “above.” This version of the ballad is commonly dated to the late 14th century, as the majority of the colloquial terminology used in the ballad was at its peak popularity at that time.

The musical notation of this ballad, by James Johnson in the 18th century, was part of a large compilation he collected on popular Scottish songs.

The ballad tells the story of Janet, a young woman who is the daughter of a nobleman. She enters the woods of Carterhaugh (an area near modern-day Selkirk, Scotland), where she meets Tam Lin, a fairy knight who guards the well there. Tam Lin requires a tribute of all who pass the well, and Janet pays the tribute of her virginity. She becomes pregnant and returns to her father’s hall, where her pregnancy is discovered. Although her father wants her to marry one of his knights, Janet refuses, claiming that only Tam Lin – the true father of her child – will be her husband. She returns to the well, where Tam Lin tells her that he was once a mortal knight. He then explains that on Halloween, she can win him back from the fairies if she can pull him down off a white horse and hold him in her arms while he turns into various dangerous animals and objects. Janet accomplishes this, and Tam Lin is transformed from a fairy knight back into a naked mortal man. The Queen of Fairies curses the pair as she acknowledges that Tam Lin belongs to Janet now.

About the genre:
A ballad is a song that tells a story; ballads are often fairly long, composed of a dozen or more stanzas. Although many other songs, both long and short, also tell stories, the term “ballad” used in this particular sense dates from the late Middle Ages. Some late-medieval ballads and a great many early-modern ballads survive, some of them in multiple versions, and throughout the world. Documentation for ballad melodies is in general substantially later than for the texts.

About the edition/translation:
The classic edition for traditional ballad texts, often with many variants, is The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, ed. Francis James Child, New York, Dover, 1965, 5 vols (orig. 1888). This song is Vol. I, No. 39. The musical notation the performer uses comes from Scots Musical Museum, Originally Published by James Johnson with Illustrations of the Lyric Poetry and Music of Scotland by William Stenhouse, Hatboro, PA, Folklore Associates, 1962 (orig. 1787).

About the performer/ensemble:
Gina Guadagnino graduated from New York University in May 2003 with a major in English; she minored in Medieval and Renaissance Studies and Irish Studies. She has loved Tam Lin since childhood (2008).

About the production:
This performance was created for this website. It was videoed in a reception room at New York University in spring 2008.

Gawain: Hunting and wooing scenes

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About the scene and clip:
Eight performers take turns telling and performing the (abridged) hunting and wooing scenes, using costumes and adding some comic elements; among them: the hunting horn is a harmonica; students in animal costume act out the terrified animals; the cutting up of the deer becomes a surgical operation.

About the work:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, one of the best loved works of medieval literature, is an anonymous Middle English romance of the 14th century. The style is “alliterative”: each poetic line is dominated by a certain letter sound that is repeated.

The story: At Christmas, a strange, huge, all-green knight arrives at King Arthur’s court. He challenges all present to an exchange of blows with his great axe. Gawain accepts, and cuts off the knight’s head—but the green man does not die! Rather, he picks up his head and, before riding away, reminds Gawain that in a year it will be his turn to receive his blow. Gawain, in his dutiful quest for the Green Knight, encounters many adventures—in particular, at a castle where he has an exchange of gifts with the lord, and where the lady attempts repeatedly to seduce the virtuous and honorable Gawain. He finally finds the Green Knight—in a surprising conclusion to the romance.

About the genre:
Medieval romances are typically long narratives of love and adventure in which an aristocratic hero (or occasionally a heroine) proves himself in combat and courtship. Medieval romance arose in France and Anglo-Norman England in the 12th century and spread through Western and even Eastern Europe. Many early romances tell the stories of knights and ladies at King Arthur’s court. In the 12th and 13th centuries, romances are composed in verse (typically octosyllabic rhymed couplets), and are commonly performed aloud from memory by minstrels; romances are also sometimes read aloud. In the 13th century, some romances begin to be written in prose; public and private readings become more frequent.

About the edition/translation:
Abridged from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, tr. Brian Stone, Penguin, 2nd ed., London, 1974, pp. 62ff. One edition of this frequently-edited work is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, ed. J. R. R. Tolkien and E. V. Gordon, 2nd ed. revised by Norman Davis, Oxford, Clarendon, 1968.

About the performer/ensemble:
Danielle Benzaken is a student in Psychology and English in the College of Arts and Science at New York University. Jessica Carei is a student in Journalism and Medieval and Renaissance Studies in the College of Arts and Science at New York University. Ruby Joy is a Drama student in the Playwrights Horizons Theater School at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Kat Keating is a student in English, Medieval and Renaissance Studies, and Music in the College of Arts and Science at New York University. Nick Kocher is a Drama student in the Experimental Theatre Wing at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Andrew Long is a Drama student in the CAP 21 Studio at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and a student in Spanish literature and culture at the College of Arts and Science. Marielle Mosthof is a Drama student in the Stella Adler Studio of Acting at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Steven Northrup is a Drama student in the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2008).

About the production:
This performance was created for the course “Acting Medieval Literature,” taught by Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz at New York University in spring 2008. It took place at the Maison Française at an event called “Making It Real 2008” in April 2008; it was videoed by Gina Guadagnino.

Gawain: Gawain leaves in search of Green Knight

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About the scene and clip:
In a strongly physical performance, a trio tells and acts out the departure of Gawain from Bertilak’s castle: the hero must go off alone in search of the Green Knight.

About the work:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, one of the best loved works of medieval literature, is an anonymous Middle English romance of the 14th century. The style is “alliterative”: each poetic line is dominated by a certain letter sound that is repeated.

The story: At Christmas, a strange, huge, all-green knight arrives at King Arthur’s court. He challenges all present to an exchange of blows with his great axe. Gawain accepts, and cuts off the knight’s head—but the green man does not die! Rather, he picks up his head and, before riding away, reminds Gawain that in a year it will be his turn to receive his blow. Gawain, in his dutiful quest for the Green Knight, encounters many adventures—in particular, at a castle where he has an exchange of gifts with the lord, and where the lady attempts repeatedly to seduce the virtuous and honorable Gawain. He finally finds the Green Knight—in a surprising conclusion to the romance.

About the genre:
Medieval romances are typically long narratives of love and adventure in which an aristocratic hero (or occasionally a heroine) proves himself in combat and courtship. Medieval romance arose in France and Anglo-Norman England in the 12th century and spread through Western and even Eastern Europe. Many early romances tell the stories of knights and ladies at King Arthur’s court. In the 12th and 13th centuries, romances are composed in verse (typically octosyllabic rhymed couplets), and are commonly performed aloud from memory by minstrels; romances are also sometimes read aloud. In the 13th century, some romances begin to be written in prose; public and private readings become more frequent.

About the edition/translation:
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, tr. Brian Stone, Penguin, 2nd edition, London, 1974, IV: 83, pp. 98ff. One edition of this frequently-edited work is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, ed. J. R. R. Tolkien and E. V. Gordon, 2nd ed. revised by Norman Davis, Oxford, Clarendon, 1968.

About the performer/ensemble:
Eric Giancola and Kelly Swartz are Drama students in the CAP 21 Studio at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2004). Jory McMillan is a Drama student in the Stella Adler Studio of Acting at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2004).

About the production:
This performance was created for the course “Acting Medieval Literature,” taught by Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz at New York University in fall 2004.

Orlando: Opening canto

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About the scene and clip:
In this clip, the Italian performer Paolo Panaro recites much of the first canto of Orlando Innamorato, in which we meet many of the central characters—Charlemagne, Roland (Orlando), Angelica, and others—and the fast-paced story begins. Panaro makes dramatic use of a few props: a chair, crown, sword, and book.

About the work:
Boiardo’s Orlando Innamorato, published in 1483, tells of Roland, the great hero of La Chanson de Roland. But in this work, Roland (Orlando, in Italian) is not just a warrior; he also takes on the characteristics of the famous lover Lancelot, falling madly in love with the beautiful Angelica. In this great bbk rg gloomy bear disposable vape device 8000 puffs mineral water work of passion and magic themes usually associated with Arthurian romance, Boiardo refigures chivalric romance along epic lines, combining love and war to create the new form of the romance epic.

About the genre:
Boiardo’s Orlando—like a number of other major works of the Italian Renaissance—represents a blend of epic and romance traditions.

The epic is an ancient genre and is found in almost every culture. It is a long heroic narrative which tells of war and great deeds. Epics are generally composed in verse, and sung from memory or improvised in performance by professional performers with instrumental accompaniment. These narratives are created from traditional elements, commonly without recourse to writing, by poets whose names are often unknown to us. Among the famous traditional epics are the Iliad and the Odyssey, attributed to Homer; the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf; and the Old French Song of Roland. Many known poets adopt epic forms and themes for their literary verse (such as Virgil in his Aeneid).

Medieval romances are typically long narratives of love and adventure in which an aristocratic hero (or occasionally a heroine) proves himself in combat and courtship. Medieval romance arose in France and Anglo-Norman England in the 12th century and spread through Western and even Eastern Europe. Many early delta extracts romances tell the stories of knights and ladies at King Arthur’s court. In the 12th and 13th centuries, romances are composed in verse (typically octosyllabic rhymed couplets), and are commonly performed aloud from memory by minstrels; romances are also sometimes read aloud. In the 13th century, some romances begin to be written in prose; public and private readings become more frequent.

About the edition/translation:
Opere di Matteo Maria Boiardo, ed. Ferruccio Ulivi, Milano, Mursia, 1986. English translation: Orlando Innamorato, trans. Charles Stanley Ross, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1989 (rpt. West Lafayette, IN, Parlor Press).

About the performer/ensemble:
Paolo Panaro is an Italian actor who performs widely in Europe and the United States. His repertory includes Italian works from the Middle Ages and Renaissance, as well as from the modern period.

About the production:
This performance was filmed at a studio at Purdue University in 1996; technical assistance was provided by John Strathman. We wish to thank Paolo Panaro for giving us permission to use this wonderful clip, and Prof. Charles Ross of Purdue University for making the video available to us; copies are available through Prof. Ross.

St. John: Sins and miraculous forgiveness

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About the scene and clip:
The solo performer tells—and acts out—the second part of the remarkable legend about the hermit St. John Chrysostom: his great sins and his miraculous forgiveness by God.

About the work:
This legend, recounted in medieval Croatian Church Slavonic, tells the story of a friar named John who leaves his monastery because he deplores the low morality of his brethren. He goes to the desert where he lives as a hermit and writes prayers in honor of the Virgin Mary. The devil steals his inkpot, so John uses his saliva as ink—which miraculously turns into gold, hence his name “Chrysostom,” or “golden mouth.” John prays to be delivered from great sins, thinking that he can defend himself from small sins, such as drunkenness. But his belief in his own moral strength is an error, an angel tells him—and prophesies that John will commit both murder and rape in a drunken state.

A new storyline opens at this point: A princess gets lost in a bad storm during a hunt and finds refuge in John’s humble hut. She offers him wine, and—as the angel had predicted—after the third glass he gets drunk, rapes her, and then kills her; he hides her body. Horrified by his transgression, he vows to crawl on all fours like an animal until God has forgiven him. Time passes, and the king, the princess’s father, organises another hunt to celebrate the birth of a son and heir. In the desert the huntsmen come across a strange creature and bring it to the court. It is John—and the king’s baby son shouts out that John is now forgiven. John praises the Lord, and tells his whole story to the king and courtiers. They go to find the grave of the princess—but discover her alive and well. Everyone is happy and praises the greatness of “John’s God”.

The Croatian Legend of St. John Chrysostom (Hermit) survives in the so-called Zgombic Miscellany, now in the Archive of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zagreb. Although compiled in the early 16th c., this miscellany (a collection of a wide variety of texts) is part of an older medieval tradition. The Croatian tale draws on several European sources, but only this version has John’s lengthy monologue.

About the genre:
Stories about the saintly wisdom, heroism, or miracles of remarkable men and women exist in many religious traditions, such as Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. Such stories are termed “hagiography.” In medieval Europe, the saint’s life or legend was an extremely popular type of work. A great many stories (and plays) about male and female Christian saints exist in Latin and in all the vernacular languages. These works may focus on the saint’s dramatic death by martyrdom, or recount the remarkable miracles performed by the saint, or may relate the entire life of the holy man or woman. Among the most important collections of saints’ lives and legends is The Golden Legend by Jacobus of Voragine. Chaucer’s “Prioress’s Tale” in The Canterbury Tales is a tale of martyrdom. Miracle and pious tales about the Blessed Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus, constitute a special, and highly important, category of saintly legends.

This story also belongs to the tale tradition. The tale, like the epic, is an ancient genre and one found everywhere in the world. Many tales are firmly rooted in oral tradition and are recited or told by amateur and professional storytellers and performers. Other tales are the work of literarily sophisticated authors and are often intended to be read aloud or silently from written texts. Some tales circulate separately, while others are part of collections, which may be set in complex frames (as in the case of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Boccaccio’s Decameron and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales). There are many sub-groups of tales with specific characteristics; see for example the “lai” and the “fabliau.”

About the edition/translation:
English translation by Marija-ana Dürrigl. Original text: critical edition in Stjepan Ivsic, “Iz hrvatske glagolske knjizevnosti: Legenda o Ivanu Zlatoustom,” Prilozi za knjizevnost, jezik, istoriju i folklor 11 (1931): 59-83, 1931. We express here our particular gratitude to Dr. Dürrigl for bringing this remarkable text to our attention, and for providing an English translation of it.

About the performer/ensemble:
Nick Spangler is a Drama student in the CAP21 Studio at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2005).

About the production:
This performance was created for a group independent study with Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz in fall 2005. It took place on December 15, 2005, as part of an event titled “Making It Real: Performing the Middle Ages,” at an Off-off-Broadway venue in New York City—The American Place Theatre, 266 West 37th St (22nd floor). The performance was also sponsored by “Storytelling in Performance,” a workshop funded by the Humanities Council of New York University and co-directed by Profs. Timmie Vitz, Nancy Regalado and Martha Hodes. Gina Guadagnino was the videographer.

Robin Hood and the golden arrow, guitar accompaniment

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About the scene and clip:
The performer sings the ballad and accompanies himself on a guitar. (A fellow student serves as music stand from which the performer reads the words of the song.)

About the work:
Robin Hood and the Golden Arrow is one of many ballads about the legendary popular hero Robin Hood, yeoman outlaw, defender of the poor and weak against the rich and powerful. Such songs and tales arose in 14th-century England, and this ballad may have originated in the medieval Gest of Robyn Hode. The ballads tell of Robin Hood’s life and numerous adventures, and of his encounters with a wide array of characters. In this lengthy ballad, Robin Hood, dressed in red instead of green, and therefore unrecognized, bears away the prize of archery—the golden arrow—against the arrogant Sheriff of Nottingham. Robin Hood ballads continue to be sung today in the United Kingdom and in parts of the United States.

About the genre:
A ballad is a song that tells a story; ballads are often fairly long, composed of a dozen or more stanzas. Although many other songs, both long and short, also tell stories, the term “ballad” used in this particular sense dates from the late Middle Ages. Some late-medieval ballads and a great many early-modern ballads survive, some of them in multiple versions, and throughout the world. Documentation for ballad melodies is in general substantially later than for the texts.

About the edition/translation:
A recent edition of the text of this ballad is in Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, ed. Stephen Knight and Thomas H. Ohlgren, Kalamazoo Michigan, Medieval Institute Publications, 1997 (this ballad is also at present available on the web: search “TEAMS texts online”). The classic edition for traditional ballads, often with many variants, is The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, ed. Francis James Child, New York, Dover, 1965, 5 vols (1888); this song is Vol. 3, No. 152. Ballad melodies, like the words, often exist in many versions; for this song, as for most, the surviving melodies are substantially later than the Middle Ages; see Bertrand Harris Bronson, The Singing Tradition of Child’s Popular Ballads, Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, 1959-72, 4 vols.; Vol. 3, p. 52.

About the performer/ensemble:
Greg Powell is a Drama student in the Experimental Theatre Wing at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2005).

About the production:
This performance was created for a group independent study with Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz in fall 2005. It took place on December 15, 2005, as part of an event titled “Making It Real: Performing the Middle Ages,” at an Off-off-Broadway venue in New York City—The American Place Theatre, 266 West 37th St (22nd floor). The performance was also sponsored by “Storytelling in Performance,” a workshop funded by the Humanities Council of New York University and co-directed by Profs. Timmie Vitz, Nancy Regalado and Martha Hodes. Gina Guadagnino was the videographer.

Orfeo: Opening scenes

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About the scene and clip:
The solo performer recounts and acts out the opening section of the tale of Sir Orfeo: the hero, a master harper, appears; and his wife, the beauteous Heurodis, while napping on the grass, suddenly has a mysterious frenzy (we discover later that she has just received an unwelcome summons from fairyland).

About the work:
Sir Orfeo is a Middle English tale, composed in rhymed couplets, dating from the late 13th or early 14th century. The story is an adaptation—and in important respects a transformation—of an ancient story. In the classical myth, Eurydice, beloved wife of the great harp-player Orpheus, dies; the grieving Orpheus goes down to Hades to win her back by playing his harp for the gods of the underworld. They agree to give her back to him—on condition that he must not look back as he leads her away. But, at the last moment, having looked back to make sure she was following, he loses her forever, and he must return home alone. In the Middle English story, Sir Orfeo is a king and a master harper, whose wife, Heurodis, is snatched away and taken off to fairyland. Orfeo follows, disguised as a minstrel, and manages to find her. The king of “Faërie” is so taken with Orfeo’s harp-playing that he promises to give him any reward—and Orfeo asks for Heurodis. This Orpheus (unlike his classical namesake) succeeds in bringing his wife back home—to great rejoicing and minstrelsy. The couple live happily ever after (or, more precisely: “long they lived, till they were dead”). Harpers were inspired by the story to compose beautiful lays in honor of the lovers.

A related clip on this website is “King Orfeo: Sung,” which is taken from another medieval English version of the story of Orpheus–an early ballad.”

About the genre:
A narrative lai is a short poetic tale composed in verse, which may claim to have a Breton original with harp accompaniment. The 12th-century Anglo-Norman woman poet Marie de France is the best known author of lais in French, and may be one of the creators of the genre.

About the edition/translation:
Sir Orfeo, in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo, tr. J.J.R. Tolkien, New York, Ballantine, 1980, pp. 169ff. Original text: Sir Orfeo, ed. A.J. Bliss, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, 1966.

About the performer/ensemble:
Nick Spangler is a Drama student in the CAP21 Studio at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2005).

About the production:
This performance was created for a group independent study with Prof. Timmie (E.B.) Vitz in fall 2005. It took place on December 15, 2005, as part of an event titled “Making It Real: Performing the Middle Ages,” at an Off-off-Broadway venue in New York City—The American Place Theatre, 266 West 37th St (22nd floor). The performance was also sponsored by “Storytelling in Performance,” a workshop funded by the Humanities Council of New York University and co-directed by Profs. Timmie Vitz, Nancy Regalado and Martha Hodes. Gina Guadagnino was the videographer.