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OmniClassics · Literature

Le Morte Darthur

Sir Thomas Malory

Arthur's fellowship takes shape through quests and rival loyalties whose contradictions gradually threaten the ideal they sustain.

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About the book

Malory gathers the Arthurian world into a broad sequence of adventures involving kingship, fellowship, love, religious aspiration, and betrayal. Knights leave court to test themselves in encounters whose meaning is not always apparent, while personal bonds repeatedly complicate the obligations of service. The stories of Lancelot, Tristram, the Grail quest, and Arthur's final struggles give the collection different centres of emotional gravity. Repetition and variation are part of its method: another combat or promise can expose a new limit within the code characters profess. This text is Edward Strachey's edited presentation of the Caxton tradition, with introductory discussion and supporting material. It offers a sustained encounter with chivalric ideals through a narrative that also records their failures, costs, and internal conflicts.

  • Fellowship and betrayal
  • Chivalric ideals
  • Conflicting loyalties

Why read it

For the expansive Arthurian narrative in which heroic achievement and the fragility of a shared ideal remain inseparable.

Caxton text edited by Edward Strachey · English

Contents and reading sections