MDVL 216

Fall 2025 Part of Term 1

Part of Term 1
Aug 25-Dec 10

Legends of King Arthur

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Credit: 3 hours.

Same as CWL 216 and ENGL 216. See ENGL 216.

This course satisfies the General Education Criteria in Fall 2022 for:

Humanities – Lit & Arts

Cultural Studies - Western

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MDVL 216 class schedule data for fall 2025
	CRN	Type	Section	Time	Day	Location	Instructor	Section Details
	67745	Lecture-Discussion	M	10:00AM -10:50AM	MWF	29 Psychology Building	Barrett, R	Part of Term: 1 Date Range: 08/25/25-12/10/25 Degree Notes: Humanities - Lit & Arts, and Cultural Studies - Western course. Section Info: FA25 ENGL / CWL / MDVL 216 - In this introduction to Arthurian literature, we’ll spend the first half of the semester following King Arthur as he and his court emerge from the twelfth-century Welsh borderlands (Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain) and make their way across the Channel to France (the chivalric romances of Chrétien de Troyes and Heldris of Cornwall). We’ll then return to England for the close of the Middle Ages and Thomas Malory’s fifteenth-century Morte D'Arthur. The second half of the semester focuses on post-medieval Arthuriana, beginning with A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1889), Mark Twain’s satire of Southern nostalgia and Northern industrialization, and ending with Spear (2022), Nicola Griffith’s genderbent take on the Grail legend. In between, we’ll read The Crystal Cave (1970), Mary Stewart’s historically-minded reimagining of Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Merlin, and Legendborn (2020), Tracy Deonn’s meditation on the Round Table’s complicity in racial trauma. We may even spend some time watching and discussing George A. Romero’s 1981 film Knightriders, which stars a very young Ed Harris as the King Arthur analog in a Ren Faire motorcycle jousting show. Writing assignments will include short reading responses as well as a longer project asking students to research and present on a modern Arthurian text that isn’t included on the course reading list. There will also be at least one exam.