Le Morte D'Arthur, or The Once and Future King?

[Catherine]

This is for my rising 11th grader, for our upcoming year of Medieval History\literature.

[Michelle in AL]

I love the Once and Future King. I complained about the first book in it, The Sword and the Stone, as I thought it was slow moving, but loved it after that. I would recommend getting both from the library and comparing.

 

I liked the theme of "which government is best" in The Once and Future King. I'm not sure if that's present in Le Morte.

[Michelle in AL]

Here's a link to the thread I started about The Once and Future King, I was mistaken and didn't think it was slow at first, but just not the quality of writing you expect with classic lit:

http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=89044&highlight=future+king

[Catherine]

I read your thread with interest. I guess if it's one of SWB's favorite books it can't be all that bad :)

[Nan in Mass]

Morte D'Arthur is long. Some bits tell stories, but I remember thinking that the rest could be summed up as knight-meets-knight knight-kills-knight knight-moves-on over and over and over again.

 

The Once and Future King I liked. I love the Sword in the Stone part and have reread it as adult, but I haven't read the rest since high school, and I know from rereading other things as an adult that I when I read classics in high school, lots went over my head. It wasn't that I didn't understand the plot, the characters' motivations, appreciate the language, etc. It was more that I looked at it all from my own very young point of view, which was sometimes entirely different than what the author intended. So I have no idea if I would still like The Once and Future King as a married adult. I might find the whole love triangle much more emotionally wrenching, for example. But that is neither here nor there.

 

I think it depends what your student is like. I remember some rather weird bits of TOaFK, bits you might not want to deal with. What we did was read Sword in the Stone and an abridged version of Morte D'Arthur. Usually I avoid abridgements, but in this case, I thought it was a good idea. This is the only work we read in the abridged form. Usually, if I want shorter, we just read bits of the orginal.

 

-Nan

[Storm Bay]

The Once and Future King--was that by White or someone like that? I read that for fun in high school, and was my favourite book on King Arthur. I haven't read your other choice, nor have I ever actually studied it. I read 2 or 3 Athur books/series years ago.

 

Dd, 14, is reading Tennyson's Idylls of the King right now. She said she hated it, so I started reading it aloud to her. Once we were partway through the second part she started reading it on her own. This is merely a tangent, but since it's about King Arthur I thought it not too far off-topic. I'm very glad she is, because I couldn't get into it at all, whereas she chuckles at the funny parts, etc.

[Mama Lynx]

Le Morte is ... long. As much of an Arthur fan as I am, I would only ask my kids to read parts of it. And as Nan said, much of it is the same, over and over.

 

I'd go with TOaFK, and some exerpts from Mallory ... or an abridgement of Mallory.

[FloridaLisa]

Le Morte is ... long.

 

Yeah. Ds1 started it last summer and slogged through much of the summer, taking breaks with other books.

 

So a spin-off question: if he read about 2/3, would you just put it on his list of books read, or somehow notate that a portion had been read?

 

Thanks!

Lisa

[Kareni]

So a spin-off question: if he read about 2/3, would you just put it on his list of books read, or somehow notate that a portion had been read?

 

 

 

On my daughter's reading list, I did include a few titles with the follow up note of "(selections)". So, in your son's case, it could be:

 

Le Morte D'Arthur (selections)

 

Regards,

Kareni