Tirant lo Blanc
Planes are
great for reading and on this trip to China I managed to knock off another book
from my book list: “Tirant lo Blanc”. It is also entirely fitting that I am
sitting here in Istanbul writing the review while I wait for my connecting
flight as the major part of the story takes place in this city.
With Tirant
lo Blanc I am finally through the ancient texts in later reprints and have
arrived at texts actually written around the times they got printed… almost. In
this case there is only 20-30 years between the writing and the printing, but
at least we are not talking centuries anymore. That means that I can safely say
that I have arrived at the… later half of the 15th century.
“Tirant lo
Blanc” is very much a book of its time, for better or worse. The late medieval
era was the heyday of chivalric romances and “Tirant lo Blanc”, the white
knight, is almost the quintessential knight’s tale, so I take it that its
inclusion on the list is as a representative of its genre. Here is the supreme
knight with all the noble or at least chivalric qualities of a knight. He is
brave beyond measure, fights the enemy in open battle and wins through skill
and bravery and not through tricks. He is modest of ambition and gives his wins
away rather than keep them for himself and he will go to stupid extremes to
avoid looking selfish and greedy. Tirant is also a romantic hero who will go
through fire and water for his lady and yet respect her to an extent where he
hardly dares to speak with her. Pick a random Hollywood movie (such as “Shane”
or “Superman”) and these are the qualities we are looking for in our hero and
Tirant has them all.
But this is
the 15th century and a knight of lofty station is also of a will and
in a position to deal out swift judgement on those of lesser station he feels
offends him or his code of honor. Killing a man or maiming him to a cripple is
only an offense if he is of similar station. Many are those Tirant happens to
kill and even when he realizes his mistake there is little regret. Servants,
Moors (muslims) or just about anybody not a Christian knight are free game.
So, yeah,
an interesting look at the medieval ideal of a man.
“Tirant lo
Blanc” follows Tirant lo Blanc on his travels around the known world. He
manages to visit England, Sicily, Constantinople and the Barbary Coast (North
Africa) leaving a wake of corpses and broken hearts. Half the book is devoted
to Tirant’s battles and the other half to all the romantic escapades in
between. The battle parts soon become tiresome through repetition, super human
skill and a general foul up of geography and actual events (Moorish invasion of
England???, total victory over the Turkish invasion force in front of
Constantiople when it actually fell, Catholics in Greece where people are and
is Eastern-Orthodox etc.). The romantic scenes however are far more vivid and they
are those that carry this story.
In those
romantic sections we get real characters and realistic scenarios… almost. We
are still dealing with human ideals anno 1470, but had this been a movie this
would not be R rated, not even PG. The brave knights become tame as lambs in
the presence of these women and the romantic setups with nightly visits in
bedrooms and close escapes out the window are genuinely entertaining. The
emphasis on these elements and indeed the quality difference between battle and
romance made me wonder more than once if the writer was actually a woman and
Joanot Martorell, the author credited, just a front. I can just imagine how
this story would have been a success with the girls in its day.
For me the
book was a mixed bag of candy. Not surprisingly a lot of the writing is antiquated
and motives and morality hopelessly outdated. I know that for centuries to come
this will be a recurring theme, but when a man’s success is measured in how
many he has managed to convert to his religion it is missing the mark for me.
Rating people in A people, B people and infidels also grinds on me. Oh me and
my 21st century sensibilities… However there are also surprisingly
modern elements such as the bedroom sequences and the ending, which I really
did not see coming.
“Tirant lo
Blanch” was made into a movie of the same name in 2006 (Spanish-English
co-production). I have not watched it, but I looked it up and it looks
positively naughty and fairly close to the book. I think I will have a go at
it.
