How we cite our quotes: (Line)
Quote #4
‘Yet take thou heed of him, for, so thou pass
Beneath this archway, then wilt thou become
A thrall to his enchantments, for the King
Will bind thee by such vows as is a shame
A man should not be bound by, yet the which
No man can keep.’
(“Gareth and Lynette,” 263-268)
The gatekeeper refers to the vows Arthur binds his knights with as “enchantments.” This description makes the vows into something mysterious and magical, possibly even ominous and threatening.
Quote #5
[…] See you not, dear love,
That such a mood as that which lately gloom’d
Your fancy when ye saw me following you
Must make me fear still more you are not mine,
Must make me yearn still more to prove you mine,
And make me wish still more to learn this charm
Of woven paces and of waving hands,
As proof of trust. O Merlin, teach it me!
The charm so taught will charm us both to rest.
(“Merlin and Vivien,” 322-330)
Vivien begs Merlin to teach her how to turn someone into a statue to do her bidding. She longs for this charm as proof that Merlin is “hers.” She says the charm will “charm us both to rest,” claiming that once Merlin teaches it to her she will believe in his love for her and will not trouble him anymore for proof. The irony, of course, is that Vivien intends to use the charm to make Merlin “rest” in another way—by imprisoning him in the hollow oak.
Quote #6
‘Nay monk! what phantom?’ answer’d Percivale.
‘The cup, the cup itself, from which our Lord
Drank at the last sad supper with his own.
This, from the blessed land of Aromat—
After the day of darkness, when the dead
Went wandering o’er Moriah—the good saint,
Arimathaean Joseph, journeying brought
To Glastonbury, where the winter thorn
Blossoms at Christmas, mindful of our Lord.
And there awhile it bode; and if a man
Could touch or see it, he was heal’d at once,
By faith, of all his ills.’
(“The Holy Grail,” 45-56)
Percivale responds with indignation to his fellow monk’s suggestion that the Holy Grail is a mere “phantom,” although this characterization of the Grail is precisely the one that Arthur will give just a few lines later. Percivale describes the Grail in terms that associate it with new life: it originates on a day when the dead walked, was placed in an abbey where the “winter thorn/Blossoms” (a time of year when everything else is dead), and cures the dying of their illnesses.