Abstract

Malory's most recent editor considered that the secret of his style escapes analysis. But no close analysis of his style has ever been published, and because of the way in which Malory writes, anything less than a close analysis is likely to fail even in the first task of apprehending the facts. His style is unusual in combining a quite exceptional degree of self-effacement by the author within the story with a high degree of evoked emotional response from the reader. But because Malory's is an emotional and evocative style, those critics for whom it has been successful have all too often been seduced into describing their own reactions to Malory's style to the exclusion of the style itself. And on the other hand, readers who have refused the prescribed response have rejected the whole story with surprising violence. The aim of this study is a characterization of Malory's style which, if successful, should clarify not only the style itself but also the critical response to it. The method will be by an examination of Malory's use of narration and description, mainly but not exclusively from his story of Balin and its source. jQuery.click { event.preventDefault(); })