Thanks for reading.
The announcement was precipitated by the discussion on one forum of the History Channel's plethora of Arthuriana this month, no doubt hoping to ride the marketing coattails of next month's Jerry Bruckheimer blockbuster. I expect Arthurians will like King Arthur in Time and Space more than they expect they'll like the movie. I guess I was making snarky remarks about it when we saw a tv ad the other day, because my wife responded, "Your stuff isn't exactly canonical* either." The difference, though, is that I don't pretend that mine is the "true, untold story" but Bruckheimer does, and that irks those of us who know better (while we nevertheless acknowledge that a hit movie could spark genuine interest in the genuine classics). Well, there'll be more on that in the Sunday strip the movie's premiere weekend.
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* Canonical and canon, referring to the works recognized by an
organized religious faith as its true scriptures, began many, many years ago
to be used by Sherlock Holmes fans to refer to Arthur Conan Doyle's stories.
The concept is today used by screen series' fans, which is appropriate
because arguments over which/whether tie-ins are canon get quite religiously
humorless and acrimonious. Arthuriana, on the other hand, doesn't actually
have a canon; only sources and classics. Let that be a
lesson to you, screen series fans, if you want the inspiration of your
passion to still be remembered fifteen hundred years from now. (I can't
believe I'm having this much trouble keeping a footnote shorter than the
essay it's footnoting.)
Arthuriana sources I use or recommend:
Arthuriana - the
Journal of Arthurian Studies; the website of the quarterly journal of the
North American Branch of the International Arthurian Society.
The Camelot Project at the University of Rochester.
Camelot In Four
Colors: A Survey of the Arthurian Legend in Comics
Mystical-WWW -
The Arthurian A2Z knowledge Bank which has encyclopedically-arranged
entries on the characters of the Arthurian legends.
Le Morte Darthur: Sir Thomas Malory's Book of King Arthur and of his Noble
Knights of the Round Table,
Volume
1 and
Volume
2.