Sixteenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities

Abstract

Always a “profane” manifestation of medieval society and condemned by the Church, courtly love does not usually lead one to look too deeply into saints’ lives and canonically spiritual matters. Yet, paradoxically, it is possible to see within perhaps one of the most “profane” illustrations of courtly love found in the Tristan corpus a closer connection to radical Franciscan spirituality, a consecrated piety that has had one of the greatest impacts on the Church and the world. An examination of various versions of the Tristan legend, used interdisciplinarily and cross-culturally, can show linkages to key aspects of Franciscan penitential spirituality. The Tristans of Béroul, Marie de France, Gottfried von Strassburg, and others highlight the mystical and especially penitential essence of Tristan love. To explore these avenues, this study advances this idea of “penance” in Franciscan spirituality, seen as equivalent to the biblical meaning of “metanoia,” as an intimate conversion of heart to God, as a vital attitude, as a continuous state of being. The Tristan stories always include a moment of love’s recognition, a type of conversion. Love in Tristan goes beyond required or programmed behaviors similar to “doing penances,” but instead lives a life of actively loving, of being penitent, of being engaged in a life-changing embrace of a new existence. It also moves the lover from specific, practical requirements of everyday life as determined from station and status to a world expressed in terms of cosmology and mythic if not divine principles.