[In the following essay, Perrine provides an interpretation of Queen Guenevere's character in “The Defence of Guenevere” and finds her guilty of adultery in the poem.]

“The Defence of Guenevere” is a poem that has been widely admired without being fully understood. An initial difficulty lies in its central situation. The Queen is pleading her innocence of an accusation made by Gauwaine. Whether she is innocent or guilty, however, and, indeed, what exactly the accusation has been—though it includes the charge of adultery—are not stated. Critics of Morris have either disagreed, admitted their perplexity, or dodged the issue altogether. A few of their comments follow:

Though wedded to Arthur, [Guenevere] has loved Launcelot, but not sinned with him. This she confesses, at the same time denying the baser charge.¹

Were it not for “King Arthur's Tomb,” which follows, and which may be taken as a sequel to “The Defence of Guenevere,” the Queen's guilt would not be indubitable. … With Guenevere talking like this [boasting of her beauty], and with Morris leaving it uncertain whether he intended her to be guilty of adultery or not, you cannot help thinking that a dash of clear 18th-century reason would have made his poetry … a stronger thing than it is.²

Morris does not settle clearly whether Guenevere is innocent or not. Instead he leaves us with the memory of the suffering Queen.³

[Morris's] “romanticism” seems to have clouded his power of judging fairly. The argument is exceedingly weak. The reader is left uncertain of the Queen's guilt.⁴

What Guinevere meant by saying that Gawain lied is never cleared up.⁵

[“The Defence of Guenevere”] is a defence of the virtue of King Arthur's queen, a lady whose fair fame, like Helen's, it was reserved for our politeness to vindicate.⁶

Since the essence of the poem lies in the characterization of the Queen, the question of her technical guilt or innocence is an exceedingly important one. The answer to the question, however, is only one clue to the interpretation of her character. In this paper I shall, first, establish the fact of Guenevere's guilt; second, provide an interpretation of her character; and, third, comment briefly on Morris's attitude toward her.

I

There can be no doubt—nor has there ever been—that the source of the poem is the Morte Darthur. “The Defence” was written within a year or two of Morris's purchase of a copy of Malory in 1855 and probably within a year of his having heard Rossetti describe the Morte Darthur and the Bible as the two greatest books in the world. It was written during a period when Morris and his friends talked constantly of Malory and Morris did three murals for Rossetti's ill-fated project of decorating the new Union Society building at Oxford with a series of ten scenes from Malory.⁷ The details of the poem conform, with two minor exceptions, to the story as told by Malory. And these variations—the substitution of Gauwaine for Mordred as Guenevere's accuser, and the substitution of Agravaine for Gaheris as the slayer of Gaheris's and Gauwaine's mother—are not explainable by any other source. They are the kind of mistakes a man might make who was writing from a vivid impression of his reading, and whose philosophy of the best way to retell an old romance was, as Morris told his daughter, to “read it through, then shut the book and write it out again as a new story for yourself.”⁸

Not only does Morris's poem stem from Malory as a source; it requires a knowledge of Malory for its comprehension. Such an allusion as that to the death of Gauwaine's mother (“Remember in what grave your mother sleeps,” etc., lines 153-157) is unintelligible without familiarity with the Morte Darthur; for the reader who has that familiarity, it calls up the whole dramatic story of the enmity of Gauwaine and his brethren for Lamorak and of the various amours of Gauwaine's mother Margause, whom her own son Gaheris finally slew when he took her in bed with Lamorak. Guenevere's implication in reminding Gauwaine of this affair is simply “Remember that your own mother was guilty of the same crime of which you are accusing me.” The episode of Mellyagraunce's accusation and of his fight with Launcelot is similarly not understandable without knowledge of the Malory source; yet Morris devotes nineteen stanzas—one fifth of his poem—to this episode. One fact stands out from these considerations, and its recognition is essential to correct interpretation of the poem. “The Defence of Guenevere” is written by a reader of Malory for readers of Malory. Morris has chosen to explore one moment from the Morte Darthur in all its dramatic implications and to make it vivid, exciting, and alive. In the Morte Darthur Guenevere had been given no “defence.” The “defence” is Morris's invention; the rest is dependent on Malory. It is for this reason that Morris has not stated the guilt or innocence of the Queen. He assumes that the story told by Malory will be as vivid in his reader's mind as it is in his own.

The episode in Malory which occasions Morris's poem is the third of three occasions on which Launcelot saves Guenevere from being burned at the stake. The first of these episodes (Book XVIII, chs. 3-8) is not mentioned by Morris. The second (Book XIX, chs. 1-9) is the episode referred to in the Mellyagraunce stanzas. On this occasion Guenevere, in the castle of Mellyagraunce, had slept the night in the same chamber with the wounded knights of her escort, that she might tend them if needed. During the night Launcelot climbed to her window, they had a long talk, and then “both wished to come to each other.” Launcelot broke the iron bars, cutting his hand, and “went unto bed with the queen, and he took no force of his hurt hand, but took his pleasaunce and his liking until it was in the dawning of the day.” When Mellyagraunce found blood on the Queen's bed, he accused her of having lain with one of her wounded knights. In the trial by combat which followed, with the fire prepared for Guenevere, Launcelot fought Mellyagraunce with his left side exposed and his left hand tied behind him, and slew him.

The third episode (Book XX, chs. 1-8) is the famous one which provides the basis for Morris's poem. Mordred and Agravaine, suspecting that Launcelot lay “daily and nightly with the queen” and plotting to take the pair together, sent word to Guenevere that Arthur would not return from a hunting trip that night. Then Mordred and Agravaine with twelve other knights secreted themselves in the castle until night, and when Guenevere and Launcelot were together, came crying outside their door. Launcelot, unarmed except for his sword, opened the door and killed all but Mordred, who fled. Then Launcelot took farewell of the Queen, promising to rescue her on the morrow should Arthur condemn her to death, as indeed Arthur did. In the morning, therefore, Guenevere was led forth from Carlisle, stripped to her smock, and shriven by her ghostly father. One of Launcelot's spies informed Launcelot and his men, who were hidden in the woods near Carlisle, and “then was there but spurring and plucking up of horses, and right so they came to the fire,” and slew many knights, and rescued Guenevere. Though it is not stated definitely whether Launcelot and Guenevere were abed on this occasion, their guilt on previous occasions has been made amply clear.

The evidence for Guenevere's guilt, in Morris's poem, is thus practically conclusive. She is guilty in Malory. Morris has written his poem so that it requires knowledge of Malory for its complete comprehension. Had Morris intended a different conception, he would surely have taken pains to avoid misinterpretation. Had he intended the Queen to be innocent, he would not have included the tell-tale incident of Mellyagraunce and the blood on Guenevere's bed. And he would not have portrayed, in his sequel poem, “King Arthur's Tomb,” a repentant Guenevere lamenting her sin.

II

“The Defence of Guenevere” is something more, however, than the cold-blooded denial by a guilty woman of her guilt. It is the desperate battle of a proud queen and passionate woman for life and for everything which makes life dear to her. And it is given dignity by her genuine feeling that she has been done, and is being done, a great injustice.

Guenevere is moved in her defence primarily by three emotions—anger, fear, and love. Her anger is over her very real sense of a just grievance—of having been bought in marriage “by Arthur's great name and his little love” and of being denied her love for Launcelot. Her fear is for her life, which she clings to with all the force of a person who is still young, beautiful, and intensely physically alive. Her love is for Launcelot and is what makes life a priceless possession to her and the prospect of losing it terrible. Her defence is a mixture of passionate sincerity, sheer bluff, and bold lies, prompted by desperation, and receives its force from all of these. She knows that Launcelot is coming to rescue her and that she will be safe if she can stave off the lighting of the faggots until then. She is striving, in her defence, to justify her conduct; to dazzle, threaten, or cajole her judges into releasing her; and to stall for time until Launcelot's arrival.

In the parable of the choosing-cloths Guenevere's defence is genuine and sincere. Here she is making a plea for a larger moral frame of reference than that which obtains in Camelot. She is suggesting that Camelot's law and God's law are not necessarily the same, that in the eyes of God she may be innocent. Her choice has been between fidelity to a marriage without love or to love without marriage. She has chosen love, and her judges have declared her wrong. Obviously, however, Guenevere does not believe that she is wrong. Love, for her, has a law of its own. Love is that which she had deemed would ever move round her “glorifying all things”; and now that she has experienced it, it has not disappointed her. How can one do wrong in following love? She has not been breaking law, she implies, but following law—only it has been the law of love rather than that of Camelot. She says, in effect, “I am not guilty. I know a higher law than you are aware of. Better true love without marriage than marriage without love.”

Guenevere boasts of her feeling for Launcelot. In her recounting the growth of her love, she obviously takes glory in it. Her fighting it off for a year and a half, she would imply, attests both to the genuineness of her own motives and to the reality of the love. She denies, however, that she has been guilty of adultery, and the vehemence of her denial is such that it almost seems to carry some color of truth:

          Nevertheless you, O Sir Gauwaine, lie,
Whatever may have happened through these years,
God knows I speak truth, saying that you lie.

Not improbably Gauwaine, in accordance with his hot nature, has stated his accusation in broader terms than a mere flat charge of adultery. He has called her, perhaps, a harlot, a strumpet, or a traitor. If such is the case, though Guenevere is consciously and deliberately lying in denying the technical charge against her, she is passionately in earnest in repudiating the broader imputation. She is legally guilty, though she denies it, but she believes firmly that morally she is innocent.

The rest of Guenevere's defence is mostly bluff and virtuosity. She uses every trick and weapon at her command in order to get mercy from her judges. She tries to draw forth their pity—

          Gauwaine be friends now, speak me lovingly.
Do I not see how God's dear pity creeps
All through your frame, and trembles in your mouth?
Remember in what grave your mother sleeps. …

She tries to frighten them with the judgment of God upon them for a false decision—

                                                            Yet Mellyagraunce was shent,
For Mellyagraunce had fought against the Lord;
Therefore, my lords, take heed lest you be blent
With all this wickedness.

She tries to sway them by her beauty—

                                                                                See my breast rise,
Like waves of purple sea, as here I stand;
And how my arms are moved in wonderful wise,
                                                            … how in my hand
The shadow lies like wine within a cup
Of marvelously colour'd gold.

Guenevere is proud of her beauty and uses it as a strong man would use his strong right arm. She “dares” her judges to condemn to the fire anything as beautiful as she. She plays deliberately upon the reluctance of human nature to believe that anything beautiful can be corrupt:

                                                                                Will you dare,
When you have looked a little on my brow,
To say this thing is vile?

She is not, however, a coolly designing schemer. She is a woman who has been faithful to one great love, and whose lies arise from the heat of her passion, danger, and desperation.

The task of establishing her innocence—since she is not innocent—is, of course, an impossible one. Nevertheless, Guenevere attacks it boldly:

Let God's justice work! Gauwaine, I say,
See me hew down your proofs.

The proofs that Gauwaine has advanced are two: (1) that on the occasion when Guenevere slept in one room with her wounded knights, Mellyagraunce found blood on her sheets; (2) that, more recently, Launcelot has been found in her chamber. Guenevere's “hewing down” of these proofs consists (1) in asserting that a queen does not need to offer proofs—that it would have been undignified in her, on the first occasion, to stoop to answer Mellyagraunce's unseemly accusations; and (2) in suggesting that Launcelot, on the recent occasion, could have come to her chamber and spent the night in it for entirely innocent reasons. Needless to say, both arguments are sophistical. Guenevere then urges further that her very tears are proof of her innocence:

          Being such a lady could I weep these tears
If this were true? A great queen such as I
Having sinn'd this way, straight her conscience sears;
And afterwards she liveth hatefully,
Slaying and poisoning, certes never weeps.

This argument, of course, is no better than the first two. The lowest harlot is capable of real tears, and any actress can simulate them.

At least two of the critics previously cited have held the weakness of Guenevere's logic to be a weakness in the poem. Nothing could be further from the truth. Morris's whole characterization of Guenevere is that of a person whose motivating force is passion, not principle or reason. As a woman of passion, and one, moreover, who is legally guilty, Guenevere defends herself, not logically, but boldly, and altogether as such a person might, under the circumstances.

And after all, what first impresses the reader about Guenevere's defence is not its weakness but its strength—even its magnificence. The initial reaction is one, not of moral indignation, but of admiration. Be she ever so guilty, one cannot help feeling, as Morris has written in a discarded introduction, that her plea has been spoken by “brave lips and beautiful.”⁹ Moreover, her defence has “worked.” Whether it persuades any of her judges of her moral innocence, each reader must determine by his own reaction—since he is ultimately the judge himself, but it does stave off the lighting of the fire until Launcelot can come to the rescue; and the reader of Malory will remember that Guenevere outlives her accusers and dies a holy woman. But her defence accomplishes even more than that. It has persuaded some scholars of her technical innocence.

III

One further misunderstanding about the poem needs clearing up. The poem has been referred to by some critics as being Morris's defence of Guenevere. The implication is that when Guenevere pleads for her moral innocence, in the parable of the choosing-cloths, Morris is pleading for her. The temptation, of course, is to contrast Morris's exculpation of her behavior with Tennyson's later Victorian condemnation of it. This contrast, however, is unjustified. The true contrast is between the importance of the didactic element in Tennyson and the complete absence of it in Morris. Morris's poetry as a whole is notable for its absence of philosophical ideas, and one looks in vain for moral judgments in The Defence of Guenevere volume. Morris, at the time of its composition, was strongly under the influence of Browning. When asked, before its publication, in whose style the title poem was written, he answered, “More like Browning than anyone else, I suppose.”¹⁰ What influenced Morris, in Browning's poetry, was not its philosophy, but its dramatic character. Browning took persons good, bad, and indifferent, and let them speak for themselves and attempt to justify themselves. In The Defence of Guenevere volume Morris follows suit. Nearly all of the poems are dramatic. The speakers are so many medieval knights and ladies, not Morris himself. Though most of them are good, some are bad. In “The Judgment of God” and “Golden Wings” the speakers are murderers, but in neither does Morris express any moral judgment. And there is no more reason for supposing that Morris is justifying these characters than there is to believe that Browning is defending the Duke of Ferrara or the Bishop of St. Praxed's.

The only moral sympathies that Morris expresses in “The Defence of Guenevere” are admiration for Guenevere's beauty and bravery—

Still she stood right up, and never shrunk
But spoke on bravely, glorious lady fair!

Courage and physical beauty command admiration always in Morris's poetry. But Morris no more necessarily condones Guenevere's conduct than Milton does Satan's when he describes the archfiend as a “great Commander” and as possessing “dauntless courage.” The poem is not Morris's defence of Guenevere, but Guenevere's defence of herself. Morris has merely taken one of Malory's characters in a moment of stress and brought her intensely alive. His task has been not to excuse or to blame, but to vivify.

Notes

1. James Ormerod, The Poetry of William Morris (Derby, 1938), p. 4.

2. Howard Maynadier, The Arthur of the English Poets (Boston, 1907), pp. 359-360.

3. B. Ifor Evans, William Morris & his Poetry (London, 1925), p. 28.

4. Margaret J. C. Reid, The Arthurian Legend (Edinburgh, [1938]), p. 98.

5. August J. App, Lancelot in English Literature (Washington, 1929), pp. 177-178.

6. Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science, and Art, vi (November 20, 1858), 506-507.

7. See J. W. Mackail, The Life of William Morris, 2 vols. (London, 1899).

8. The Collected Works of William Morris, With introductions by his daughter May Morris (London, 1910), xvii, xxxix.

9. Collected Works, i, xx.

10. Mackail, i, 131-132.