The Name, Explained

I promised in my first post that I would explain the significance behind this blog's name, so now I'll make good on that promise. "Perceval Wandering" is, as I already wrote, reference to the most prominent hero of the Arthurian Grail romances (i.e. stories about the knights of King Arthur and their Quest for the Holy Grail. Yes, like in Monty Python.). I've read many of these romances and books about them, so I consider the Grail romances one of my sub-interests in literary studies.

One of them in particular I find to be especially interesting: the Welsh "Peredur Son of Efrawg." Peredur is the Welsh name for the character known in French romances as Perceval. In the Welsh account, Peredur is a ignorant country bumpkin whose only desire in life is to be one of King Arthur's knights. He has some things working for him: he's strong, good with weapons, handsome, and nobly born. Unfortunately, Peredur is extremely dim and obtuse: he understands nothing of what is going on around him, and he always does or says the wrong thing, usually with catastrophic results. Imagine a big, dumb Brendan Fraser in armor, face aglow with vapid heroism. Got it? That's Peredur. (Indeed, this is how Perceval acts in most versions, but Peredur is the dumbest of the lot.)

Of all the versions of the Grail story, Peredur's is the most mysterious. In other stories, helpful hermits and priests pop up at suitable intervals and interpret the hidden meanings behind the Grail questor's adventures. Sometimes these explanations are a bit grandious, leaving the knight to respond like Galahad in "The Quest of the Holy Grail" that "he had never thought the adventure held so high a meaning." For Peredur, there are few explanations, and none of them satisfactory. Instead we have a foolish, bumbling Peredur wandering about a landscape of wonders -- a landscape that screams "I mean something important!" but never shares what that meaning is.

Which brings me to a case in point: the half-burning tree (see illustration above). Here's the passage: "And he could see a tall tree on the river bank, and the one half of it was burning from its roots to its tip, and the other half with green leaves on it." That's IT. No other reference to the tree, ever again, no explanation, nothing. Just a tree, half on fire, half not. Obviously this MUST mean something. Trees don't do this! But no interpretation is forthcoming. Peredur -- and the reader -- is left clueless.

So I made up my own interpretation. Well, not an interpretation, really -- I won't argue that the author of "Peredur" MEANT anything like what I'm about to say. But the half-burning tree has taken on a significance for me, regardless of what it means in the text. That significance is this: the half-burning tree stands for the portentousness of life. The half-burning tree is like all of the landscape of Peredur's wandering, as well as his adventures: clearly pregnant with a meaning that remains maddeningly beyond Peredur's reach. And isn't that often like our own lives as well? Things happen, and we wonder why, because there must be a "why," right? But we remain like Peredur: seeing the signs, not understanding the significance.

But the half-burning tree is still an encouragement, for it reminds me of another burning plant: a bush in this case, and it burned with the fire of God. Perhaps we don't know the significance, but is it not encouraging to know that there IS a significance? It certainly encourages me. I don't know why, but the tree burns. And one day I hope to understand, and like Galahad be amazed that "the adventure held so high a meaning."

"Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries..."

(Elizabeth Barrett Browning)