What instantly struck me about Erec and Enide was the emphasis on looks. I mean, people are sexy in this story.
It's making me start to understand the romance part a bit more. I mean just listen to this,
"Such beauty was his that nowhere on earth could be found a knight so handsome. Though not yet twenty-five, he was most noble, brave, and becoming. Never had any man his age displayed such valor. What more can I say of his good qualities?" (Chretien, pg.2)
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that this is the fan service part for the ladies. I'm just working on the assumption that crazy machismo existed in this period and that there is an underlying 'no homo' stamped here.
(I hope that I'm wrong. Someone tell me that there was an abundance of homo happening, please.)
But, back to my point. While I still have no idea what Erec actually looks like, he sounds like a dream boat. Of course he's got nothing on the Vavasor's daughter. She is the bomb diggity. (OMG, STAY TO THE POINT IRIS.)
Up until this point there hasn't been a moment where the attractiveness of the man took front seat to that of the woman's. That is what makes me buy that women were sponsors to this genre.
Okay, so how does this get into hospitality? PLOT TWIST, It doesn't.
I don't know man, I couldn't make them relate to one another. It was just the other thing that kept popping into my mind as I read. I'm sure that hospitality is a sexy quality/ behavior to some.
It is totally something that I'd like to know a little bit more about. In comparison to the way these stories explain hospitality, I am a terrible host. I was along for the ride with the vavasor right up until he gave away his daughter that he apparently was super fond of (just not enough to keep). It's a great moment of plot progression but it is...seedy? And even for the time it seems seedy. It doesn't appear to me that Erec has any proof that he could provide for his new lady friend but the dad was none to bothered by it.
If I were to make a chart, hospitality would be up there on some of the best qualities to have in any medieval story. I'm assuming its got to do with Jesus, in part, but it must also be cultural. I wonder where that went because I know that if someone rolled up to my door right now they are not getting a meal, information, a horse cleaning, and my daughter. No matter who they claim to be. Wow, now that I say all of that I feel like it can all be summed up with suspension of disbelief and that I should just get over it.
Whelp, I wrote an incoherent blog post about it anyway. So there!
