I
created this online game to illustrate the interplay between “chance”
and human choice within Marie de France's
Bisclavret,
and
to show the role of social hierarchy in informing those forces. For
the game, I identified some of the most pivotal moments where the
plot is advanced either by chance or Bisclavret's own choices. Using
these pivotal points, I developed a sort of choose-your-own-adventure
game. The player acts as Bisclavret, and each stage contains a
question that determines how the plot progresses. The questions
labeled “Choice” indicate decisions that Bisclavret makes for
himself. Forces beyond his control—machinations of other
characters and sheer dumb luck—are presented as “Chance”
questions. The game shows how, at any point during the story, a
different decision on the part of Bisclavret or one of the other
characters could end the story immediately. Naturally, some poetic
license was necessary in determining alternate endings at each
stage.
An
initial comparison of choice versus chance in Bisclavret
is
interesting but superficial. By inspecting how the social hierarchy
portrayed in the poem informs the characters' decisions, and thereby
influences the plot, it is possible to push past the surface of the
piece. The poem’s ending is determined by a series of interactions
with a particular social hierarchy. This hierarchy is headed by the
king, under whom we find the knights, then the wild beast Bisclavret,
and finally the woman. Bisclavret’s ultimate fate is decided by his
and the other characters’ relationship with that order.
The
poem is full of examples of how success and happiness are achieved by
accepting the social structure, and how challenging the social order
leads to destruction. In Stage One of the game, the wife is already
going against the social order by nagging her husband, her superior
(line 87). In Stage Three, the treacherous wife violates the pecking
order further by betraying her husband outright (100-126), with
disastrous results. But in Stage Five, Bisclavret finds himself
cornered by hunting dogs, and saves himself by humbling himself to
the king (139-160) and placing himself in agreement with the social
order. Stages Six and Seven show the king extending grace to
Bisclavret because of the animal's faithful submission. Even the
violent action in Stages Eight through Ten conforms to the social
structure, where the wise man and king award higher status to the
faithful beast than to the faithless woman (240-260). Bisclavret’s
concluding submission to the social hierarchy comes in Stage Eleven,
when he refuses to dishonor himself and the king by publicly changing
back into a human (283-302). This final act of deference to and
respect for the king ensure his ultimate success in the lai. In Stage
Twelve, the conclusion is that the king and Bisclavret, both of whom
have acted in accordance with the social structure, enjoy a favorable
ending. Conversely, the subversive wife is humiliated and banished
along with her new husband (303-314).
The
underlying connection in the poem between success and conformity to a
male-dominated social structure is especially interesting considering
its
historical context. The lai was
produced by a female poet in the court of Eleanor of Aquitaine, who
is noted for being among the most independently influential women in
medieval Europe (Bailey). Evidently, the expectation of negative
consequences for the subversive woman held true even in the court of
a woman famous for her agency. The modern reader might be taken aback
by Bisclavret's disfigurement of his wife and the king's decision to
have her tortured. However parallels exist in other medieval
literature for what would now be considered brutish behavior. One
such parallel is found in a book written in the fourteenth century by
Geoffrey de la Tour Landry to instruct his daughters in lady-like
behavior. The book contains a story of a woman who betrays her
husband by reproving him in public. For this offense her husband
“smote her with his fist down to the earth. And then with his foot
he struck her in the visage and broke her nose, and all her life
after she had her nose crooked, the which shent (ruined) and
disfigured her visage” (Coss 159). Contextually, this is a
cautionary tale to women about obedience to men, meant to reinforce
by fear of violence the social structure which was headed by men.
This story brings to the forefront the oppressive social context that
can be seen beneath the surface of de
France's Bisclavret.
By
analyzing the choices made by various characters throughout the poem,
we are able to catch a glimpse into its
social and historical context. Comparing Bisclavret
with
other medieval literature yields a consistent picture of a
male-dominated
social structure, characterized by violence and strict standards for
conformity.
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