Ithaca College

On August 8, Michael Twomey (Dana Professor, English, Emeritus) presented a paper at Acadia University's "Malory at 550" conference, which celebrated Sir Thomas Malory's completion of Le Morte Darthur [the death of Arthur] in London in 1469. 

Despite its French title, the Morte Darthur is in English prose.  For English-speaking readers, it is considered to be the canonical version of the pseudo-history of King Arthur. 

Titled "Night, Moonlight, and Genre in Le Morte Darthur," Twomey's paper examined Malory's illumination by moonlight of the battle between Arthur and his rebellious son/nephew Mordred.  Previous versions of this scene had set it either in daylight or in starlit darkness.  Malory's addition of moonlight linked the scene typologically to previous nighttime scenes of betrayal and misfortune in the Morte, thus placing the death of Arthur in the medieval genre of de casibus tragedies of misfortune and fulfilling the prophetic implications of Arthur's dream of Fortune's Wheel on the night before the battle.  In pre-Copernican astronomy, the universe below the moon was believed to be governed by Fortune, a belief that Malory underscored by setting the final battle on a Monday. 

The "Malory at 550" conference featured speakers from the US, Canada, Australia, and Great Britain.