Apocalyptic Arthuriana - Kalamazoo 2025 Co-Sponsored Session

I am pleased to report the success earlier today of our first co-sponsored session for this year's International Congress on Medieval Studies. 

Please find the session details below.

Apocalyptic Arthuriana (A Roundtable) (Virtual)

60th International Congress on Medieval Studies

Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo, MI)

Session 144: Thursday, 8 May, from 7:00-8:30 PM EDT

Principal Sponsoring Organization:

Alliance for the Promotion of Research on the Matter of Britain

Co-Sponsoring Organization(s):

International Arthurian Society, North American Branch (IAS/NAB)

Organizers: Michael A. Torregrossa, Bristol Community College; Joseph M. Sullivan, Univ. of Oklahoma

Presider: Karen Casey Casebier - Univ. of Tennessee–Chattanooga

Morte Darthur: Conflicted Loyalties, Promised Reconciliation

Hannah Montgomery, Univ. of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Abstract:

Many scholars have commented on the importance of fellowship and unity in Thomas Malory’s Morte Darthur, and it is the failure of this central ideal that leads to Arthur’s death. Malory depicts the fall of Camelot as specifically a civil war. While there is still an element of divine retribution for the moral failings of Arthur and his knights, the immediate and primary cause is discord within the Round Table fellowship. These cracks within the Round Table are not the result of simple disloyalty or betrayal, but rather of irreconcilable conflicts of loyalty coming to a head and forcing Arthur’s most faithful knights to choose between a multitude of important relationships, whether to be loyal to their lord, their brother in arms, their lady, or their family.

In part because Morte Darthur ends in conflict, without resolution, there have long been debates about its genre. While Whetter has argued that Morte Darthur is best understood not as a romance but as a tragic-romance, I argue that it is actually an incomplete romance. The promised return of Arthur suggests the completion of the genre’s narrative pattern of separation and return, rise, fall, and rise again, a narrative structure that I argue is linked to a generic relationship arc of separation and reunion or reconciliation. In delaying, yet promising, the return, Arthurian legend forces us to linger in the moment of conflict, drawing attention to the causes of the fall, but leaves hope that, although reconciliation is not currently possible, it is yet to come.

Hannah Montgomery is a PhD candidate in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at UNC Chapel Hill. Her dissertation project analyzes the role of friendship and loyalty in Middle English romance, considering their connections to ideas of identity and ethics, and arguing for the centrality of interpersonal relationships to the plot, structure, and themes of the genre. She is currently working on a chapter examining romances’ simultaneous idealization and problematization of knightly brotherhood. Her other research and teaching interests include fantasy and medievalism.

Cthulhu Returns to Camelot: New Works of Lovecraft-Inspired Arthurian Fiction

Michael A. Torregrossa, Bristol Community College

Abstract:

In the Matter of Britain, there are multiple ways for Camelot to fall, but some of the more interesting occur in texts that mash up the Arthurian legends with the Cthulhu Mythos of H P. Lovecraft. This presentation represents the latest update in my ongoing attempt to catalog representation of Lovecraft-inspired Arthuriana and will focus on the recent anthology series Shadows Over Avalon (2022-2023) published by 18th Wall Productions.

Michael A. Torregrossa (he/him/his) is a graduate of the Medieval Studies program at the University of Connecticut (Storrs) and works as an adjunct instructor of writing and literature courses in both Rhode Island and Massachusetts. His research focuses on popular culture’s adaptation, appropriation, and transformation of literary classics, like the Arthurian legends and the works of writer H. P. Lovecraft. In addition to these pursuits, Michael is the founder of The Alliance for the Promotion of Research on the Matter of Britain (2000-) and The Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture (2004-). He also serves as editor for these organizations' various blogs and as moderator of their discussion lists and leads the development of their conference activities. Besides this work, Michael is active in the Northeast Popular Culture/American Culture Association (a.k.a. NEPCA) and organizes sessions for their annual conference in the fall. Since 2019, Michael has been NEPCA’s Monsters and the Monstrous Area Chair, but he previously served as its Fantastic (Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Horror) Area Chair, a position he held from 2009-2018. 

Rebuilding Camelot: Life After Arthur's Death in Grossman's The Bright Sword

Leah Haught, Univ West Georgia

Abstract:

Can Camelot survive Arthur's death? Versions of this question have, of course, haunted Arthuriana since the Middle Ages. In these remarks, I will briefly explore how Grossman's recent reimagining of Arthur's death as survived only by the Round Table's "oddballs" is in conversation with medieval narratives that end with Arthur's death, including the Alliterative Morte and Malory. Grossman's original character, Collum, is determined to uphold the legacy of the recently killed king who he long idolized, but he quickly realizes that he isn't entirely sure what that legacy is or should be. Along with the other survivors of Camlann, Collum tries make his way in an Arthurless world, which appears at times impossible, at times hopeful, and, more often than not, inevitable.

Leah Haught is an Associate Professor of English at the University of West Georgia. Her research interests include the Arthurian legend, cultural understandings of gender and sexuality, the history of monsters, and the functions of nostalgia within medievalism. Her work frequently explores the intersections between past and present idealisms and has been published in Arthuriana, Parergon, JEGP, Year’s Work in Medievalism, and Studies in Medievalism as well a variety of edited collections. Forthcoming publications include a chapter in The Cambridge History of Arthurian Literature and Culture and a co-edited volume for METS.