|
the never ending pain in the butt |
|
|
|
|
|
|
The Never Ending Heartache
Love has always been around, but love is not as simple as people believe. There are many true love relationships that seem to be too perfect to be true. Then there are the relationships that are fated for ruin. In Marian Zimmer Bradley’s The Mists of Avalon, love is a constant heartache for a few of the main characters who play a key part in the novel.
In the beginning of Marian Zimmer Bradley’s novel one fated love seems beyond reach of Igraine and Uther Pendragon. Gorlois and Igraine share no real love in their marriage, and so when Viviane and Merlin tell Igraine that the goddess expects her to have a child by another man other than her husband. As Igraine hears what she is expected to do, all she can think is, “I was afraid, or I was alone and terrified, or Rape would have been easier because I could have run away to die afterward, but any of those would have been only words, conveying only the smallest part of what she had felt. (Bradley 16)” Igraine entered her marriage with Gorlois due to the goddesses command that she do so. To be told that all the pain and suffering, all alone, she went through was in reality for nothing, was not something she wanted to hear. All she can think is that, “One man was bad enough, who would want others who might be worse?” (Bradley 7) To Igraine the thought of another husband who would treat her poorly, another horrible marriage of pain and fear. To her, another man was a never ending nightmare that Igraine did not wish to re-live again with another man. When Igraine meets Uther, she is shocked by how easily it is for her to fall for him and wonder if maybe being with him will not be so bad, “Until this very moment I felt guilty that some witchcraft or spell had made me love Uther.” (Bradley 66) Igraine yearns for the promise in Uther’s eyes that she does not see in Gorlois’s eyes. By believing that there would be a chance between her and Uther, Igraine sets a path of no return for her relationship with Gorlois. Gorlois does not appreciate Igraine’s interest in Uther at all, and soon begins to blame Igraine for something she has not yet committed. He interrogates her, and says “Uther, too, swore that you were innocent of wrong. But you are a woman and you put some enchantment on him I suppose – I went to Uther, hoping to mend this quarrel, and do you know what proffer that evil and lustful man made to me?” (Bradley 70) By questioning Igraine’s innocence, Gorlois created a deep hatred in Igraine’s heart. As Igraine’s hatred for her husband grows, so does her love for Uther. To Igraine falls deeper into a love that seems to be impossible. Soon Igraine comes to believe that, “She would never see Uther again. All the plans of the Merlin were in wreck and ruin; she was bound to an old man she hated – she knew, now, that she hated him, which never before allowed herself to know – and the man she loved could think of nothing better to do than to try and bully the proud Gorlois into giving her up of his own free will!” (Bradley 71) Gorlois decides that Uther is becoming too attached to Igraine, and so Gorlois denies King Uther his allegiance and takes Igraine back to their castle. Igraine is fed up with Gorlois’ cruelty and threatens him not to come near her. When Uther comes for Igraine, she declares “You are my love and my lord and my king, and I will love you as long thereafter as God wills.” (Bradley 105) At last Igraine’s promised love is granted, and she finally has a chance at happiness with Uther. Gorlois’s treatment of Igraine just increased her love for Uther, and with each passing day Igraine’s love for Uther grew to the point that she would give anything to be with him and be loved by him. Unfortunately for Igraine, Uther would not live and die with her. Their love, though, would be the only love that could survive in Bradley’s novel.
Morgaine meets many men, who she loves, and they in turn love her, but unfortunately they are not meant to be. Morgaine’s first love is Lancelot, who just happens to be Morgaine’s cousin. Unfortunately their love for each other draws them into pain and confusion. Lancelot even proclaims “All the Gods together forbid I should trespass where the goddess has marked you for her own, my dear cousin. I hold you sacred as the Goddess herself.” (Bradley 153) Lancelot sees Morgaine as the goddess incarnate, and so he knows that she is someone he can only admire from afar and never posses as his own. Regrettably, Morgaine cannot help the love and admiration that she feels for her cousin Lancelot. Morgaine’s thoughts are that “He and I were meant one for the other; I should have had the courage that day, even though it meant the breaking of a vow…” (Bradley 207) To Morgaine, she sees no reason that their love should not become a permanent relationship. Lancelot though does not see the point to even try to create a relationship with Morgaine, because in reality, Lancelot sees Morgaine as another form of his own mother. Morgaine and Arthur, on the other hand, are siblings, but their love for each other is due to a need that they fulfill within each other. After the great marriage, for the goddess, between the king stag, Arthur, and Morgaine, Arthur says that “No matter how many women I may have, for all my life I will have, for all my life I will always remember you and love you and bless you.” (Bradley 181) Although Arthur says such wonderful things to Morgaine, no sooner are they said then the two lovers discover who the other is. Pain and joy are their first reactions to the discovery, but the pain seems to overrule all of Morgaine’s other emotions, and all she feels is the painful feeling of having done something to someone who was like her own child. Whenever Arthur sees Morgaine, his thoughts are always of that wondrous night of discovery. Not only does he think of it but he tells her “I think of you all the time. I can’t help myself. It was true what I said, Morgaine – that all my life I shall remember you because you were the first, and I shall always think of you and love you--” (Bradley 201) Poor Morgaine is unable to help the love she feels for Arthur, but the love she feels is for a child she once cared for as her own child, but Arthur’s love is for that and more. The thought of what happened that fateful night of the king stag, just destroys her mind to the point of no return. Morgaine and Kevin have a short relationship soon after, but when Kevin turns his back on Avalon, Morgaine looses all trust and love for him, and in the end she is the one who destroys him. When Morgaine marries a Welsh king, her real love is for his son Accolon. No sooner, though, is Morgaine’s love life looking happier, then Morgaine’s relationship with Accolon is also destroyed along with every other one she has had. As Morgaine’s step son becomes a part of Morgaine’s heart, Morgaine herself becomes more careless and a bit more heartless. Morgaine evenly consciously acknowledges the fast that someone is watching them, but all she thinks is that “Even as we lay together under the stars that Midsummer, I knew that what we had done was not so much lovemaking as a magical act of passionate power; that his hands, the touch of his body, were re-consecrating me priestess, and that it was her will.” (Bradley 58 cool Morgaine relishes in her love affair with Accolon, but does not wish to foresee the end her almost perfect love. Due to Morgaine’s desire to please the ones she loves, she created the key to her own destruction. Morgaine is warned that “The Goddess – or your own will and pride and ambition for those you love?” (Bradley 72 cool Morgaine gave her love to whoever she could, and it was one of the many causes to the downfall of Camelot.
Gwenhwyfar has her own trouble with love. Gwenhwyfar has trouble facing the love she has for both Lancelot and Arthur. Meeting Lancelot was, for both Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot, love at first sight. Morgaine witnessed it all, and “Morgaine, her heart sinking, saw that he now looked upon the stranger as he had looked on her only minutes before, with love, desire, almost worship.” (Bradley 15 cool No sooner did Morgaine meet and love Lancelot, then did his heart be given to another. Morgaine comes to pity the two lovers and she worries for Arthurs sanity as well. For Gwenhwyfar, her first hope was that her father would marry her off to Lancelot, the king’s best knight. Even before Gwenhwyfar married Arthur she always worried that Lancelot would not return her love, “But he saw her and smiled, and the smile seized her very heart.” (Bradley 255) Gwenhwyfar’s hopes rise at the glimmer of love in Lancelot’s eyes. No sooner does she marry Arthur, and then does Gwenhwyfar question the deep pain that her new marriage would cause for her new love. Gwenhwyfar has a choice to make, of whether to love a king or to love his best friend. Upon meeting her husband, “Gwenhwyfar felt the crimson rising to her cheeks. Yes, Arthur was handsome, she told herself fiercely, with that fair hair and the serious, level grey eyes.” (Bradley 272)Gwenhwyfar attempts to convince herself that she can love Arthur and forget her love for Lancelot. Igraine is most joyous for her son, Arthur, to be happily married but Igraine soon discovered that her son was not the only one Gwenhwyfar could not stop watching. When Igraine looked at Gwenhwyfar, she saw how her eyes seemed to be filled with joy for her husband the king, “And again Igraine saw that hopeless, transfixed look in her eyes when he looked on Gwenhwyfar, and the brilliance of the girl’s smile as she looked up to him.” (Bradley 276) Others, as well, see Gwenhwyfar’s and Lancelot’s love for each other, and the worry for King Arthur and the future of Camelot begins anew. Gwenhwyfar believes that she can love both men, and at one point in the novel, Arthur grants her wish. When it seems as though no heir of Arthur shall be borne by Gwenhwyfar, King Arthur decides, in a drunken state of mind, that Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot should sleep together in the king’s, bed in the hope that an heir would be born. Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot both love Arthur, and often they find themselves showing their love for him by having the other give the king a message from one another. Gwenhwyfar, at the beginning of her marriage for Arthur, asks Lancelot to give Arthur a message for her.“Tell him I gladly return to him his most loyal captain, and that I await him with love and obedience, sir.” (Bradley 277) Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot share a mutual love for Arthur, but their love for each other is often to overpowering for the both of them. In reality, Gwenhwyfar’s and Lancelot’s love for Arthur just makes their love even greater. For Gwenhwyfar, finally succumbing completely to her love for Lancelot also meant something more saddening for her heart. She finds joy in her love for Lancelot, “And there was grief for the end of her years with Arthurs, and all they had shared for so long. But from what had happened this night there could be no going back.” (Bradley 860) Gwenhwyfar and Lancelot know that they can’t stop loving each other, and thus they mark the fall of both Arthur and all of Camelot.
Love is not always a path of sadness and regret. Love can be and overpowering sensation of relief and joy. How peoples love life’s turn out depends on how the person in question treats their new found love. For the women in The Mists of Avalon, their choice of love would never have been an option for them. So in a way, their downfalls in love were not their own fault but the faults of society. Then again the few characters who had many love relationships, they had a choice, but they just made the wrong choices.
 lov2catnap · Wed Nov 28, 2007 @ 04:04am · 1 Comments |
|
|
|
|
|
