I daresay that you have heard the stories of King Arthur before. The heart-tugging story of a King, brought up anonymously only to rise and claim his destiny is surely a good one, and every bard knows that it's the best way to get some hot food and a place to sleep for the night. Your head is probably full of the tor and rubbish that these troubadours are already selling- as if we didn't have enough problems as it is. Arthur has only been dead these past ten winters, and yet already almost everyone has managed to forget what he was actually like, and believe that those sweet-voiced lunatics are singing at them.
I daresay, had I less experience upon my shoulders, I would be among them. Of course, most of the people closest to Arthur are dead or gone now anyway, so there are few people like me to actually remember and tell the world what he was really like. But no one wants to hear my story.
Don't I sound bitter? I suppose I am. I'm old, fed-up, I keep hearing stories about this 'better place' that men go to when they die, but it seems determined to keep me out and keep me living for as long as possible. I have a wife who complains at me so much that she does it in her sleep, four ungrateful daughters who had me for a dowry but barely remember my name, and two useless sons who can't tell their arses from their elbows. Add to this a series of bad harvests, a sharp winter and a leg that's never really been the same since before Camlann, and maybe you can start to see why I am so bad-tempered and disillusioned with the world.
I don't even have anything left to do anymore, I seem to have no real use left. I decided to fill up the long nights by writing a history of Arthur. Then I was chatting down the market to Bedoyére, the French fellow who writes things for you, and trades manuscripts, and he said that it would never sell, not against all those bloody ballads being prostituted around, and I changed my mind. One of my friends down the tavern, a rather sleazy priest from Benwick named Baudin [all red nose and bloodshot cheeks] told me that the new fashion is life-stories of people, and that people would eat up something written by someone who really knew Arthur. And to some degree, of course, he must have been right- after all, you are reading this, and I am sure that you will agree with me when I say that you have impeccable taste. So, I shall get on with the story, and hasten to the bits that include Arthur- after all, that's the reason you want this, you don't want to hear my long and boring life story.
I daresay, had I less experience upon my shoulders, I would be among them. Of course, most of the people closest to Arthur are dead or gone now anyway, so there are few people like me to actually remember and tell the world what he was really like. But no one wants to hear my story.
Don't I sound bitter? I suppose I am. I'm old, fed-up, I keep hearing stories about this 'better place' that men go to when they die, but it seems determined to keep me out and keep me living for as long as possible. I have a wife who complains at me so much that she does it in her sleep, four ungrateful daughters who had me for a dowry but barely remember my name, and two useless sons who can't tell their arses from their elbows. Add to this a series of bad harvests, a sharp winter and a leg that's never really been the same since before Camlann, and maybe you can start to see why I am so bad-tempered and disillusioned with the world.
I don't even have anything left to do anymore, I seem to have no real use left. I decided to fill up the long nights by writing a history of Arthur. Then I was chatting down the market to Bedoyére, the French fellow who writes things for you, and trades manuscripts, and he said that it would never sell, not against all those bloody ballads being prostituted around, and I changed my mind. One of my friends down the tavern, a rather sleazy priest from Benwick named Baudin [all red nose and bloodshot cheeks] told me that the new fashion is life-stories of people, and that people would eat up something written by someone who really knew Arthur. And to some degree, of course, he must have been right- after all, you are reading this, and I am sure that you will agree with me when I say that you have impeccable taste. So, I shall get on with the story, and hasten to the bits that include Arthur- after all, that's the reason you want this, you don't want to hear my long and boring life story.