But it's Sir Gawain! With the picture of Lady Bertilak in a spotty dotty dress!

[adaeze]

Me: I hate, loathe and detest the Folio Society, mutter, mutter, lavish deluxe facsimile MS Cotton Nero A.x (The Pearl Manuscript, including Sir Gawain) mutter mutter.
Wellinghall: Can I think about that before saying Yes?

I think our mutual resolve not to make any big book purchases until we've done some serious bookshelf-pruning has just gone kaput.

In other news, always check your references before hitting "Post". I just typed, without looking, MS Cotton Nero A:x, when of course what I really meant was A.x. I know you will all be deeply and profoundly shocked that I could make such a clumsy error.

Comments

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

This is why I didn't initially understand you on the phone - I heard you say :, when you meant .

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

The sign of a truly sympathetic accord.

[heliopausa.livejournal.com]

The spotty dress does sound appealing. :)

[adaese.livejournal.com]

I have a particular soft spot for that picture, because there was an exhibition a few years ago where they had the Gawain MS open at that page, in the same case with CS Lewis's annotated copy of Tolkien & Gordon's edition. The only way I can think of to get more geek-points into one display case would be to light it up with a light-sabre.

[adaese.livejournal.com]

Here she is! http://contentdm.ucalgary.ca/cdm/singleitem/collection/gawain/id/357/rec/177

[heliopausa.livejournal.com]

What a lovely page! I like her air of serenity, no matter what mildly perfidious thing she's about to attempt (seducing Sir Gawain? no chance, surely! But what a pleasing way to start, by tickling his chin!) I do like her spotty dress, and I like her head-dress, too.
Is she holding something in her right hand, or just touching the end of the bed-head?

(On the geek-quotient question, yes, agreed, definitely! and - tangent: what terrific exhibitions you go to from time to time!)

[adaese.livejournal.com]

That particular exhibition was in the Bodleian Library, who do fantastic (in both senses of the word) exhibitions every few years. They also had the Red Book of Hergest, and the Romance of Degore (which may well be where Lewis got the name Digory from), and ooh it was just lovely.

And I've just noticed that this page includes a shot of Lewis's drawing of armour, bottom right. Annotating the bit of Gawain where Sir Gawain puts on his armour, in elaborate detail. http://medievalromance.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/romance-explore

[heliopausa.livejournal.com]

That sounds brilliant! and I recall the one two-three years back, which had much Narnia in. Ruth got to see it, I think, while I seethed jealously a thousand miles away. (No, I didn't really! I availed myself as hard as I could of the online aspects.)

and heaps to explore on that linked page, too - thank you very much for showing it to me! I like Dante and Virgil and the lost wind-blown romantics, and the Sir Gawain page is terrific! and "menskful"!! :D a word to be noted and absorbed - I liked the Toulouse red silk, too. :) and the armour, of course! (Not sure how something as relatively small and functional as the cowters can be 'gay' - do you think they were of a different, stand-out, metal? copper?) But the whole page - lovely! :)Thank you!

[adaese.livejournal.com]

That was the day we showed Ruth Oxford - that exhibition, and the dodo in this icon (one of the new ones adorning a restored stretch of the Bod.) among other things.