{"id":4814,"date":"2026-07-22T15:00:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/?p=4814"},"modified":"2026-06-16T21:50:55","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T03:50:55","slug":"book-le-morte-darthur-1485","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/22\/book-le-morte-darthur-1485\/","title":{"rendered":"BOOK: Le Morte D’Arthur (1485)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"LeLe Morte D’Arthur
\n<\/u><\/strong>Year: 1485
\nAuthor: Thomas Malory
\nLength: 1,974 minutes \/ 32.90 hours<\/p>\n

While the Arthurian legend has always fascinated me, I wasn\u2019t entirely sure how much of what I knew was just condensed through other adaptations and interpretations and what was in the original story. I finally took it upon myself to read through this huge multi-volume set to find out what it\u2019s actually about. To say it disappointed me would be an understatement. Perhaps it\u2019s the prose, or the translation, or just the story structure, but I have never been so bored by a piece of literature since I forced myself to read Ulysses<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Early on, Le Morte D\u2019Arthur<\/em> had enough recognizable events to keep me engaged. The origins of Arthur\u2019s birth. The Sword in the Stone. Lady of the Lake and Excalibur. Then, things fell apart. So much of the focus in this book was on random battles and jousts that I could hardly believe the famous stories that were gleaned from this tome even existed in this form. After a while, I was just forcing myself to sit through it just to say that I\u2019d covered the source material.<\/p>\n

Considering this is the earliest story (aside from the Bible) that I\u2019ve read all the way through, it can be forgiven for being obtuse and unfocused. I\u2019m more glad that the salient story beats have been distilled in Cliff Notes and other adaptations so that I don\u2019t have to dive in and tackle this unwieldy story again. My curiosity wanted to make sure I wasn\u2019t missing anything, but my masochism forced me to finish it. Ultimately, if you\u2019re also curious to read the original manuscript that inspired so many drama-filled tales of chivalrous knights, I\u2019d say just pick up something that covers all the good bits and ignore the original.<\/p>\n

An overly long book that doesn\u2019t even seem to focus on anything it\u2019s known for, I give Le Morte D’Arthur<\/em> 2.0 stars out of 5.<\/p>\n

\"255px-Five-pointed_star_svg\" \"255px-Five-pointed_star_svg\"<\/h2>\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Le Morte D’Arthur Year: 1485 Author: Thomas Malory Length: 1,974 minutes \/ 32.90 hours While the Arthurian legend has always fascinated me, I wasn\u2019t entirely sure how much of what I knew was just condensed through other adaptations and interpretations and what was in the original story. I finally took it upon myself to read […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,54],"tags":[4581,4585,2826,55,727,4582,8,4583,4584],"class_list":["post-4814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2-0-stars","category-book","tag-4581","tag-arthurian","tag-arthurian-legend","tag-book","tag-king-arthur","tag-le-morte-darthur","tag-review","tag-the-death-of-arthur","tag-thomas-malory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4814"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4820,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4814\/revisions\/4820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}