The Other Faces of Arthur - (Raceb4race: Critical Race Studies of the Premodern) by Nahir I Otaño Gracia (Hardcover)

About the Book

"The Other Faces of Arthur lays bare the role of Arthuriana in the racial logics of Medieval Europe through an analysis of the construction of whiteness in the Global North Atlantic-Scandinavia, Britain, Iberia, and North Africa. By analyzing Arthurian texts written in Castilian, Catalan, Middle Welsh, and Old-Norse Icelandic, among other languages, the book introduces the Arthurian materials, discusses the important role of translation in the dissemination and analysis of Arthuriana, and demonstrates how these texts function within the chivalric setting that produced them, concluding that Arthuriana's obsession with chivalry is about whiteness-a racial category that privileges dominance-by normalizing violence and marginalizing non-whiteness. Beyond its primary intervention-to shape the framework of the Global North Atlantic using the sub-corpus of Arthurian texts to discuss the function of chivalric whiteness, this book aims to highlight lesser-known Arthurian texts. In many cases providing excerpts of these texts and translations, and relevant scholarship, which are not readily available. In this sense, The Other Faces of Arthur isn't just a literary study; it may be the easiest way for Arthurian scholars who do not read some of these languages, especially Castilian or Catalan, to access these materials. In this way, The Other Faces of Arthur aims to introduce the Global North Atlantic as a subset of Global Medieval Studies to further literary and historical analysis, centers lesser-known Arthurian texts in conversation with each other, and it establishes how the texts construct chivalric whiteness to disguise power, genocide, and terror against racialized subjects, ultimately rationalizing geo-cultural expansion"--

Book Synopsis

Reveals the role of Arthuriana in the racial logics of medieval Europe through an analysis of the construction of chivalric whiteness

The Other Faces of Arthur reveals the role of Arthuriana in the racial logics of medieval Europe through an analysis of the construction of whiteness in the global North Atlantic: Scandinavia, Britain, Iberia, and North Africa. Taking a comparative approach that draws on language traditions not commonly studied together and places lesser-known Arthurian texts in conversation with each other, Nahir I. Otaño Gracia explores the important role of translation in the dissemination and analysis of Arthuriana, showing how these texts functioned within the settings that produced them.

Introducing the framework of the global North Atlantic within the field of global medieval studies, Otaño Gracia examines Arthurian texts written in Castilian, Catalan, Middle Welsh, and Old Norse, among other languages, in order to illustrate the various ways that the writers adapt the materials to serve their specific cultural and aesthetic purposes. Tracing how Arthuriana shifts and changes throughout the global North Atlantic, Otaño Gracia uncovers the hierarchies of power present in Arthurian texts and how they reflect, manipulate, and critique the power relations existing in the courts that circulated the texts. Arthuriana's obsession with chivalry, Otaño Gracia demonstrates, is fundamentally about whiteness; these texts deploy chivalric whiteness to naturalize relations of domination and normalize violence against racialized subjects.

The Other Faces of Arthur establishes Arthuriana as a pan-European project of racialization that ultimately serves to rationalize geocultural conquest and expansion.

Review Quotes

"The Other Faces of Arthur is a groundbreaking book that will make a substantial impact in literary studies, historical studies, cultural studies, and race studies. Nahir I. Otaño Gracia boldly and brilliantly theorizes chivalry in Arthurian romance as an institution that enshrines whiteness and makes a compelling case for rethinking all of Arthurian literature. This is a book for all time."-- "Geraldine Heng, author of The Invention of Race in the European Middle Ages"

About the Author

Nahir I. Otaño Gracia is Assistant Professor at the University of New Mexico.