Camelot

You know the Richard Burton - Julie Andrews musical, Camelot? It details that age-old story of Guinivere and Arthur and Lancelot, with jaunty show tunes and frankly stunning costuming, and an excellent original soundtrack album. I was reminded of it this past weekend, when I attended my first Medieval and Fantasy Fair.
Let me set the scene. It was hotter than Hades, the steamy, sticky heat that is a specialty in Quebec. I wore an enormous sun hat and only the lightest linen clothes, and still felt sure that I would melt by the end of the day. Happily, there was much to distract me from the sweaty, pressing weather. Immediately upon arrival, we were delighted to encounter a handful of ponies and some quite nice dappled grey horses, munching hay in their paddock. The pony’s mane and tail had been very skillfully dyed in a rainbow - the reason for this would become clear later. There was live music and dancing, demonstrations of archery and swordplay, a court jester festooned with bells, stilt walkers, face painting, and purveyors of a startlingly wide range of goods for purchase.
There was also an ongoing display of 17th-century French warfare tactics, which meant that for much of the day, live cannons and muskets fired with little warning, and smelled strongly of sulphur. There were people dressed as pirates, as dragons, as mermaids, as Orcs and other mythical creatures from Tolkien, with more rubber elf ears and flower crowns than you could shake a stick at. During the literal horse and pony show (wherein some pretty high-level dressage was taking place), the tie-dyed pony in question had been decked out with a sparkly horn to make him into a minuscule unicorn, albeit with the characteristic barrel belly so many Shetlands have. He was charming and delighted the small princes, knights, fairies and dragon hunters in the crowd. Frankly, I was delighted by him too.
Now, some of you may be thinking, ‘well, none of that fits the Medieval category’, and you’d be right, dear reader. You’ll notice that the organisers of this event very cleverly tacked “and Fantasy” onto their medieval fair, so that any and all could ostensibly fit in. However, this link between fantasy and the medieval world reminded me of this week’s episode. For some reason - possibly the Victorians, perhaps the Camelot musical, or some other, unknown connection - people seem very ready to associate the medieval period and its loosely understood aesthetics with the worlds of fantastical beings, heroic deeds, and fair damsels. As we saw in this week’s episode, the medieval period wasn’t actually all that full of damsels in distress, and the closest we come to fantastic beasts are in the marginalia of illuminated manuscripts. Perhaps because the era is so distant, so very far away from our own, it lacks the sharp detail in our imaginations that more recent periods possess, and so we are happy to fill in the blanks with whatever suits our fancy.
And it isn’t just modern folks, like the ones I met at the Medieval and Fantasy Fair. Remember Camelot, the musical? The whole thing ends with Richard Burton plaintively asking that we, the audience, remember that the magic and mystery, the pleasantness and inevitable tragedy of Camelot, existed—a place where it never rained or snowed out of season, where love blossomed as a matter of course, a place of shining glory. But of course, whether in the Thomas Malory stories or the musical, Camelot is itself a fantasy, too. Maybe, after all is said and done, that’s not a bad thing. Perhaps it’s a help, not a hindrance, to have a fantastical place to escape to on the weekends, to let our fancy run wild, and if we choose to call that place Camelot, then so much the better.

Jennifer