Lanval

            On Saturday morning I worked out the chords for verse three of “Barcelone” by Boris Vian. I probably also established the chords for “Privé" by Serge Gainsbourg but I still have to position them with the lyrics. 

            Around midday I went out to the supermarket. At No Frills I bought seven bags of red grapes because they were very cheap and not in bad shape. I also got a pint of strawberries, seven Courtland apples, a pack of three chicken legs, mouthwash, a small jug of bleach, a can of dark coffee, and a bag of Miss Vicky’s chips. Additionally I grabbed a new can opener because the one I’d bought last year has started chewing rather than smoothly cutting my cans. 

            For lunch I had a toasted bagel with cream cheese. 

            In the afternoon I read most of the Marie de France lai “Lanval”. Lanval is a knight in King Arthur's Round Table but he is a foreigner and a social outcast. When he goes off by himself one day he is approached by two beautiful maidens who say they have been sent to bring him to their mistress. She lives in a tent more opulent than the finest castle and comes from far away. She is the most beautiful woman he has ever seen. She tells him she loves him and will be with him always, giving him unimaginable wealth but the condition is that he must not tell anyone about her. Lanval begins to bestow rich gifts on all the other knights and he becomes very popular. On top of that his lover comes to him whenever he is alone and thinks of her. He catches the attention of Queen Guenevere and she offers herself to him. He turns her down because he does not want to dishonour his king but she feels rejected and accuses him of being homosexual, suggesting that he will corrupt her husband. he blurts out that he has a lover whose servants have more worth than Guenevere. She is so upset that she tells Arthur that Lanval made advances at her and then insulted her when she refused him. Lanval is placed on trial and the judges say all he has to do is produce proof that what he said to Guenevere is true. But Lanval is distraught because he has already broken his vow and thereby broken the spell. He won't say anything in his defence. Near the end of the trial two beautiful handmaids arrive to announce the arrival of their lady. Later two even more beautiful ladies in waiting arrive to announce their lady is coming. Then she arrives and everyone recognizes that she is the most beautiful woman they have ever seen. There’s just one page left. 

            This story took a long time to read and I have lots more to read for this week in addition to a short essay that has to be handed in on Thursday, which I have yet to start. 

            For dinner I heated the last of my pork patties and had them on a toasted bagel with a sliced tomato, chili sauce and mustard. I ate it with a beer while watching The Count of Monte Cristo. 

            In this story Odette de Combray has just seen off her fiancé Lieutenant Pierre Marnet at the coach station and her father the Vicomte de Combray is there with her. They are approached by a man named Rolla who they do not know but he deliberately insults Odette’s honour so that the vicomte challenges him to a duel. Odette goes to see the count to get him to stop the duel but he arrives too late, and Odette’s father is killed. The count goes to the prefect of police to ask for the record of all the duels fought by Rolla. He finds that Rolla has fought four duels in less than a year. Next we see Rolla with his father, the former Captain Balbec. Balbec has trained his son from a very early age to be an excellent marksman towards the purpose of eliminating five men, four of whom he has already legally killed in duels. These men prevent Balbec from reclaiming the title of Duke of Begoin because they are the only witnesses to Captain Balbec having abandoned his ship at the Battle of Trafalgar. The prefect of police comes to inform Rolla that the Count of Monte Cristo has been asking about him. Rolla finds the count at the opera and insults him in hopes of being challenged to a duel but the count does not accept the challenge. The count has Jacopo follow Rolla and he has Carlo look for a connection between the four men that Rolla killed. Meanwhile Rolla is on his way to challenge his last victim, Pierre Marnet. Jacopo tells the count that Rolla is headed for the coast. Carlo has found that all of Rolla’s victims had been in the French navy. At the Ministry of the Navy the count asks for the record of the four men. The minister informs the count that all four men had served on the Victoire and that there is one survivor. It was a young man named Pierre Marnet who had been the cabin boy. In Toulon Rolla approaches Pierre at an inn and insults his fiancé Odette. Pierre challenges him to a duel at dawn. The next morning the count comes to Pierre and asks to take his place in the duel. Pierre refuses and so the count knocks him out. When the count arrives at the site of the duel he slaps Rolla until he challenges him. The count chooses pistols at an unheard of short distance of two paces. This frightens Rolla because his opponent cannot miss at that distance. As they face off Rolla throws his gun down and falls to his knees asking for mercy. The count continues pointing his gun and demands to know the identity of the sixth man in the lifeboat. Rolla confesses that it was his father. 

            Odette was played by Claudia Barrett, who played a lot of secondary roles on television and some in films but is mostly remembered for “Robot Monster”. It looks like the first half of this series was shot in England with British actors but later moved to Hollywood where they used mostly players from the United States. 

            There was a time in the first two decades of talkies when there were still US actors that could pull off accents for European period pieces. In the previous episode an actor said “fer” instead of "for" and in this one Odette says “gonna”. It sound horrible when they have no pride in their work.