Illuminating Brilliantly, or Those Jousting Monkeys just won't behave!

This has been a great week for a would-be-knight such as myself, overall. Most importantly, a paper of mine (yet to be written) has been accepted for presentation at the International Congress for Medieval Studies at Kalamazoo, Western Michigan, which is quite A Feather in My Cap (and perhaps will cause those Senior Knights of the Adcomm Round Tables to Sit Up and Take Notice of my application scrolls). Placing all freaking-out emotions aside (of which there are many), this is possibly the best thing that has ever happened to me. I feel like an actual scholar, despite my deficiency in Holy Grails and Questing experience.

Spamalot! (with Clay Aiken, sans Jousting Monkeys.).

The Scroll of Intent, however, is not progressing quite as well. It is, in my humble opinion, effete crappe (pardon my Occitan*), and although my friend Melissa says it's a fairly solid scroll, I feel petulant. I don't want it to be solid. Solid isn't an adjective you describe your first pick. It's that back-up pick, the one you take if your first pick isn't available (so you comfort yourself by saying - "oh, it's a solid option, I really shouldn't complain"). I don't want my scroll to be solid. I want those jousting monkeys to jump out of the page in their brilliance, to give the impression that they are actually singing and dancing and performing Spamalot! That's not solid work - that's extraordinary work. That's brilliant work. Now that there is actual substance to back up my claims of being a brilliant scholar worth the five to six year fellowship + meat pie & new horse stipend provided by the Orders of Knights, my Scroll of Intent should reflect that.

Knight and his paramour

Only, it feels like it doesn't. While I have been told that it's normal to feel this way about scrolls of intent, I'm not sure how to fix it. What can I possibly say that will make my scholarship sound unique? The fact that I currently live in the very site of the Crusades and have visited the crusade city of Acre (and the less famous Montfort castle in the western Galilee) many times? I won't be living here if accepted to an Order of Knights! That I can read Melech Artus in the original Hebrew, as translated from various sources of French, Middle English, and Latin? I'm far from being the only person in the world who knows both Hebrew and is an Arthur Freak. While my particular field of interest is somewhat obscure, I'm not the first to think of it, or to suggest this particular angle of dragon slaying. So how, how does one illuminate a scroll of intent brilliantly, vibrantly, so that the images literally pop out and grab a Senior Knight's attention? And how, in the name of everything sacred, do I manage to state this without sounding like a condescending, self-important, vain prat (as I have stated in earlier posts, the one distinguishing mark of a knight-in-training is abject humility and the ability to endlessly humiliate oneself for our paramour - in this case, my paramour is actually getting in to grad school)?

The presentation of my paper at Kalamazoo will help - at least it gives my scholarship (i.e. theoretical dragon slaying) some credence and credibility. I'm very much hoping that my writing sample (i.e. fire-breathing dragon slaying treatise) will be a heart-stopping, breath-taking, page-turning masterpiece. In fact, I've just discovered that aside from the longer piece, I must also revise one of my shorter dragon slaying proposals from college, as The Southern Star Order of Virginia Knights actually require two samples of my abilities (together not exceeding 25 vellum sheets. Why oh Why? I wish I could just study with Merlin, who would turn me into a fish. Much more practical! Also, wouldn't it be absolutely excellent to receive a Letter of Recommendation from Merlin? After all, who is more qualified to sing my praises than one of the characters in the material I study???).

Monkey as Doctor (instead of Jousting, as he should!)

Anyhow, back to those pesky Jousting Monkeys. Revision three is not going well. I'm actually thinking of tossing it and starting over from scratch. Perhaps use an anecdote from the Crusades illustrating the connection between the literary crusades tradition and the Matter of Britain**. This is extreme, I know. But perhaps then the gold leaf paint will stay on the page, and those silly monkeys will stop dressing up as monks and doctors holding vials filled with urine, and return to their proper function, i.e. jousting.  And now the worries about the CV are starting to pop up, and the gnawing insecurities about actually writing a brand new paper on my own (make that write one, revise one), and I'm turning into a quivering bowl of yellow jell-o (oooh, nice rhyme!).

However, as the Jewish people have managed to overcome 2000 years of persecution, pogroms, and manic knights on the way to the Holy Land wildly swinging their broadswords, I, too, shall overcome. Perhaps what I need is a sit down in front of a camp fire, roasting marshmallows, and singing we shall overcome and kumbaya. Or Prozac may just do the trick...


Next Time on THE QUESTE: ummmmm... well, ummmm.... I'd rather not say. It's not like I actually manage to keep to what I promise to write each post. I just thought that "Next Time on THE QUESTE" sounded really dramatic, like an episode of "The Hills" or something.




*Occitan - an Old French dialect, based primarily in the Aquitaine area. There appears to be a revival of Occitan songs, trying to rediscover the glory of the 12th century troubadours (many of which were the first to sing and tell Arthurian legends) by an excellent duo called The Fabulous Troubadours. Trés hip!

**The Matter of Britain - the collection of faux histories, romances, and legends (including the Arthurian) that pertain to the olden days of Britain (compared to contemporary medieval times, of course). The Matter of Britain officially starts with Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain. Supposedly, Britain was founded by Brutus, an escaped Trojan (obviously hijacking the Aeneid...), and obviously, the most glorious King of All was Arthur (also, according to Matter of Britain tradition, Helena, Constantin's mother [you know, Constantin, the Roman Emperor who converted to Christianity and dragged the entire Roman Empire after him, kicking and screaming] was British, thus making Constantin a Brit as well, and a great source of pride for the Anglo-Saxon conquerors of the Britons).