IDYLLIC ROMANCE
. The idyllic romance (roman idyllique) describes the juvenile love of its hero and
heroine, whose emotional union is threatened by differences in religious or social
background. The variations on this theme include the inappropriate love of a Saracen
slave for a Christian knight and the attraction of a lesser noble for a woman of higher
rank. Family opposition often leads to separation. Some romances show the departure of
the hero to foreign lands, where he proves his worth in combat; others depict the exile of
both hero and heroine and their separate struggles against pirates, would-be seducers, and
rival knights. However, all ends happily with the reunion and marriage of the couple,
once death has overtaken the dissenting parents. The settings of the romances are varied,
ranging from a stylized Byzantine or Arthurian background to a more realistic French,
German, or Scandinavian context. The plot incorporates traditional themes, including the
exile-and-return motif, usually part of the hero’s adventures, but sometimes duplicated in
the experiences of the heroine. The rivalry between an official and unofficial suitor and
the landless knight’s achievement on the battlefield, overcoming objections to the young
couple’s mésalliance, are also featured. The idyllic hero’s sufferings, based on the
Ovidian pathology of love, threaten to keep him from victory. His lady, often indifferent
to love at first, also yields to the sweet sickness, sometimes with amusing rapidity. Titles
frequently feature the names of both hero and heroine, a device to indicate their equal
beauty, worth, and suffering, which has led to suggestions that Chrétien’s Erec et Enide
be labeled an idylic romance.
Floire et Blancheflor (first version, ca. 1160; second version, 13th c.) is a classic
combination of the genre’s main themes. The hero and heroine, separated by religion but
united in the intensity and precocity of their love, are driven apart but reunited through
the hero’s efforts. Later romances develop the melodrama of the plot, becoming openly
parodic in the case of Aucassin et Nicolette, which, against a traditional background of
exile and reunion, playfully inverts many of the narrative and characterizational
conventions of medieval fiction. Amadas et Ydoine (1190–1220) plays heavily on the
lovesick hero and introduces an atmosphere of magic and the supernatural. Jean Renart’s
Escoufle (ca. 1202) traces the love and separation of Guillaume and Aelis, who had been
brought up together at the imperial court. Roughly contemporaneous, Galeran de
Bretagne by a certain Renaut follows the wanderings of the hero, son of the count of
Brittany, who had met and fallen in love with Frêne, abandoned by her mother, fearful
that the birth of twins would lead to accusations of infidelity. The anonymous early 13th-
century Guillaume de Palerne tells of Guillaume’s love for Melior and his protection in
childhood and in his later exile by a werewolf. Blancandin et l’Orgueilleuse d’Amour (ca.
1230) is preserved in five manuscripts, one of which (A: B.N. fr. 19152) contains a much
curtailed version. The lady’s hostility to love, reminiscent of La Fière in Hue de
Rotelande’s Ipomedon, is vanquished by the hero’s victory over her pagan enemy, King
Alimodes. The work was composed by a “mestre Requis,” whom Foerster has identified
with the author of Richars li biaus (in his edition of the latter). In the 15th century, Jean
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