Sir Thomas Malory (d. 1471). The Holy Grail.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
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Until a few years ago Malory himself was little more than a name, our information about him being limited to the statement in Caxton’s edition of the “Morte d’Arthur” that he was the author. It now appears probable, however, that Sir Thomas Malory was an English knight born about 1400, of an old Warwickshire family. He served in the French wars under Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, “whom all Europe recognized as embodying the knightly ideal of the age,” and may well have owed his enthusiasm for chivalry to his association with this distinguished nobleman. He died in 1471.
Malory’s book is a compilation from French and English sources. These are chosen without much discrimination, and put together without great skill in arrangement. But the author’s wholehearted enthusiasm for chivalrous ideals and the noble simplicity and fine rhythm of his prose have combined to give his work a unique place in English literature. In it the age of chivalry is summed up and closed. It is not without reason that the date of its publication by Caxton, 1485, should be conventionally accepted as the end of the Middle Ages in England. Romance had passed under the printing press, and a new age had begun.