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Milun’s Son
In “Chaitivel,” the indecisive lady lives in the city of Nantes in Brittany. She is so beautiful and charming that she’s irresistible to knights. In fact, four knights woo her, and instead of settling on just one lover, the lady courts all four of them. Accordingly, all four knights fight and perform their hardest in hopes of outdoing rivals. But at a tournament at Nantes, all four knights encounter fierce fighting, and only one of them survives. She takes in the wounded knight to convalesce in her home. After this catastrophe, the lady declares she can never be happy again. She later composes a lay to commemorate the four fallen knights, titling it “The Unhappy One” at the wounded knight’s suggestion.
The Indecisive Lady Quotes in The Lais of Marie de France
The The Lais of Marie de France quotes below are all either spoken by The Indecisive Lady or refer to The Indecisive Lady . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
X. Chaitivel
Quotes
It would be less dangerous for a man to court every lady in an entire land than for a lady to remove a single besotted lover from her skirts, for he will immediately attempt to strike back. […] Yet, even if a lady has no wish to listen to their pleas, she should not speak insultingly to her suitors: rather should she honour and cherish them, serve them appropriately and be grateful to them.
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“My lady, compose the new lay, but call it The Unhappy One. I shall explain why it should have this title. The others have long since ended their days and used up their span of life. What great anguish they suffered on account of the love they bore for you! But I who have escaped alive, bewildered and forlorn, constantly see the woman I love more than anything on earth, coming and going; she speaks to me morning and evening, yet I cannot experience the joy of a kiss or an embrace or of any pleasure other than conversation. You cause me to suffer a hundred such ills and death would be preferable for me.”
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The Indecisive Lady Quotes in The Lais of Marie de France
The The Lais of Marie de France quotes below are all either spoken by The Indecisive Lady or refer to The Indecisive Lady . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
X. Chaitivel
Quotes
It would be less dangerous for a man to court every lady in an entire land than for a lady to remove a single besotted lover from her skirts, for he will immediately attempt to strike back. […] Yet, even if a lady has no wish to listen to their pleas, she should not speak insultingly to her suitors: rather should she honour and cherish them, serve them appropriately and be grateful to them.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
“My lady, compose the new lay, but call it The Unhappy One. I shall explain why it should have this title. The others have long since ended their days and used up their span of life. What great anguish they suffered on account of the love they bore for you! But I who have escaped alive, bewildered and forlorn, constantly see the woman I love more than anything on earth, coming and going; she speaks to me morning and evening, yet I cannot experience the joy of a kiss or an embrace or of any pleasure other than conversation. You cause me to suffer a hundred such ills and death would be preferable for me.”
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
