After staying up on Friday night with Pomba Gira, I
took my own good time recovering the following morning, and didn’t make it back
to the second day of Pantheacon until the early afternoon. I found a good seat right near the front for
a presentation on The Grail and Cauldron.
This was intended to include a visual presentation but, alas, technical
difficulties intervened. However, I liked
the presenter and she discussed one of my favorite topics: The Grail legend. She dealt mainly with the French versions of
this medieval legend and epic, particularly the version by Chretien de
Troyes. I found myself close to tears as
she described the life of Perceval, mentioning also the women Blanchefleur and
Repanse de Schoye. She mentioned the
question that the seeker must answer to find the Grail: “Whom does the Grail serve?” She also dealt with connections between the
Grail and Hermes Trismegistus. This all
was very emotional for me, because of my long study of the Grail legend. I shared this with the presenter later on in
the conference.
My own study of the Grail began decades ago with Richard
Wagner’s “opera” Parsifal (he himself
referred to it as a “Stage-consecrating Festival Play”). This is a magical work, and during the
Chalice workshop it entered my mind that I should present a workshop next year built
around the idea of Wagnerian Witchcraft or Wagnerian Magic.
Wagner led me eventually to Joseph Campbell’s
four-volume The Masks of God, which
includes a ninety-page retelling/analysis of the Parzival poem of Wolfram von Eschenbach, my second personal source
of Grail material (though I don’t know it nearly as well as Wagner).
My third source of Grail material is John Boorman’s
1981 film Excalibur, which is
allegedly based on Thomas Mallory’s Morte
d’Arthur. I went through a period
where I watched this film repeatedly. I
made extensive notes for an essay I never wrote (maybe later?) on why the film
was actually about finding authentic masculinity.
Of course, most people nowadays know about the Grail
from Monte Python and the Holy Grail. Well—any great work deserves a great
parody. It keeps the story alive, even
if ironically.
For myself, I can say that the Grail legend appeals
to me on some deep level. The fact that
people have told different versions just makes the whole story richer. Something of worth is being sought in a world
that seems tainted. You have to look for
it even when you have very little idea of what you are looking for or how to
find it. You have to ask the right
questions and answer them. We need
something authentic.
So I was moved into a state of contemplation during
Pantheacon. I looked for my own
authenticity, sought to realize and acknowledge my own emotions and grasp the
meaning of what moves me. While
envisioning a workshop on Wagnerian Magic, I wondered whether I wasn’t heading,
rather, towards a future as The Sacred Curmudgeon. Maybe it comes with my age.
Or maybe not.
There is a cure or healing for the curmudgeon; and the Grail legend is
about the healing of the Waste Land. For
several years now, I’ve entertained the idea that (gasp!) Wagner got the Grail
legend wrong. Campbell himself hints at
this. Wagner’s Parsifal finds the Grail
after renouncing sexuality in the form of the woman Kundry. Campbell prefers Wolfram, where Parzival
eventually finds mature adult love and marries.
But I, after my dancing with Pomba Gira—“in service to the Goddess?”—wonder
whether perhaps we can revise Wagner’s story so that Parsifal can celebrate
sacred sexual love with the goddess Kundry?
That could be the true Grail Incarnation!
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