Like Malory, Marie distances herself from the source of the narrative in Lanval. She opens the lai saying, “I shall tell you the adventure of another lai, / just as it happened: / it was composed about a very noble vassal” (lines 1-3). She establishes that the story has been passed to her and acts instead as a channel for it, merely repeating the events as they were told to her. The story seems to be already written, indicated in the line “it was composed” (line 3). Yet, Lanval is a figure that, as far as I can discern, was first popularized in Marie’s lai. Marie acts the same way modern authors do, writing the stories of characters who are only tangentially related to Arthur’s story. Lanval was a member of Arthur’s Round Table, and his absence in other stories is explained as, “… Arthur forgot him, / and none of his men favored him either” (lines 19-20). Lanval exists on the furthest edge of the Arthurian legend the same way the lai itself does, untouched by modern authors seeking to adapt Arthurian works, even though it leaves gaps and questions like Malory’s Morte Darthur does. The story also adds to the Arthurian legend in that it further establishes Guinevere as an adulteress. She attempts to seduce Lanval, who refuses her advances (lines 261-274). In the grand scheme of the legend, it creates a precedent for her affair with…