The Song Of Roland Sparknotes

This analysis paper is written about a section of the book, The Human Record: Sources of Global History, Volume I. The section is about the “Song of Roland” a fictionalized story about a real person in history. It is the earliest literary work of the chivalric code, which is a code that sets shared values of how feudal soldiers, or knights, should act. In the story, Roland is the nephew of France’s emperor, who happens to be Charlemagne, and he is put into battle as a rear guard as a punishment by his stepfather Ganelon, whom he had unintentionally offended. Unbeknown to Roland, Ganelon has set up a conspiracy with the Muslim king, who is to ambush the rear guard. Ganelon knows that his stepson will be too proud to sound his horn, beckoning
The whole reason Roland is put into the situation he is in is because of the feud between his stepfather and himself, even though he is not aware of it. Even though he is put in a life and death situation, he remains loyal to his king because he believes he knows that is what a good warrior would do. Through it all, his right hand man, Oliver, urges him to sound the horn and call for backup, but Roland does not want shame to come to his family or dishonor to fall on France. He believes he is being loyal to his king and country. For the historical part of the article, there appears to be no bias. Since the author is simply recounting details, there is no room for bias. The loyalty and honor portrayed in this article is the kind of loyalty and honor seen in movies and television shows that are set back in the same time period this story takes place and even in some of them today. For the narrative part telling the story of the fictional “Song of Roland”, however, it is more difficult to tell if there is bias. It is likely, however, that there is. The poem was composed around the time of the First Crusade, and it contains many ideologies of the French warrior class. It is likely that the poem was written to persuade others to act in the same way, or perhaps to warn them to learn from Roland’s choices. It is very likely that the author felt that Roland should have listened to his friend Oliver and sounded his horn early on in the battle, thus sparing the lives of thousands of men, including himself, instead of being too prideful to call for