favorite queer retellings/interpretations of arthurian legend
hello anon!
this simple question has a complicated answer if only bc some authors seem to have created queer stories unintentionally! & i like them! i'll include quotes from my suggestions below a cut as there will be some mild spoilers but that may help you decide what stories suit your tastes as they vary a lot. you can also just go ahead & assume kay & agravaine are always queer (bc they are, not accepting crit) which makes narrowing down the list difficult for me.
TL;DR: Camelot 3000 Mike W. Barr & Brian Bolland, Exiled From Camelot/Trial of Sir Kay/Hunt for Hart Royal by Cherith Baldry, Spear Nicola Griffith, Guinevere/Morgan/Morgawse by Lavinia Collins, The Queen's Knight by Marvin Borowsky, Arthur Rex by Thomas Berger, The Road to Avalon by Joan Wolf.
Camelot 3000 by Mike W. Barr & Brian Bolland: reincarnation story with transman sir tristan coming to terms with his gender & sexuality so he can accept isolde's love for him & reciprocate. it's really beautifully written imo plus the art is so 80s & my exact cup of tea. it's dated in some of its handling of the subject matter but i think it was done thoughtfully for the time.
Exiled From Camelot, The Trial of Sir Kay, The Hunt for The Hart Royal by Cherith Baldry: the way baldry writes is overall my favorite ever but her kay is unparalleled he is everything to me. unequivocally disinterested in women (without misogyny, very important note). codependent on gawain if not fully in love with him the crown style. lots of hurt/comfort, kissing, holding & worrying over each other. they exchange a ring for god's sake. in exiled it says ragnelle was the only woman for gawain (based) but after she passed he's all kay's basically so this checks all my boxes. love wins.
Spear by Nicola Griffith: butch perceval pulling bitches chapter after chapter it's glorious. ends up settling down with nimue. bonus throuple arthur/guin/lance with a very sweet moment with lance talking to percy about them both. no homophobia (external nor internal) to be found its very enjoyable. beautiful prose. audiobook was wonderfully narrated by the author, which is how i read it, thus i've written out a quote here:
"Secrets may prove a burden. So...Lance, my mother is indeed Merlin's sister but I am not Merlin's sister's son."
Lance frowned. "I don't understand..."
"I am not his sister's son."
His eyes stretched wide. He reassessed the line of her jaw, the size of her hands. She nodded. Then he reassessed how she and Nimue sat with one another. This time, Nimue nodded.
Guinevere, Morgan, & Morgawse by Lavinia Collins: these aren't my favorite (did gawain really dirty, deal breaker) but the fact is they have multiple explicitly queer characters including: kay, lancelot, morgawse, agravaine, isolde, dinadan, etc. plus there were several poly scenes including one with guin/lance/kay, another morgawse/lot/visiting king/queen swinging. wild all around everyone is sleeping with everyone no character is unaccounted for. be warned these books are extremely graphic in every conceivable way. queer solidarity in the face of homophobia is a theme throughout. kay punches phobic urien & agravaine "saw nothing." shh its fine urien sucks. this hilarious convo between agravaine & morgawse kills me.
The Queen's Knight by Marvin Borowsky: an interesting retelling in which mordred is a grown up warlord right from the outset. he also happens to be queer. mind this came out in the 50s & contains pederasty, but mordred does later have a loving tragic relationship with fellow knight calogrenant (yay crackships<3), which others were aware of & helped conceal (kay, for example). agravaine is also queer, he only joins arthur's forces bc lancelot asks him to & continues to fixate on him for the whole book. typical.
Arthur Rex by Thomas Berger: so this book is super homophobic. but it's so homophobic that it circles back around to being pretty queer bc berger saw queerness everywhere, apparently. but the green knight is purposefully queer, so the kissing game's gender-role-reversal/bisexuality....escalates. david lowery wishes. both gawain & arthur are pretty homoromantic with lancelot to the point the narrative calls attention to it & then no-homos their closeness. agravaine appears to be queer too. he's the only unmarried brother (claims to be in love with guinevere but i don't buy it), he wants lancelot so bad he gets all tongue tied & stupid around him...wrecked.
The Road to Avalon by Joan Wolf: what's this? agravaine again? so in this version, lancelot is named bedwyr (inspired by mary stewart's quadrilogy) but he's lance in all but name. anyway agravaine constantly beefs with guinevere for his attention...& loses. plus it's implied agravaine slept with lamorak before his mother which is hysterical. (my fave crackship is thriving<3) agravaine topples the empire for a much older straight man. it would be funny if it wasn't so sad. let's give it up for problematic jealous slutty queers.
these are just the retellings i have read & liked. there are more on my retellings list but those were suggestions from others i haven't gotten to yet with the exception of dishonorable mention to the winter knight by jes battis. it has gay gawain & his bestie transgirl bi kay in that but the writing style was unbearable to me unfortunately i'm so sorry i just didn't like it. anyway thanks for the ask!
List of āyou say you wanna be friends but itās starting to feel like you wanna be more than thatā prompts
āTell me why you say you wanna be friends but then go and pull shit that makes me feel like you want to be more than friends?āĀ
āDo youā¦ Like like me?ā āNo, I donāt. Thatās defamatory.ā
āI donāt know why but all I can think about is kissing you. Iāmā¦ Not the only one, right?ā Ā
āFriends donāt fucking do this.ā
āDo you actually want to be friends or do we need to talk about this and reevaluate our relationship?ā
āI donāt know if I can do this with you when I think Iām starting to want more.āĀ
āIf I knew weād come to this then I wouldnāt have agreed to be your friend in the first place.ā
āYouāre confusing me. Stop it.ā
āSo what is it you really want from me?ā āI donātā I donāt know.āĀ
āFuck, why are you doing this to me?ā āDoing what?ā āMessing with my head!ā
āEverything about this is starting to feel really not platonic.ā
āā¦This isnāt working.ā
āIām pulling away before I get hurt.ā
āDonāt give me mixed signals. If you want us to stay friends, donāt fucking act like that.ā
āI donāt know about you, but I want out. I canāt keep doing this and act like weāre just friends.ā
āDid I do something? Why are you suddenly acting so distant?ā āJustā¦ Because.āĀ
āDonāt give me that shit. Donāt treat me like that. Donāt make me think you like me. Donāt give me the hope I donāt need or want. Donāt give me a reason to continue feeling this way for you.āĀ
āā¦I think I like you.āĀ
āIs it weird I wanna give you all of me?ā
āThis is all we should be, yet it somehow feels like we could be more. You feel me?ā āā¦Sorry?āĀ
i love The Eagle 2011 movie adaptation of the Eagle of the Ninth but it makes me SO sad how many moments between Marcus and Esca arenāt in the movie.
Like when Esca had the option of running away and not being Marcusās slave but he CHOSE to stay so that he could be with Marcus: āBut I chose to go with him because it was in my heart that it might be you that we went to." DIRECT QUOTE FROM THE BOOK!!!! And they hadnāt even spoken to each other at that point ššš
Like the fact that esca says āI have not served the Centurion because I was his slave, I have served Marcus, and it was not slave-service.ā ALL WHILE HOLDING MARCUSāS HAND AND THIS IS BEFORE THEY GO ON THE JOURNEY FOR THE EAGLE!!! Like the books so much gayer than the movie!!!
The fact that Uther murdered thousands of innocent sorcerers all because HE used magic to conceive Arthurā¦is just baffling. heās like āItās definitely not my fault that ygraines dead! I mean sure I FORCED her to sire an heir through magic without looking into the repercussionsā¦But itās the sorcerers fault! Theyāre all evil!ā Ugh I hate him so much
