#le fresne

[whateverbrunettewants]

[fresne999]

Fifty Shades of Ash (Redux)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/62359606/chapters/159997480

So, here’s the thing. In 2022, I decided to flesh out a retelling of the Lais of Le Fresne, which I’d previously written as a short story (Fifty Shades of Ash), into a novel to self-publish. Because lets face it I want to write about obscure things in new ways. I shared it with some friends for Beta, and life happened, and into limbo the story went.

On one hand, given current world events, returning to a story that heavily deals with power dynamics and raging wildfires (it’s set in 1900-06 S.F. So, if you know, you know.) is an interesting choice on my part. And yet, it’s written and I wrote it because I wanted it to exist.

I also want it out of my documents and into the world. While I don’t think it will necessarily be a comfort read in the coming days as we tack through the maelstrom, it’s what I’ve got.

Words of warning: This story features references to child mortality, descriptions of miscarriage back when maternal mortality was even worse, and eventually traumatic fires that consume urban landscapes. There's messed up people learning to love themselves, a made up abby in place of an army base on Angel Island. Also, the birth of a number of social welfare programs in the Golden state of California, which I love. Also BDSM.

[magratmakethetea]

The premise of every Lay of Marie de France:

1) GUIGEMAR. Acespec icon cursed by dying deer to suffer for love or die. Also featuring magic chastity belt shenanigans

2) EQUITAN: King of France has affair with stewards wife. Couple conspire to murder her husband but end up in hot water after ill-timed sex.

3) LE FRESNE: Do you have to cheat to have twins? Local woman gives birth to twins, regrets spreading rumors.

4) BISCLAVRET: Breton baron insists on three day naked weekend. This is because he is a werewolf.

5) LANVAL: Why does Sir Lanval not want to fuck Queen Guinivere? This clearly deserves the death penalty.

6) THE TWO LOVERS: overprotective/incestuous king demands daughter's suitors perform impossible feats of strength. Intrepid suitor + daughter succeed, but die. Worth it?

7) YONEC: Woman imprisoned by abusive husband has affair with a shapeshifting bird-knight. Don't worry, she checked he was christian first.

8) LAUSTIC: Knight's wife has emotional affair with bachelor neighbor over garden wall. Very Pyramus and Thisbe.

9) MILUN: Welsh knight almost kills long-lost secret son in duel. They make up.

10) CHAITIVEL: Nantes woman can't choose between four knights. She has a solution: polyamory

11) CHEVREFOIL: Tristan and Iseult hook up at a pentecost feast. It's not the first time and it won't be the last.

12) Eliduc is just too charming for his own good. His extremely supportive wife is cool with bigamy and great at necromancy.

[queenofglassbeliever]

Le Fresne

A Cinderella-esque story in which the Cinderella character, named Le Fresne, has a twin sister and they were separated at birth.

The Lais of Marie de France study guide contains a biography of Marie de France, literature essays, a complete e-text, quiz questions, major

[liminalpsych]

Le Fresne live react

This one's a bit more direct of a moral tale, at least to start, than the "reader, make your own judgment" of Equitan.

There are two knights. They're neighbors, they're both rich and powerful, bold and valiant, etc etc. One knight's wife has twin sons. Her husband is elated and sends word to his neighbor, asking him to be the godparent of the sons.

However, the neighbor wife is "false and proud and backbiting and envious", and says essentially that having twins means a woman cheated on her husband, because "nor will it chance to happen that in one single pregnancy a woman should have two sons, unless two men have done this to her".

Hard to tell if this is common wisdom, or if she's just making it up. Her husband says don't say that, the neighbor lady has a good reputation. But everyone gossips about it and believes that the mother of twin sons definitely had an affair, and even her husband believed it, "and greatly mistrusted her, and kept her closely confined without her deserving it".

Well, the same year, the gossip lady gets pregnant and has twin daughters, which she's very distressed about, because, well:

Gossip lady is terribly shitty. "I'm gonna gossip about this other woman because I'm jealous!" "Oops now I'm in the same position, shouldn't have gossiped, guess I have no choice but to kill one of my twins to cover it up," like, what?? That's your first thought?

Oh good, another competent interesting servant character. Hopefully she sticks around for the whole poem, but I doubt it.

So the lady is happy that she doesn't have to kill her infant, and says she'll reward the maiden for taking her child to a church. So they wrap up the child with fancy cloth ("very fine linen" and "a patterned silk cloth" that her husband had brought back from Constantinople), and the lady ties a heavy gold ring to the baby's arm with a red zircon in the setting, so that anyone who found the child would know she was born to a noble family.

The infant is stashed in an ash tree in front of an abbey and found by a porter as he's leaving the abbey. He takes her home to his widowed daughter who's still nursing, and they take care of her. He tells the abbess about it the next day and she adopts the child as her niece, names her Le Fresne (ash tree), and she's raised in that way til she's an adult.

Of course she grows up beautiful, courteous, gracious, well educated, well spoken, wise, etc (all words used in the Lai to describe her). "No one saw her who did not love her and hold her in the highest esteem."

So a lord named Gurun of Dol hears about her, falls in love without even seeing her (which seems to be a theme; I'm skeptical of it but I suspect I should internalize it when reading Arthurian literature), and takes great pains to be able to talk to her. Eventually she sleeps with him after he cajoled her a bunch, and then he uses that to get her to come away with him as his mistress. (To make this worse, we're told that Le Fresne has basically never left the abbey and is very sheltered.)

This is not condemned in the text. We were told just a page earlier that he was "a good lord; never before nor since was there a better", so I'm guessing this behavior is considered acceptable and even romantic?

Different culture, different time, different morals. But still. That's some dubious consent and sketchy behavior right there.

So Le Fresne goes off with the baby cloths and ring she'd been found with sealed up in coffers, and spends a long time with Gurun, and everyone loves her "for her graciousness" and cherishes and honors her. But the knights say the lord should get rid of her and marry a noblewoman.

Who does he get matched with except… Le Codre. Which means the hazel tree. Her twin sister.

(Lais: the original soap operas?)

Le Fresne stays gracious through the news, keeps serving the lord "most kindly" and honoring the people, and the whole household is very upset that they're going to lose her.

Gurun and Le Codre get married. The mother goes with Le Codre because she's worried Gurun's mistress will make trouble.

Le Fresne's serving her unknown sister, everyone's amazed that she can be so courteous. Even her mother loves her and wishes she wouldn't have suffered loss for Le Codre's sake, she wouldn't have agreed to the match if she'd known the sort of person Le Fresne was. Which is a big deal, since you might remember what a petty person the mother was in the past. (Maybe she's changed her ways.)

Le Fresne prepares the bridal chamber. There's an old silk coverlet on it, and Le Fresne thinks it's too shabby for her lord. So she puts her birth cloth over it instead, to honor him.

Good thing, too, because the mother brings Le Codre over and is absolutely shocked to find the silk cloth she gave her hidden daughter.

She admits to her misdeed to her husband, who's actually really happy to learn he has another daughter. They tell Sir Gurun, who's also joyful.

The archbishop says to leave things as they are for the night, and he'll separate them the next day, and then Gurun can marry Le Fresne. (Does that mean Gurun and Le Codre sleep together for a night? What does that mean for Le Codre (sometimes written as La Codre in different parts of the text)? How does she feel about this?)

Well, all right, I guess?

This one read very much like a fairy tale to me. Kind of Cinderella in a lot of ways. I mean, the adoptive mother (the abbess) is way better than the birth mother, there are no stepparents, and the dad's still alive, etc. But the feel is similar.

[queenofglassbeliever]

Did you know?

There's a version of Cinderella where she has a twin sister.

It's called "Le Fresne."

[the-bearchelor]

The Lais of Marie de France are my new favourite things.

I mean...

Bisclavret is literally about a man who turns into a wolf, and needs his clothes to turn back, so his wife decides to be a jerk and hide his clothes.

Le Fresne is about a woman whose neighbour has twins, and she decides to be a jerk and tell everyone that having twins means you slept with two different guys, getting her neighbour in trouble. Then like a week later, she ends up having twins herself, and is like "oh shit," so she gives one of them away in secret so she doesn't look like an idiot.

Honestly, these are like little 5-9 page stories written in the 12th century and they are actually the funniest/most entertaining things you will ever read.

Highly recommend.