The Jester’s Tale

Chocolate and cheese

Are sure to please

The maddest dreams

Are made of these

There was Dagonet, King Arthur’s jester, cartwheeling around the room while balancing a platter of cheese and chocolate and singing!

Little Plump Jo had always been subject to vivid dreams. Sometimes she could remember them in detail; but mostly they vanished at the call of the alarm clock. Sometimes they were scary, sometimes heartwarming, sometimes amusing.

Often her dreams were based on incidences of the previous day or solving problems in her current life situation. The dreams made perfect sense while she was in them but proved completely ridiculous when she woke.

Occasionally Jo was enjoying the dream so much she would only wake partially and she could make herself go back and continue the dream.

Jo’s dreaming had become even more vivid and strange since she had taken up residence in Malory Tennyson’s Cloudbank Cabin for Arthurian Studies. In fact, it was becoming harder to recognize the dividing line between dreams, imaginational inspiration and reality.

She probably should be more careful about what she ate before bedtime, Jo often thought.

Now Dagonet was standing there in front of Jo with his hands on his hips.

I can tell you truths

You need to know

But you must deduce them

From my jester’s show

“It is time for you to write my story now!” Dagonet insisted. “I am an interesting character in my own right. I have my own background and thoughts and aspirations.

And I have the ear of His Majesty King Arthur. But I also give an ear to all his knights.

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears

What do you have in the sack?

Ears! As Wayne & Shuster would say!

I could tell you things that would curl your toes!

I know Mordred’s incestuous parentage, who ordered the babies to be taken away in the disastrous May Day Ship, who killed King Lot, who King Mark’s wife loves ….. and so many other things which explain the undercurrents in the court of Camelot.

It is a grave responsibility to know so much about so many; and to know when it is wise to share the knowledge, and when it is wiser to hide it. The fate of the kingdom could be at stake. Wisest to tell out the truth; but hide it in the amusing ramblings of a fool.

Well may you say, ‘Well rhymed, Dagonet!’ as Sir Lancelot did in the film Sword of Lancelot.

I notice you have already included me as a minor side character in your accounts. I like you and I like your writing companions the Dabrowski Dogs (especially Imaginational) and I want you to write a tale giving me the starring role!

I need to wake up thought Little Plump Jo. It was bad enough that her heroine, Elaine was refusing to nurse Sir Lancelot and die of unrequited love; but now here was a bit player trying to stage a takeover or take over the stage.

Don’t you dare to wake up yet! Hear me out!

Have more chocolate

Have more cheese

Great stories are crafted

From such as these

Now Dagonet was juggling cheese wheels!

He then cartwheeled to the corner and returned rolling an absolutely huge cheese roll which he upended and sat down on. With a flourish he produced and opened a parchment scroll.

Here is my resume. Get your Intellectual Dabrowski Dog to check my references. They date back to the 13th century.

I have my own page on the Rochester Library Camelot Project website. Here is what they wrote about me:

‘Dagonet has been many things during his more than 800 years of existence. He has been a foolish knight, an able administrator, a mangled dwarf, a musician, a court fool, a mystic, a battle-hardened warrior, and an image of loyalty.’

Here is my profile picture "I Shall Never Make Thee Smile Again" painted by M.L. Kirk for The Story of Idylls of the King Adapted from Tennyson

It is often told that I was one of the very few who were still friend to King Arthur in the final days of his reign.

So, you see, I am the ideal person to narrate the Arthurian stories for you. Write my story and you will not regret it!

“I am focussing on Lancelot and Elaine at present,” said Jo. “I was attempting to write the full epic in the month of November a couple of years ago,” she confided. Dagonet seemed very easy to talk to in her dream. “But I started with Lancelot and Elaine of Astolat and I got stuck in a plot hole because of the four different Elaines. And then my Elaine refused to nurse Lancelot and die and just wanted to run a weaving enterprise.”

“I can tell you all about that story. I was there, you know, in the 1909 play Lancelot and Elaine: A Play in Five Acts by Morley Steynor.

And I know all about Lancelot! I know about his blackouts. He rode his horse into a swamp once. I found him and led his horse back to Camelot. I claimed that I had captured the great Sir Lancelot and everyone thought we were both playing a hilarious joke and his dignity was preserved.

I can tell you about the Quest for the Holy Grail too. Everyone knows about Sir Galahad, Sir Percival, and Sir Bors achieving the Holy Grail and Sir Lancelot very nearly seeing it. But not many people know that I too was granted a vision of the Grail. You can read about that in The Dwarf's Quest: A Ballad by Sophie Jewett written in 1905

I was there with King Arthur in the last days of his reign. His wife was in a nunnery, his best friend was over the narrow sea trying unsuccessfully to get back in time to fight for him against Mordred and the Saxons. That was when that profile picture of me was painted.

This sounds great, Little Plump Jo thought. Here was a witness to the whole epic and a confidante of most of the main characters. He might be easier to work with too – constant yet flexible, self-aware and yet content with his identity and with a great sense of humour. This could give her writing a whole new perspective.

If only she could remember all of it when she woke up!

Right on cue the alarm sounded.

“Ignore that!” said Dagonet. “Pull up a cheese wheel and let’s get start on writing The Jester’s Tale!”