Arthurian Legends Today

Last weekend, I was discussing Arthurian legends with the lovely Julia Golding at the Bath Children's Literature Festival...

Julia Golding, Jeff Norton, and me (with Excalibur) at Bath Festival

Julia has written a series based on the Arthurian legends too Young Knights - and it was interesting to see the different ways we brought the old legends into our books. My Pendragon Legacy series continues the story the day after after King Arthur is killed in battle, with his secret daughter Rhianna Pendragon riding out of Avalon to fight her cousin Mordred for the throne of Camelot. Julia's series takes characters from different times back to Avalon, then sends them into the modern world to form a new Round Table.

At the event, after I'd done a bit of sword waving, and Julia had shown her beautiful cloth version of the Round Table, our chair Jeff Norton asked us a rather difficult question:

"Why do you think the Arthurian legends are still relevant today?"

We were running out of time, and I knew if I started it answering that question then everyone would still be sitting there! So we said we'd think about it and opened the floor to some (slightly) easier questions from the audience. But now that I've had a week to mull it over, I've written a post at the History Girls with my answer, which is a long post but might explain why I wrote the Pendragon books. It's all to do with the Grail, which seems appropriate for a Sunday post, when many people are thinking of spiritual matters.

The Pendragon Legacy is now complete!

Watch the trailer HERE.