is lady. . . . (187).
It seems that Borst wants it both ways. He says there was never such a thing as an ideal knight which existed in reality, but we should nevertheless be inspired by that ideal. He brings together the various ideals of knighthood as described in the romantic literature, finds common denominators among them, and then tells his readers that we should be inspired by those general knightly standards. He ignores the knightly principles and practices which are hardly anything to live up to, and then holds up ideal standards which existed only in the epic poetry of the era. A writer might just as well say that Superman never really existed, but we should nevertheless be inspired by his standards of behavior. And then, to complete the parallel, we are told that Superman occasionally enjoyed bloody slaughter for glory and bounty. Trying to live up to standards which never existed, and which offer contradictory images anyway, can on
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