Kelly, Amy S.

Morgan le Fay and the Lady of the Lake are the two most critical representatives of supernatural female power in Arthurian legend. Yet despite their common origins from a single figure in Celtic myth, these women were split into two distinct characters as the legend was progressively revised. Malory finalizes this split by forcing Morgan and Nymue into direct opposition. The events and characteristics that he did not include from his French sources combined with the actions and descriptions that he invented for the two sorceresses reveal his vision of these women and his intolerance for their contradictory nature. Malory's attitude toward supernatural female power, perhaps the reigning attitude of his time, could only reconcile accommodate this magic if it occurred in a dichotomy: such power must either be good or evil. The archetypes constructed in Malory's Morgan le Fay and his Lady of the Lake persist in popular culture even today.