“A Loving Act”: The Grail in Red Dead Redemption 2

What the grail is in Red Dead Redemption 2, and how Arthur Morgan finds it.

All articles on this site feature detailed discussion of literary allusions in Red Dead Redemption 2, and as such contain unmarked major and minor spoilers for the game, and occasionally the eventual fates of some characters in Red Dead Redemption. Read at your own risk.

At the same time as a version of the fall of King Arthur’s court unfolds, another allegory plays out in Red Dead Redemption 2: the quest for the grail. More than King Arthur, perhaps even more than Lancelot, Arthur Morgan resembles another character: Perceval, the grail knight. “The Story of the Grail,” the “earliest and still the most intriguing Grail romance” (Lupack 213), was written by the great poet Chrétien de Troyes, one of the best and most influential of all Arthurian writers. Although the story most people are familiar with today differs dramatically from Chrétien’s version, details in the story that appear in RDR2 show that his work is most likely where the writers drew their inspiration.

Perceval’s story follows what foundational mythologist Joseph Campbell called the hero’s journey. From an unpromising beginning, Perceval goes on a series of adventures and is on the path to becoming a great hero when Chrétien’s text prematurely ends. Initially, Perceval is a country bumpkin, appallingly rude and uncouth. The parallels to Arthur’s behavior, particularly early in the game, are obvious.

Perceval’s mother has raised him in a waste land after his father and brothers, who were knights, died. She hopes that by keeping knowledge of chivalry from him, she can protect him from the same fate. As soon as he learns of the existence of knights, however, he leaves her, despite her protestations. In fact, she’s so distraught by his departure that

When the boy was but a stone’s throw away, he looked back and saw that his mother had fallen at the head of the bridge and was lying in a faint as if she had dropped dead. But he whipped his hunter across the crupper with his switch, and the horse bore him swiftly on without stumbling through the great dark forest.

Chrétien 389

As we shall see, this mistake — leaving his mother lying there — is the crucial one of Perceval’s life. He later learns that his mother dies, either as she lies there unconscious or shortly after. In RDR2, Perceval’s mother is represented by someone who has shown kindness to Arthur and been treated with cruel disregard in return: Thomas Downes. When Arthur leaves him lying in the dirt, it’s equally unclear if Downes is dead or alive — in any case, we soon learn that Downes has died, partially as a result of this interaction. The cutscene shows Thomas lying on the ground, then Arthur galloping back to camp, and while it isn’t quite a forest, the camerawork does emphasize the trees. A bridge and a gate feature in both scenes (459).

This is not Perceval’s only error in conduct. Shortly after he leaves his mother, he comes across a knight’s tent where a maiden is resting, waiting for her lover to return. Misunderstanding advice his mother gave him, he forces kisses on the woman and steals a ring from her. When her knight returns to the camp, Perceval has left, and the knight accuses her of being unfaithful to him. (More of this later.) Shortly after this, Perceval is made a knight, and begins to learn how to behave correctly. He meets a gentleman who kindly advises him on the rules of conduct he ought to follow.

As Alan Lupack describes,

Perceval’s problem is not a failure of strength or courage—he easily kills the Red Knight with a javelin—but rather a failure of concern for others besides himself. As Keith Busby has pointed out, the prologue which praises Chrétien’s patron, Philip of Flanders, introduces a theme of charity that is central to the romance itself (13-14). And just as Perceval must learn about chivalry, so too must he learn about charity.

215

How to care about others is one of the central lessons that Arthur must learn if the player is to succeed — that is, to get the game’s “true” ending. If the player earns low honor, Arthur will be more selfish in dialog. For instance, in “Mrs. Sadie Adler, Widow I,” when Sadie asks Arthur for help wiping out the O’Driscolls, high-honor Arthur will say: “I’ll do it, but there’s something you can help me with. Abigail, Jack, John. Make sure they make it.” Low-honor Arthur, however, will say: “You, me, and John. This whole thing is pretty much done. But Dutch still has our money.” Arthur, like Perceval, must let go of selfish concerns and learn charity, that is, how to care for other people. The correct thing to do is to help Sadie, Charlotte Balfour, Rains Fall, Captain Monroe, and John and his family, and to give money to Mrs. Londonderry and Edith Downes.

Fittingly, many of these RDR2 characters are re-imaginings of characters from “The Story of the Grail.” Charlotte Balfour is an incarnation of the character Blancheflor, a maiden besieged in her castle by a knight who wishes to take possession of her and her lands. Charlotte’s name, while not an anagram, shows the kind of letterplay of which the writers are fond (as in Micah Bell’s name): Blancheflor becomes Charlotte Balfour. Like Charlotte, Blancheflor is both rich and starving (Chrétien 403-405). When we meet them, neither character has enough food to last even a week. Perceval defends Blancheflor from the knights who threaten her, buying enough time for a sort of miracle to occur: a ship laden with food is driven off-course and ends up at the castle, where its contents are sold to the inhabitants. In “The Widow of Willard’s Rest I,” Arthur teaches Charlotte to hunt and defends her from wolves that nearly attack them. Arthur solves the same types of problems for Charlotte — starvation; physical danger — that Perceval does for Blancheflor.

The Fisher Kings

As significant as Perceval’s rescue of Blanceflor is, it is not at the very heart of Perceval’s story. That lies in his interaction with one of the most famous figures in Arthurian mythology: the Fisher King. The Fisher King is another of the influences on Arthur’s character¹. This great king has been badly wounded through his thighs. The wound renders him impotent: like Arthur, he has no heir. Arthur, too, suffers from a kind of impotence, albeit a less literal one. He’s unable to effectually assert his will: nearly everything he tries to do to save the people he loves or cares about fails. He can’t save Dutch or Karen from themselves. He can’t save Eagle Flies or help Rains Fall. The Fisher King’s wound means that the land is failing, because his body is the representation of those lands. In RDR2, the dying ways of the outlaw and the destruction of the wilderness are intertwined. Arthur’s situation is the Fisher King’s in reverse: as the land is taken over, so is his body.

Perceval’s interaction with the Fisher King is shrouded in mystery. Warmly welcomed and given the gift of a marvelous sword, Perceval sits down to dine with the king. During their meal, he sees a strange procession: a maiden carrying a glowing grail (a kind of serving dish) and a youth with a lance bleeding from its tip. Naturally, Perceval is curious about the procession, and wonders to himself who is served from the grail, and why the lance bleeds. But the gentleman who taught him his manners him told him he shouldn’t ask too many questions (one of the rude behaviors that Perceval initially exhibits), so he stays silent, thinking to himself that he’ll ask someone later. However, when he wakes up in the morning, he’s alone in the castle: the king and his entire court have vanished. He believes at first that they’ve simply gone out hunting and leaves to follow them. Before he can travel far, he comes across a maiden — who turns out to be his cousin — crying over the body of a dead knight. When he explains what’s happened to him, she tells him that

had he asked about what he saw—about the meaning of the lance and the Grail and about who is served by the Grail—he could have cured the wounded Fisher King. Although Chrétien never explains why asking the question will effect the cure, the testing of the hero seems to involve his ability to go beyond even the advice of the worthy man who instructed him and thus to act truly independently and empathetically. As the cousin Perceval meets after leaving the castle tells him, his failure is ‘because of your sin against your mother, for she died of grief for you’ (384). Though there appears to be no logical connection between the two events, there is a suggestion that his lack of concern for his mother is analogous to his lack of concern or compassion for the terrible wound of the Fisher King.

Lupack 215-216

Arthur’s death is caused by a similar “lack of concern or compassion:” had he been acting on his better instincts, he wouldn’t have beaten Downes and contracted tuberculosis. Beyond that, one of Arthur’s most serious failures is that he doesn’t question Dutch — not early enough, and not strongly enough. He sides with Dutch in “Country Pursuits,”* and killing Angelo Bronte ensures that the Pinkertons know where they are and are ready when the gang attempts the bank heist. While it’s hard to entirely blame Arthur for his unquestioning obedience, given the abuse Dutch subjects him to, it is easy to imagine Arthur how standing up to him could potentially have saved lives. While Paradise Lost condemns seeking knowledge, RDR2 joins “The Story of the Grail” in declaring it vital.

As is often the case, the traits of one character — the Fisher King — appear in several characters in RDR2. Even more than Arthur, Rains Fall is a type of Fisher King. He gives Arthur a great gift² — the Owl Feather Trinket — just as the Fisher King gives Perceval the gift of the sword. Rains Fall is called a king in the mission name “The King’s Son.” One of the looser and more playful associations to be found is at the end of “Archeology for Beginners.” Although missions will sometimes move the player back to camp at their end, this one, rather unusually, moves the player from the mountaintop to O’Creagh’s Run. It’s quite possible that at this stage, the player will complete “The Veteran II,” in which Arthur goes fishing with Hamish Sinclair, a man who was once seriously wounded through the thigh and lost his leg as a result. Although this mission may put one in mind of the Fisher King, it’s Rains Fall, in the mission that has just ended, who bears the real resemblance. Rains Fall’s inability to save his people or retain their lands is a kind of impotence. As a damsel tells Perceval of the Fisher King, “he shall now never again command” his lands (Chrétien 438).

And in the end, Rains Fall is left with no heir. The last time Rains Fall and Arthur meet, they don’t speak. There is not much that can be said. Arthur delivers the dying Eagle Flies and leaves in silence, no doubt remembering his own son. Although this isn’t necessarily inherent in the text, when we consider the two stories together, questions naturally present themselves: which of the two men could have asked the other a question in that moment? What would it be? And who might be healed by it?

Shortly after meeting the maiden who tells Perceval about the death of his mother and the results of his failure to question the Fisher King, he meets another maiden, this one in wretched in condition. Her horse is starving; her dress ripped and tattered. Her skin is “pocked” and sunburned, her hair loose (427). She laments that the knight who forces her to live this way “refuses to kill me” (427). We soon learn that this maiden is the one from whom Perceval, early in his journey, stole a kiss and a ring.

This maiden, in RDR2, is represented by Edith Downes. As with the maiden, there’s a sexual element to Edith’s disgrace: the maiden’s dress is so damaged it exposes her breasts; Edith becomes a sex worker. Both women have loose hair and pocked and burned skin. Both beg the man trying to help them to leave them alone and are distressed that the men greeted them at all. Both stress that they are ashamed of their condition. Both are mired in despair: the maiden wishes for any escape, even death. When Arthur saves Edith from a creepy john, he writes in his journal that she was “in the process of getting herself murdered. Maybe she wanted that” (entry after “Do Not Seek Absolution II”). Perceval defeats the knight who has treated her so callously and orders him to care for her and take her to Arthur’s court, where he is to surrender himself and confess to the poor way he’s treated her. Arthur rescues Edith, gives her money, and sends her away. Both men make amends, as best they can, for the wrongs they’ve done.

After a few more adventures, Perceval finally returns to Arthur’s court, where he briefly visited early in his journey. There, a hideously ugly damsel confronts Perceval about his failure to question the Fisher King. Perceval, in response, pledges to learn who is “served from the grail and [find] the bleeding lance and [be] told the true reason why it bled” (439). Perceval spends five years on his quest, by the end of which, Chrétien says, “no longer remembered God” (457). When he encounters a group of penitents on Good Friday, he’s reminded, and repents deeply. He seeks out a hermit, and begs him “to give him absolution” (459). RDR2 diverges significantly with Chrétien’s text here, given the title of the missions in which Arthur helps Archie and Edith Downes and the way he stresses that he doesn’t want forgiveness.

Perceval confesses to the hermit about his failure to ask the questions that would heal the Fisher King. The hermit explains,

‘a sin of which you are unaware has caused you much hardship: it is the sorrow your mother felt at your departure from her. She fell in a faint on the ground at the head of the bridge in front of the gate, and she died from this sorrow. On account of this sin of yours it came about that you did not ask about the lance or the grail, and many hardships have come to you in consequence.’

459

This passage is curious, both because we, and Perceval, have already been given this information, and because the connection between the two events is unclear — except that, as Lupack notes, they are both rooted in apparent failures of empathy. Arthur’s illness, in contrast, is a heavy-handed commentary on his sin: he beats an innocent, ill man on behalf of someone taking advantage of that man’s desperation, and dies because of it. The hermit gives Perceval penance, which involves worshiping God, and helping maidens, widows, and orphans (460). Although Arthur obviously never comes to believe in God, we see the other types of penance throughout the Beaver Hollow chapter as he helps Abigail, Charlotte, Edith, Archie, Sadie, and Mrs. Londonderry.

Identifying the Grail in Red Dead Redemption 2

The hermit also answers the first of Perceval’s questions: who is served from the grail? You may have noticed that there’s a word I haven’t used up to this point: “holy.” That’s because the grail, in Chrétien’s version, wasn’t — as in later versions — the cup used at the last supper. In fact, “Jean Frappier has stated unequivocally that ‘Nothing authorizes us to believe that Chrétien imagined the graal… in any other way except as a wide and hollow dish.’” (Lupack 216). That is not to say that the grail isn’t holy in a sense; the hermit tells Perceval that the man who is served from it is Perceval’s uncle, and “a single host that is brought to him in that grail sustains and brings comfort to that holy man — such is the holiness of the grail!” (460). As William B. Kibler explains in his translation, “the grail is ‘holy’ (tant sainte chose) because of what is conveyed in it” (520).

Shortly after this point in the narrative, Chrétien tells us “The tale no longer speaks of Perceval at this point; you will have heard a great deal about my lord Gawain before I speak of Perceval again” (461). Indeed we will, for in the middle of Gawain’s adventures, and in the middle of a sentence, Chrétien stopped writing, perhaps due to his death (Lupack 214).

Because Chrétien’s story is so powerful, many writers attempted to finish it, or to retell it and craft their own ending and explanations for the mysteries of the grail and the lance. The writers of Red Dead Redemption 2, too, crafted their own interpretation of achieving the grail, which takes into account both what a grail is — a dazzling serving plate — and what it contains — a host (the thin, round piece of bread that represents Christ’s body in Catholic mass). It also incorporates the effect that the grail has: when the maiden who carries it enters the hall “the room was so brightly illumined that the candles lost their brilliance like stars and the moon when the sun rises” (Chrétien 420). The grail is the last thing that Arthur Morgan sees: the sun.

Arthur gains the grail by committing “a loving act,” as Sister Calderon invites him to do in “Of Men and Angels II.”³ If the player makes the wrong choices, the ending will play out in other ways: if the player has low honor, Micah will murder Arthur before the sun can rise. If Arthur has high honor but goes back for the money, his vision of the sun is obscured by the trees. This recalls the fate of the other Arthurian character he represents, Lancelot, who is in the presence of the grail at a chapel, but is lost in a stupor, unable to rise, due to his state of sin (Malory 330-331)⁴.

That Arthur dies as he achieves the grail found in Red Dead Redemption 2 is consistent with Arthurian legend. When Galahad, the purest of the knights, achieves the grail, he soon dies, and his soul is borne to heaven (Anonymous 126-127). Perceval, who also achieves the grail in The Quest of the Holy Grail, dies a year later. He passes after becoming a religious hermit (127), implying that, while not as pure as Galahad, he is able to relatively quickly purify himself through religious devotion. This isn’t a tragedy in Arthurian legend: their friends will mourn them, but they are going directly to heaven.

Perhaps, by his sacrifice, Arthur is purified, albeit in a secular sense. But even as he redeems himself, it’s hard to feel that this is the case. Not because he’s an evil person, or because he hasn’t atoned, but because he remains weighed down by grief and heartbreak, unable to forgive himself, or to ask anyone else to forgive him. That final dawn is beautiful, but the narrative does not convey a sense that Arthur has found peace. Rockstar would certainly never do anything as earnest and uncool as suggest that heaven exists, or outright proclaim that salvation can be attained. That sin must be punished is the religious concept it most embraces. The possibility of imagining ideas like wrongdoing and redemption outside of a Christian framework does not seem to have occurred to anyone. Perhaps we should ask, with Perceval: Who is served by this vision of the grail?

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1. The mission title “A Fisher of Men” doubly refers to Arthur as a Christ figure and as the Fisher King. ↩︎
2. Only if Arthur retrieves the sacred items from the army camp without killing anyone in “Archeology for Beginners.” ↩︎
3. Dependent on player actions. The player must complete “Help a Brother Out” and “Brothers and Sisters, One and All” and have high honor to meet Sister Calderon here; otherwise, Reverend Swanson will appear. ↩︎
4. His affair with Queen Guinevere. ↩︎

Bibliography