What Women most Desire

Mine is a telling based on the 15th century Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle, itself a version of earlier tales known as The Loathly Lady. (The Wife of Bath’s Tale is Chaucer’s version in The Canterbury Tales.)

I had not told the story for a long time. But a few days ago (October 2025) I was asked after a performance in Erlangen, Bavaria, to include it in my 2026 programme.
Researching the origins of the tale, I was sent a metaphysical essay “On the Loathly Bride” by Ananda K. Coomaraswamy (first published in Speculum, XX, 1945) in which he draws many parallels with myths in other cultures. He also writes:
We have so far seen that the heroic motif of the transformation of a hideous and uncanny bride into a beautiful woman cannot be regarded as peculiarly Celtic, but rather represents a universal mythical pattern, underlying all marriage, and one that is, in fact, the “mystery of marriage.”

However, discovering further that some scholars view the 15th century version itself to be a parody of chivalric codes, confirms my decision that my version should develop that side of the story.
Moreover, I know that in performance it works!

The new recording will be uploaded to my video gallery on 9th Dec. 2025. Until then, above is the half-minute clip filmed by a member of the audience at the 2009 ZauberWort storytelling festival in Nuremberg,