There and back again : fortune and possibility in medieval romance and Dungeons and Dragons

This thesis explores alternative readings of fortune in medieval romance through examining the role of chance in the tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) Dungeons & Dragons (D&D). Using game studies, medieval, and medievalism scholars, I highlight these mediums’ key similarities, including: relational creation and transmission, nearly limitless possibilities, and the hopeful message that individuals can achieve a happy ending. As D&D and romance have a similar format, content, and function, examining the living tradition of TTRPGs can provide new insight into the medieval medium. I argue that chance, limitations, and the possibility of failure underlies and structures D&D’s hopeful nature, allowing the stories it generates to reassure its audiences that they can also seize their own happy ending both despite and because of the reality that they cannot completely determine their fate. When applied to romance, this reading of fortune allows for an optimistic interpretation that differs from Boethius’ fickle Fortune in The Consolation of Philosophy, the primary medieval authority on fortune. Studying actual plays, TTRPG web shows broadcast for an audience, alongside romance manuscripts provides concrete examples of how these parallel storytelling traditions work. I examine the participants’ strategic rule modification while respecting chance in Exandria Unlimited: Calamity to argue for a secularization of Tolkien’s eucatastrophe, a joyous turn that depends on the possibility of failure, that emphasizes the limitations underlying D&D’s optimism. I then turn to Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale to examine how the dual narrators draw attention to the limitations of philosophical consolation and how both Boethius’s imprisonment and the Knight’s conservatism affect their views of Fortune. The text’s failure to endorse faith in God or nobility points to romance itself as fulfilling this emotionally consoling role. Finally, I highlight the optimistic workings of chance in Sir Orfeo, arguing that Orfeo’s limitations are central to his successful rescue of Heurodis in another secular eucatastrophe. Orfeo’s incorporation of disorder and limitations signals the waning relevance of religion and the monarchy in the late medieval period, which, along with the audience’s embodied response to the narrative, assures the audience that they too can seize an ultimately happy ending.