Abstract
Abstract The Arthurian aspects of George MacDonald’s Phantastes (1858) have been overlooked in Arthurian studies and downplayed in MacDonald scholarship. To fill this gap, the first section of this article examines the opening paratexts of the first edition (title, subtitles, epigraphs) tracing their Arthurian echoes and allusions. The second section focuses on a key architext, Sir Percival’s quest for the Holy Grail, suggesting that Anodos rather than the unnamed knight is the character most informed by Percival. Simultaneously, the article draws on reader response theory and Derrida’s poststructuralism to argue that Phantastes is a highly self-reflexive, metafictional work intended to disrupt normal reading and writing practices in order to initiate the reader into a more open, transformative mode of reading.
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