As The Sword in the Stone examines educational issues and The Queen of Air and Darkness explores political ones, The Ill-Made Knight is a novel whose focus is love — including, but not limited to, the forbidden love of Lancelot and Guenever. The novel abounds in different strains of love and lovers. There is, foremost, Lancelot and Guenever's affair, but there is also Arthur's blind love of his best knight, Gawaine; Agravane's violent love of their mother; Merlyn's inescapable love for Nimue; Elaine's hopeless (and eventually deadly) love for Lancelot; and Galahad's love of his own righteousness. However, the greatest love affair in this novel is not between Lancelot and Guenever, but between Lancelot and God, whose love eventually wins over the great knight. Thus, The Ill-Made Knight explores the ways that different kinds of love and devotion (to people, chivalry, and God) affect one's character, and how one man — Lancelot — struggles with the different loves in his heart until he finds peace in a love greater than any worldly affection.
Before examining the intricacies of Lancelot's heart, however, a reader may wonder why White devotes a whole volume of The Once and Future King to this particular character. Recall Arthur's idea (in The Queen of Air and Darkness) to reform his nation after quelling the present rebellions: "I will institute a sort of order of chivalry . . . And then I shall make the oath of the order that Might is only to be used for Right . . . The knights in my order will ride all over the world . . . but they will be bound to strike only on behalf of what is good . . . ."
Arthur's version of chivalry is one designed to make its practitioners more like God, who uses "Might" only on "behalf of what is good." (The quest for the Holy Grail emphasizes the spiritual nature of Arthur's denomination of chivalry.) Therefore, the more a knight fulfills the ideals of chivalry, the closer he grows to God. Lancelot is such a knight, invincible in combat and always ready to rescue any number of damsels in distress; however, he also succumbs to his own desires and places the wants of his own heart above those of God's. Like God, Lancelot wants a "Word," thinking it "the most valuable of possessions"; unlike God, however, he is unable to keep his "Word" and remains a fallible human.
