Das mittelalterliche Buch. Reclams Universal-Bibliothek: Band 18315 Book

The Service of Ladies
Ulrich Von Liechenstein
Read it in paperback at 172 pages including a biblio of sorts.

Ulrich was a squire for a beautiful lady in his youth and as he became a knight later in life he still never dropped his infatuation with her, it seems to have haunted him throughout his life. This document of sorts is an autobiography that he penned to tell of his deeds in her name to impress her, it's kind of like a medieval mix tape.

Its got hot bars professing his devotion and love to the cause:

"This I heard the wise men say:
None can be happy, none can stay
Contented in this world but he
Who loves and with such loyalty
A noble woman that he'd die
If it would save her from a sigh.
For thus all men have loved who gain
The honor others can't obtain."

Its got gritty action sequences:

"The joust was splendid, I declare.
I knocked his helmet through the air.
The veil he'd fastened to his lance
Was hanging from my shield, by chance;
A broad and gaping hole now marred
The shield where it was meant to guard
The shoulder bone on my left side.
It was a joust to suit his pride."

Overall it's kind of a weird story to be truthful. He repeatedly tries to court her but she is already married loyally. He seems to tell himself that doesn't really matter and gets his aunt to run messages back and forth awkwardly, he gets his cleft pallet fixed on her request with some hearty medieval surgery, he cross dresses as a women and goes on a jousting tour in her honor, he pretends to be a leper, and he eventually sends her his finger after it's amputated after a joust and still she spurns him. It's kind of sad but then you remember that Ulrich is happily married too and then it just kind of gets weird.

A lot of fun if you're into this kind of thing.