The Romance of the Rose is an allegorical poem with two authors, Guillaume de Lorris, and his successor, Jean de Meun.
In the first part, written by Guillaume, the narrator describes a strange, highly symbolic dream which he dreamed five years prior, but has since come to pass. In the dream, he finds himself in a beautiful garden. In the garden, he finds the Fountain of Narcissus with rose bushes in the basin. While he is looking at the fountain, the God of Love shoots him in the back with arrows, piercing him through and leaving him forever in love with one flower in particular.
Instantly, the boy attempts to seize the flower for himself, but the garden guardians are there to meet him, taking the rose away from the boy and fortifying it against his attempts. There are a cast of minor characters representing various challenges against the virtue and integrity of the boy against vices. Here, Guillaume's poem ends.
In Jean's continuation, the boy does manage to take the rose for himself by cunning. This adds the element of forbidden knowledge acquired, and he ends the poem with commentary on the themes from Guillaume's, especially on the themes of free will and the gods, or fate.
