Sir Gawain's Narrative Analysis

The story begins in King Arthur's court, where he and the Knights of the Round Table are celebrating New Year's. While they are enjoying their feast, a gigantic Green Knight rides in on a green horse with an immense axe in his hand to offer them a challenge. His offer is: "I shall bide the fist blow, as bare as I sit…….., but in twelve month and one day he shall have of me the same." (Norton Anthology,208)

gender role. The Lady’s role questions traditional presumptions of the roles of women in medieval literature. Women of the Middle Ages were generally dependent, inferior, and many female portraits in medieval texts did not fare better. While men of the Middle Ages were generally chivalry, valiance, noble and honest. Throughout the poem I began to see gender roles being reversed between Lady Bertilak and Sir Gawain.

For example, Simon Armitage proves this through the varying perspectives of the characters in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. More specifically, Armitage uses the contradicting perspectives and reactions of Sir Gawain from the Green Knight while the Green Knight explains the purpose of the trials. “‘By confessing your failings you are free from fault… I declare you purged, as polished and as pure as the day you were born without blemish or blame” (Armitage 181). In other words, the Green Knight is telling Gawain that by admitting his fault, he can redeem himself of his crippling pride. In addition, the knights of the time period were notorious for their believed lack of flaws and mistakes, which in itself is a fault.

While King Arthur’s court is feasting and partying in celebration of New Years, a strange figure, referred to only as the Green Knight, makes a surprise visit. He requests that the group’s leader or any other brave member of the court challenge him in a beheading game. He will allow whomever accepts the challenge to strike him with his own axe, but on one condition. The challenger must find the Green Knight in exactly one year to receive a blow in return.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, written by an anonymous fourteenth-century poet in Northern dialect, combines two plots: "the beheading contest, in which two parties agree to an exchange of the blows with a sword or ax, and the temptation, an attempted seduction of the hero by a lady" (Norton p.200). The Green Knight, depicted as a green giant with supernatural powers, disrespectfully rides into King Arthur's court and challenges the king to a Christmas game -- a beheading contest. Sir Gawain, a young, brave and loyal knight of the Round Table, acting according to the chivalric code, takes over the challenge his lord has accepted. The contest states that Sir Gawain

     Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a great epic written in fourteenth century Europe by the Pearl poet, emphasizes the opposition of Christian love to Courtly love in the 13th century through the dilemma of Sir Gawain, one of the great knights of the Arthurian round table. By examining the women in the poem, Gawain's dilemma becomes a metaphor for the contrast of these two distinct types of love. The poem looks upon the Virgin Mary as the representative of spiritual love, obedience, chastity, and life (Warner 9). In contrast, Morgan le Fay and Bertilak's wife appear to be representing courtly love, disobedience, lust and death. This

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight was written in the late fourteenth century. Its author was unknown, but he or she was a contemporary of Chaucer. The poem consists of two plots: one is the challenge between Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in a beheading game, and the other is the temptation of Sir Gawain by a lady from a beautiful castle. The outcome of the challenge as well as the life of Gawain is made to depend--though Gawain does not know it--on his behavior at the castle. The temptation is a test of chastity and honorable conduct towards a lord. The introduction of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight gives us a picture of King Arthur's kingdom. It describes the knights and the joy of all Arthur's

She wants him to make love to her instead he didn’t. Sir Gawain is very bold and Brave after what he has

Through all these perils and dire situations, Gawain never loses sight of his nobility and reverence for God. Gawain's trials and hardships many would have begged God for relief and shelter. Many tears would be shed, beseeching God to change the circumstances in their favor. However, Gawain asks for nothing of the sort. He asks God and Mary merely for a place to hear and participate in Christman

While being hosted by Lord Bertilak, Lady Bertilak comes onto Sir Gawain very strongly. Sir Gawain is then faced with the decision between giving into Lady Bertilak’s demands for undue sexual affection. To add to the situation, Sir Gawain has promised Lord Bertilak that the two will exchange whatever they receive to each other as gifts. In this situation, the Christian respect for marriage is at odds with the chivalric duty to accept the wishes of those who are housing you. Sir Gawain, not wishing to offend the lady, says “I wot I will do even as it may please ye, and kiss at your commandment, as a true knight

Throughout the history of fictional writing, cultural values of certain time periods have been expressed and implemented through the depiction of the heroes’ experiences on their journeys and the knowledge they gain by the quest’s end. For example, in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a chivalric romance written in the Late Middle Ages, Gawain epitomizes a knight with the characteristics that knights from the Late Middle Ages were expected to possess according to the requirements outlined in the rules of chivalry, such as honor and valor. Likewise, Beowulf, the hero of the folk epic Beowulf, embodies the qualities of an exemplary hero as well as king. Therefore, in both stories, the reader encounters a heroic character that is presented with traits that Anglo-Saxons and the Middle English valued in their culture through their stories’ monomyths, a concept of similar and structural sequences that can be applied to many stories, created by Joseph Campbell. Some of these values are carried from the Early to Late Middle Ages and can be seen through the works of both Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Beowulf.

In "The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell," King Arthur is accused of unrightfully giving away Gromer Somer Joure's lands to Sir Gawain. Gromer Somer Joure asks Arthur a question, which Arthur must

According to Christopher Reeve, “a hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” In today’s culture, the hero is frequently depicted as a knight in shining armor, an image that originates from age-old literature such as the fourteenth-century Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. In such literary works, the heroic knight has several virtuosic character traits: friendship, chastity, generosity, courtesy, and piety; however, he must also endure a quest in which his virtues are tested. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, three obstacles challenge the hero Gawain’s morals, including the Green Knight, the seductress, and the threat of death, leading to a further maturity of

“How can you go along with this?” I asked her, in frustration and distress. “Don’t you care who you marry?” 1

I feel like I have analyzed the character of Sir Gawain every time the opportunity arrises in this class and you are probably getting a little tired on critiquing my analysis over the same character. Though, relating to Arthurian concepts, it must have been “fate” or “destiny" that the Gawain character would be an option for me to analyze on this final. This sort of “fortune” to have a character that I feel I can give a clear and in-depth analysis over, just might make this final examination on an Arthurian character close to “perfection”. On a more serious note my reasoning for choosing Sir Gawain was actually based on looking at the other concepts given as choices to analyze. I was conflicted on what information I could relate and elaborate on in a 1,000 word analysis. Then as I was starting to defining each concept, I found a tremendous connection to Sir Gawain to almost all of them. One might find this sort of association in comparing other knights in Arthurian literature, but do those knights really have that strong of a connection as Sir Gawain does? This is the question I started internally debating about and found that the answer is no. This realization and connection to multiple concepts found in Arthurian literature and Sir Gawain gave me a perfect argument. In looking at one character throughout Arthurian literature there is no better example of Arthurian themes and elements that seem to embody only one character through various stories and poems, that being Sir