Introductory Remarks on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is one of the most fascinating texts of the medieval period, a long narrative poem composed around 1380 by an unnamed poet popularly known as the “Gawain-poet.” At once strange and enchanting, it blends myth, Christianity, chivalric ideals, and folklore into a compelling story that has captivated readers for centuries.

The Story

The poem is told in four parts, moving across three major locations.

The first location is Camelot, the court of King Arthur. The story begins with the Christmas and New Year festivities at the Round Table. In the midst of the celebrations, a mysterious figure enters the hall: a gigantic knight, entirely green, riding a green horse. Unnaturally tall and terrifying, he makes a bizarre challenge—he will allow his head to be cut off on the spot, provided that the knight who strikes the blow visits him at his “Green Chapel” in a year’s time to receive the same fate.

Sir Gawain, one of Arthur’s most loyal knights, accepts the challenge and beheads the Green Knight. But in a miraculous moment, the knight picks up his severed head, reminds Gawain of his promise, and rides away.

As the next Christmas approaches, Gawain sets out to find the Green Chapel. Along the way he encounters adventures until he reaches the castle of Lord Bertilak. There his honesty, loyalty, and chastity are tested. For three days, Lady Bertilak, the lord’s wife, attempts to seduce him, and a peculiar “exchange of winnings” game unfolds:

• Day 1: Bertilak hunts a deer; Gawain exchanges one kiss.

  
  

• Day 2: Bertilak hunts a boar; Gawain exchanges one kiss.

  
  

• Day 3: Bertilak hunts a fox; Gawain exchanges one kiss—and secretly accepts a green girdle that promises protection from harm.

Finally, Gawain arrives at the Green Chapel. He endures three blows from the knight’s axe, the last revealing his imperfection and failure to fully keep his word. Back at Camelot, the knights of the Round Table wear green girdles in solidarity, remembering the lesson of his ordeal.

Who Was King Arthur?

But who is Arthur himself? Was he a historical figure? Some texts from early Britain refer to a heroic leader named Arthur who defended the land against Germanic invaders around the 5th or 6th century. However, historical evidence is scant, and many scholars believe that Arthur’s legendary stature is largely the product of mythmaking.

Over time, stories of Arthur grew into a body of patriotic legend for Britain. He became less a historical king and more a symbol of national heroism. These legends spread across medieval Europe, inspiring a rich cultural tradition known as Arthurian romance.

Knights of Arthurian Romance

Interestingly, Arthurian romance often shifts focus away from Arthur himself to the adventures of his knights of the Round Table. Among the most famous are Gawain, Yvain, Lancelot, Perceval, and Galahad.

• In France, Chrétien de Troyes composed romances such as Yvain, Yvain and Gawain, and Lancelot.

  
  

• A highly Christianized romance, The Quest of the Holy Grail, also circulated widely.

  
  

• In Germany, Wolfram von Eschenbach wrote Parzival, another landmark of the tradition.

  
  

• In England, Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight secured Arthur’s place in English literary history.

Lasting Impact

The legends of Arthur and his knights left a lasting imprint on later European culture. Writers and poets repeatedly returned to these stories for inspiration:

• Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene

• Cervantes’s Don Quixote

• John Dryden’s masque King Arthur

• Keats’s La Belle Dame sans Merci (1819)

• Tennyson’s Idylls of the King and The Lady of Shalott

• Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1889)

• T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land

• T. H. White’s The Once and Future King

The tradition has also flourished on stage and screen: the musical Camelot (1960), Disney’s The Sword in the Stone (1963), Excalibur (1981), Knightriders (1981), King Arthur (2004), and TV series like Merlin (2011).

Perspectives for Reading Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

The poem invites multiple critical approaches, from psychoanalysis to theology. A few important perspectives include:

1. Courtly Love – How should we interpret Gawain’s responses to Guinevere and Lady Bertilak? What was the true nature of medieval courtly love, and how did it shape relations between knight and lady? A Lacanian lens (Seminar VII, The Ethics of Psychoanalysis) can help us explore these tensions.

   
   

2. Form, Structure, and Chronotope – Arthurian romances weave together multiple plot strands and play with notions of time and space, creating a unique “logic of romance.” Think of it as a medieval counterpart to modern Bollywood romances. Here, Mikhail Bakhtin and Eugene Vinaver provide useful tools.

   
   

3. Feudal Context – While romance often depicts an idealized chivalric world, it is rooted in medieval social realities. Thinkers like Marcel Mauss, Marc Bloch, and Johan Huizinga help us place these ideals in their historical context.

   
   

4. Christian Elements – Sir Gawain and the Green Knight abounds with Christian references. The Green Knight himself has been read as a Christ figure. Exploring the poem through medieval theology, such as the writings of St. Augustine, reveals another layer of meaning.

Closing

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is much more than a curious medieval tale. It is a rich tapestry of myth, faith, morality, and psychology, a story that continues to inspire writers, artists, and thinkers across centuries. In the next post, I will turn to a more critical discussion of the poem, examining how these perspectives open up new ways of reading it.

Note: This write-up is based on notes I prepared for my lectures and is intended as an accessible introduction rather than a full scholarly article.