Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

1
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

• Fit I

2
New Years Day

• Typical English Christmas-time revelry and
  merry-making
• Hondeselle New Years gift meant to express
  good wishes
• giving games a kissing game involving a man
  leading a woman with a green sash

3
New Years Day

• Green the promise that spring will follow
  winter
• Holly wassail bob, Christian symbol of good
  luck, of pagan origin

4
A Golden Age of Camelot

• Harkens the pre-Lapsarian bliss of Eden
• Guenevere/Eve temptress? adulteress?

5
Courtly Manners

• The Green Knight is boorish in his entrance and
  demeanor, except when he formally challenges
  Gawain
• Gawains speech is courtly and elevated at all
  times

6
The Goddess

• Gawain is at Guineveres side
• Gawain steps in for Arthur
• Gawain is a medieval version of the Celtic-era
  Knight of the Goddess

7
The Boast

• Rude intrusion of the supernatural on the feast
  green
• Christmas Game

8
The Challenge

• I shall offer to him this fine axe freely. . .
• And I shall bide the first blow, as bare as I sit
  here.
• Completely without armor

9
The Insult

• What, is this Arthurs house, the honour of
  which /Is bruited abroad so abundantly?

10
The Quest

• A year and a day traditional period of mourning
  before the dead rise
• The quest comes to Gawain
• Journey through unknown territory to the Green
  Chapel

11
Final Words

• Now Gawain give a thought,
• Lest peril make you pause
• In seeking out the sport
• That you have claimed as yours.
• Can the game be won?