Other views of Sir Gawain in Sir Gawain and The Green Knight :: Essays Papers

opposite views of Sir Gawain in Sir Gawain and The Green KnightBelow argon quotations selected from a upshot of sources which address the grapheme of Sir Gawain --------------------------------------------------------------------------------In the earliest Arthurian stories, Sir Gawain was the superior of the Knights of the bike Table. He was famed for his prowess at arms and, above all, for his courtesy. ... here(predicate) Gawain is the perfect knight he is so recognized by the dissimilar characters in the story and, for all his modesty, implicitly in his view of himself. To the others his greatest qualities are his knightly courtesy and his success in battle. To Gawain these are important, scarce he seems to set an even higher value on his resolution and integrity, the two central pillars of his manhood. The story is concerned with the conflict between his figure of himself and the reality. He is not quite so brave or so honorable as he belief he was, alone he is still very brave, very honorable. He cannot quite see this, entirely the reader can. The character of Sir Gawain is relatively fixed by tradition he cannot act very differently from the way he does. In consequence, his character is static--is, indeed, less rice beering than that of his adversary, the Green Knight. But it is for other qualities than character interest that Sir Gawain and The Green Knight is valued. (G. B. Pace, 35) FromClark, Donald, et al. English Literature A College Anthology. New York The Macmillian Compevery, 1960. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------We are placed on the side of mortality itself, and can thus, with the Green Knight, pardon Gawain for his single act of cowardice what he did was done not start of sensual lust but for love of life--the less, then, to blame. In the context of this affectionate sympathy, Gawains own violent anger at the revelation of his fault mustiness itself be viewed with amusement, as part of his human fallibility. (Marie Borroff, Introduction) FromBorroff, Marie. Sir Gawain and The Green Knight A New Verse Translation. New York W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1967. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------Gawain is, naturally, more fully drawn than any other character. Not only do we observe him ourselves, we are told how he impressed other people in the story and how he himself thought and felt. We see him behaving, as all expect him to do, with exquisite courtesy but we also see what is not apparent to the other characters, that such fashion does not always come easily to him.