Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Essay -- essays research papers fc

Women, urbane Love and the Creation Myth in Sir Gawain and the commonalty Knight     Sir Gawain and the verdure Knight, a great epic written in fourteenth carbon Europe by the Pearl poet, emphasizes the opposition of Christian love to noble love in the 13th century through the dilemma of Sir Gawain, integrity of the great knights of the Arthurian round table. By examining the women in the poem, Gawains dilemma becomes a metaphor for the contrast of these two distinct types of love. The poem looks upon the Virgin bloody shame as the representative of spiritual love, obedience, chastity, and life (Warner 9). In contrast, Morgan le Fay and Bertilaks married woman appear to be representing genteel love, disobedience, lust and death. This conflict between polite love and spiritual love demonstrates the drastically weakened religious determine behind chivalry. An interesting parallel to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is the story of pilot film sin in the Gar den of Eden. Gawains temptation correlates to the temptation of Adam, which is rooted in the sins of the flesh. The women in the story seem to accentuate the downfall of Gawain, which mirrors the downfall of Arthurs court, as well as mans fall from grace in the garden.      Originally, the first business of a knight was to be at the service of his church. However, with the rise of courtly love, knights began to give their devotion to their mistress rather than matinee idol. This elevated the churchs mistrust of women and the flesh. The act of Bertilaks wife is not un akin that of Eve, a temptress who would bring twain happiness and despair to her man. One interesting twist to this story is that, like courtly love, possession of part seems to be shifted into the hands of the women. The wife of Bertilak operates unsupported against Gawain in the bedroom as the hunter and the aggressor. The great feminine power in the story, however, comes from Morgan le Fay, the evil stepsister of Arthur. She is strong enough to take to the woods into Bertilaks castle, turn him green and order him to walk and talk with a break up head.      The Virgin Mary also plays a prominent role in the story. It seems as if Mary and Gawain have a relationship based on a special untainted Christian love. That Gawain is Marys knight is made unclouded in the scene where he is robed for battle. That all h... ...t. The women in this tale serve as a medium for comparing the spiritual go of Sir Gawain to the creation myth. With Mary as a symbol of perfection and noblewoman Bertilak as an Eve-like symbol of temptation, the fact that he is torn between them displays his man just as Adam was torn between the word of God and the love of Eve. In this case, Morgan le Fay would probably be considered the serpent in the garden, the instigator of the conflict in the story. Because of the story of Eve, women were frequently looked upon in gothic times as cunning, untrustworthy and generally evil. Women in the story of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight are looked upon with the male concept that flesh is evil and allow for lead to mans downfall, which is highlighted by the contrast of Courtly love to Christian love. plant life CitedAbrams, M.H. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. New York W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1993. De Roo, Harvey. "Undressing Lady Bertilak Guilt and Denial in Sir Gawain and theGreen Knight." The Chaucer Review 27 (1993) 305-24.Warner, Marina. Alone of all Her Sex The Myth and the craze of the Virgin Mary. New York Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1976.