Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Sir Gawain and the Green Knight) is a Middle English chivalric romance , which is in the tradition of the Arthurian epic .
Lore
Handwriting
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (SGGK), together with three other Middle English texts, has come down to us in a single manuscript: Cotton Nero Ax (Art. 3). This is dated to around 1400 and is thus recognizable as a copy, as the language in which the romance was written is older than the manuscript. Today it is in the British Museum .
The other works of the manuscript are the poems " Purity " (sometimes also called "Cleanness" ), " Patience " and " Pearl " ; all three - in contrast to the more secular Arthurian material on which SGGK is based - clearly religiously based texts. The script in which the entire four poems were recorded shows a single scribe. There are no titles whatsoever in the manuscript, and the graphic offset of the works by colored initials (the first over 14 lines, the others over 8 lines) was apparently ambiguous enough that after the manuscript was discovered around 1830, the texts were wrongly identified as one belonging together for a while Work were viewed. This may have been due to the fact that colored, albeit slightly smaller, initials appear in the text itself.
The order of the poems is: Pearl, Purity, Patience, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
It also contains illuminations which - with the exception of three in SGGK - precede the respective poem. Of the twelve illustrations in the entire manuscript, four relate to the romance of chivalry (one before the beginning and three after the end of the poem). The following scenes are shown:
- Gawain with ax before Arthur, and before the decapitated Green Knight on horseback, carrying the head in his hand - both scenes in an illustration ( fol. 90b)
- The lady of the castle enters Gawain's bedchamber (fol.125a)
- Gawain on horseback near the Green Chapel with the Green Knight (fol.125b)
- Gawain before Arthur, after his return to Camelot (fol.126a)
Tolkien / Gordon point out that some of the relevant characteristics are not shown in the illustration, for example the head and hair of the Green Knight are not shown in green.
At the end of the manuscript - and thus also at the end of SGGK - there is an entry from another hand: " Hony soyt qui mal pence ".
author
The author of SGGK is still considered unknown by most of the research, although there have been some attempts to identify him - for example as a member of the Johns of Gaunt , or the Enguerrands de Coucy. These approaches, however, were all of little impact.
It cannot even be said with certainty whether the author belonged to the clergy or a secular class. The only thing that is certain is that he had an extensive education, both in the religious and in the secular - especially courtly - area, and incorporated this into his work with a sure sense of style, but also humor.
It is not entirely clear whether the author of SGGK was also the author of the three other poems in the manuscript, but is very likely due to the linguistic and stylistic similarities between the four works. Therefore he is often referred to in research as "Gawain-Poet" or "Pearl-Poet".
language
dialect
The text is written in the North West Midlands dialect, possibly in the Lancashire area , and is usually dated to the last third of the 14th century. In addition, it contains a large number of archaisms, as well as terms of Scandinavian origin, and thus not infrequently poses problems for readers familiar with other Middle English poetry, such as Chaucer's works.
Metric
SGGK is a poem as part of the " Alliterative Revival ", the revival of traditional Germanic rod-rhyming poetry in England, which took place in the middle of the 14th century, especially in the north-west of the country. The poem makes use of the alliterative long line , which is divided into two short lines with (usually) two accents each by a central caesura. The stressed syllables “stab” with each other: They either have the same consonant or a vowel (of any kind) in their initial sound.
In its implementation of the alliterative principles, SGGK is not completely identical to the original Old English form: the poet of the Middle English work uses a rhyming ending at the end of the stanzas, which vary in length, which is referred to as "bob and wheel". It is a total of five lines, the first a single line short line ("bob"), the following four three-word line ("wheel"). The rhyme scheme of this part is always[a: baba]. In this conclusion, the narrator often gives a summary of the content of a stanza.
content
Summary
On his quest to the Green Chapel, during which he is facing an exchange of blows with the Green Knight, which Gawain does not expect to survive, he returns to Hautdesert Castle.
His stay there is characterized by the lord's three hunts, during which his wife tried to seduce Gawain three times. Although it is unsuccessful, a little slip by Arthur's nephew proves his human imperfection at the latest in the duel with the Green Knight.
From the exchange of blows, Gawain surprisingly emerges almost completely unharmed, but from then on makes the most serious reproaches because he does not believe that he has met the chivalric ideal. On his return to Camelot, Arthur's nephew finally finds that he is alone with his self-criticism.
The individual episodes
The challenge
On New Year's Eve a gigantic, wild-looking knight, who is just as green as his steed, rides into Arthur's hall and mockingly challenges the king and the round table: If they are worthy of their great fame, one of them should take the gigantic ax that he has brought it with me and struck a blow at him. If he, the Green Knight, survived this, he would return the blow exactly one year later.
Arthur starts angrily and prepares to take on the challenge himself. Gawain, his nephew, asks to be allowed to do what he is allowed to do. And so Arthur's relative cuts off the head of the Green Knight. The giant, however, does not fall dead to the ground, but only lifts his head, mounts his horse, head in hand, and admonishes Gawain not to forget his vow to come to the Green Chapel in a year and then that there To receive retaliatory strike. Then he rides away laughing.
Gawain's journey
It is All Saints Day when Gawain prepares. His shield bears the pentagram on the outside , a symbol of the five virtues and thus courtly and Christian-knightly perfection; the picture of Mary is painted on the inside . So he sets out to find the Green Chapel and none of Arthur's court expects to see him again alive.
Gawain's path, on which the winter hits him far harder than the dangers of wolves, dragons and wild men , leads him to the West Midlands . There he reached Hautdesert Castle on Christmas Eve, where he was received in a friendly and honorable manner. Gawain spends the Christmas days here, and when the lord of the castle, whom he tells of his goal, explains to him that the Green Chapel is only two miles away from the castle, he agrees to stay on Hautdesert until the day of the duel.
The trade with the lord of the castle
The lord of the castle asks Gawain to rest the following day and later dine with his wife. Then he, whose name is still unknown to the knight, proposes a barter deal: Whatever he hunted the next day should belong to Gawain, who should give in return for what chance brought him at the same time. The knight agrees.
The next morning, the lord of the castle is already on the hunt, his wife enters Gawain's room. She tries to seduce him, the Knight of the Round Table, who is known for his ministry , but Gawain succeeds in resisting this without lacking courtly etiquette. So it remains with a kiss, which he, true to the rules of the barter, passes on to the lord of the castle in the evening - without saying who he got it from - and receives his prey, a hind, in return.
The second day also goes by in this way: Another attempt to avert seduction, this time two kisses, and again the exchange with the lord of the castle for his prey, a boar.
On the third day, the lady still does not stop and tries again. Gawain doesn't give in to her solicitation, refuses to give her the desired sign of love and doesn't even want to accept her belt as a gift. But when the lady tells of his ability to save a person from death, Gawain finally agrees, thinking of the upcoming meeting with the Green Knight, and accepts. She still asks him to hide the present from her husband, which he promises her.
Then Arthur's nephew goes to the castle chapel and has his confession taken so that he can face the Green Knight unmarried about his sins the following day. The belt is not mentioned.
In the evening, in exchange for the barter, Gawain gives the lord of the castle the three kisses he received that day for his prey - a fox. Again, he doesn't mention the belt.
The duel with the Green Knight
The next day the knight of the round table puts on armor and belt and sets off with a guide to the chapel. He warns him about the Green Knight and asks him to flee, but Gawain refuses and finally reaches the chapel, which turns out to be a cave in the earth or even a barrow and has nothing in common with a Christian chapel. The Green Knight appears soon afterwards and Gawain takes off his helmet to receive the ax blow.
At the knight's first blow, he winces in anticipation, and the green giant pauses and scolds him for his fearfulness. His opponent does not finish the second blow either, but only notes with satisfaction that Gawain did not flinch this time. He gets angry and demands his opponent to finally strike, which he then obeys. Despite the power of the blow, Gawain's ax blade only cuts the skin. When the latter, knowing that he has fulfilled his obligations, takes up arms, the Green Knight stops him and explains his motives:
The first and second blow were interrupted because Gawain had honestly and faithfully fulfilled his barter contract at the castle on the first and second day. Only on the third day did he fail, and so the final blow was taken.
The Green Knight tells him that he himself, Bercilak, Herr von Hautdesert, had initiated his wife's attempts at seduction in order to test Gawain's virtue. He does not regard even its absence on the third day as overly reprehensible, since Arthur's nephew did not accept the belt out of greed or wooing, but for the most humane of reasons - because he loved his life. Gawain reacts to these statements with violent self-reproaches. He accuses himself of covetousness and cowardice, although Bercilak assures him that he is now and through his confession purified and free from any guilt. Gawain, however, declares that from now on he will always wear the belt, as a sign of his absence and the weakness of the flesh.
Finally, Bercilak reveals the originator of his challenge to Arthur's court: It is Morgan La Fay , who lives in his castle, and the deception planned to frighten Queen Guinevere .
Return to Arthur's court
Back on Camelot , Gawain tells of his experiences and his shame - and finds himself misunderstood. The knights laugh at what he feels as a disgrace and decide to get a green belt and wear it - as a badge of honor and for the glory of the round table.
research
SGGK is a very complex work, the aim of which cannot be reduced to a conflict, not even to a certain moral. This is also reflected in the literature on the poem.
swell
When it comes to the source question, we can basically distinguish between two motive lines: beheading (or challenge) and temptation.
The Central Irish work Fled Bricrenn ("Bricrius Fest") is the oldest source for challenge and beheading (manuscript approx. 1100, story itself probably 8th century), another is the old French Livre de Caradoc ("Book of Caradoc"), which , also located in the Arthurian issue, has the greatest similarities with SGGK.
The temptation scenario is also found in Celtic literature, namely in the Middle Cymrian Mabinogion , where in the story of Pwyll and Arawn (around 11th century) Pwyll, the prince of Dyfed, forms and empires a year and a day with Arawn, king of Annwn , exchanges, and also sleeps with his wife in a bed without touching her (although the queen makes no attempt at seduction here).
This motif, too, is not limited to Celtic literature, but occurs in a similar form in French culture, here, for example, in the Anglo- Norman romance Yder , which on the one hand contains the husband's instruction to seduce, but also a warning to the knight such a temptation, and last but not least also in the Old Testament .
An agreement to share the profits of one day can be found in the Latin poem Miles Gloriosus , but this is not an exchange and the work is not given a high source value for SGGK.
In recent research, the question of the sources has taken a back seat in favor of problems of interpretation of individual elements, as well as of the entire text.
interpretation
Contrast: Courtly world - Christian teaching
A basic conflict, which is particularly evident in the temptation scenario, is that between the Christian-religious and courtly world of values: the court knight Gawain, famous for his love of love, would, if he yielded to the lady of the castle's woo, offend against the virtue of chastity , as well as of disloyalty, of betrayal, against the lord of the castle. Here the poet plays with Gawain's (not always laudable) reputation as a great lover, which this character possesses in other works of Arthurian literature.
The description of the shield also plays an important role in establishing the values of the poem: the pentagram as a symbol of the five virtues generosity, loyalty, purity, courtesy and, as the highest virtue, compassion, depicts the knightly values. The fact that on the inside of the shield there is also the image of Mary indicates, as the narrator's explanation that Gawain drew his courage from the five joys of Mary , to the deep religiosity of the knight in the romance.
Still, the poet's position remains rather unclear. Is it really as absolutely Christian as Bloomfield thinks? Does the author stand behind the happy (laughing) laugh of the court society in view of Gawain's exaggerated remorse - that is, on the secular, courtly side? Is this portrayal of the lack of understanding of the spiritual dilemma of a deeply believing person perhaps an implicit criticism of the author's opinion of the overly hedonistic attitude of this time? Or does court society understand the dilemma much better than it seems at first glance, and with its decision does not criticize Gawain, but the unconditionality of an ideal that is unattainable for mortals (according to Shoaf)?
Other aspects
Mythological approaches
Nowadays, natural mythological interpretations that use vegetation myths and rebirths (such as Speirs'), which are supposed to manifest themselves in the Green Knight and the exchange of blows, are less important . The same applies to Moorman's interpretation of the plot as a passage rite . It cannot be denied that the Green Knight has characteristics that he shares with mythological figures (through his color and the connection to untamed nature he is reminiscent of the Celtic “ Green Man ”). However, it is very questionable what influence such echoes have on the poem ( CS Lewis expressed himself in detail on the problem of “ anthropological approaches” in SGGK as in literary theory in general , albeit not entirely without polemics).
Hero's Trial
Moral questions, on the other hand, have a very high priority in romance. The fact that the hero's test as a situation of ethical probation is an essential part of the poem is therefore no longer in doubt. Whether or not it represents the author's exclusive objective remains open to discussion - not least, the poem itself seems to question the unconditionality of ethical value judgments through the reaction of Arthur's entourage to Gawain's self-accusations; and Bercilak also disagrees with the romances protagonist on this point.
Comedy and irony
The various humorous elements that SGGK has, including the many moments of laughter, have led some scholars to question the seriousness of the entire work. Supporters of this interpretation therefore recognize a considerably lighter, and often even ironic , tone in the poem . Bloomfield also attributes the work to the ability to unite wealth of spirit, irony and religiosity at the expense of none of the other aspects. To what extent a completely ironic or comical interpretation is justified, however, remains questionable.
Hunts and seduction scenario
Many researchers have mentioned that there is a close connection between hunting and temptation sequences. Gawain's role is often compared to that of the prey. It is important here that the knight does not fall victim to the "hunter" until the third day, but also he - like the fox - at a time when the danger seems to have already been overcome.
Barron has dealt with the connection of the hunting and seduction scenes as an expression of social consequences for moral misconduct and sees the hunting scenes as paraphrases of Gawain's punishment, had Gawain yielded to the seduction - a punishment for high treason . Barron also postulates the proximity of the descriptions to historical punishments for this offense (such as quartering ).
Narrative technique
In his narrative, as Renoir has worked out, the poet skillfully uses dramatic changes of perspective that are similar to modern tracking shots in film. In his descriptions, the author also proves an exact knowledge of the medieval courtly realities of life down to the last detail (for example, when the game breaks up in the hunting scenes), the language used, the clothing and the architecture, as well as the geography of his country, which leads to the extraordinary realism of his Descriptions leads.
Status
Despite its obvious difference in language, metrics, style and narrative, "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" is mostly compared in its literary value with the works of Chaucer today. In its multitude of facets, the lively, colorful and detailed language, the processing of the most diverse literary influences and the rounded, shaded character, landscape and situation drawing, neither the unknown author nor the romance need to shy away from comparison.
After-effects in literature and film
Eduard Stucken processed SGGK into the drama Gawân. A mystery that appeared in print in 1901 and premiered in Munich in 1907.
In the Walt Disney classic Beauty and the Beast , a scene was originally planned in which the protagonist Belle explores the castle library of the beast and discovers a copy of SGGK. However, this scene was deleted, but for the Blu-ray release in the Diamond Edition it was cut from black and white sketches and dubbed.
The first-person narrator in Alice Munro's short story Wenlock Edge from 2005 writes a term paper on Sir Gawain for her studies - and she resembles Gawain: She misjudges the situation she finds herself in, makes compromises and is ashamed to be her Finding out truth, according to Joanna Luft in a literary analysis from 2010. In narrative terms, Munro builds her work in interlocking containers (emboîtement) and works with two types of emboîtement: one of space and one of events. In Munros Wenlock Edge , too , the emboîtement reveals something treacherous as well as an accomplice in the relationship arrangement in which the main character himself became involved.
In 2020, The Green Knight will be a processing of the material as a movie.
swell
- Barron, WRJ Trawthe and Treason. The Sins of Gawain Reconsidered. Manchester: Manchester UP, 1980.
- Burrow, JA A Reading of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1966.
- Howard, Donald R .; Zacher, Christian (eds.). Critical Studies of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1968.
- Markus, Manfred (ed. And trans.). Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Stuttgart: Reclam, 1974.
- Tolkien, JRR; Gordon, EV; Davis, Norman (eds.). Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. 2nd Ed. Oxford: Clarendon, 1967.
- Tolkien, JRR (trans.); Tolkien, Christopher (ed.). Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Pearl. Sir Orfeo. London: Allen & Unwin, 1975.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Joanna Luft: Boxed In: Alice Munro's “Wenlock Edge” and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight . In: Studies in Canadian Literature / Études en littérature canadienne (SCL / ÉLC) , Volume 35, Number 1 (2010).
- ↑ The Green Knight at IMDB .