Sir Gawain And The Green Knight Analysis

In many ways, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a poem constructed from various binary oppositions, all encompassed within the genre of the medieval romance. These oppositions, however, are not always as polarised as might be initially expected. This is certainly the case with the relationship between civilisation and the wild, whose continual juxtaposition often allows for the distinction between the two to become blurred. This essay will explore the difference between the topographical wild – that is, the wilderness – and civilisation, demonstrating that the two are not as different as they immediately appear to both reader and protagonist. Furthering this line of argument, this essay will also consider the definition of ‘the wild’ as

As W.R.J Barron says, ‘the elements [of the Green Knight] are familiar, but their fusion in one person is unacceptable, incomprehensible’. The court is stunned into ‘swoghe sylence’ (l. 242) for several moments, seemingly unable to process the almost-apparitional figure who has entered the civilised space. The poet adds that the silence was ‘not al for doute [fear], / Bot sum for cortaysye’ (ll. 246-7): the reaction is inappropriate (because these chivalric knights should not be afraid), yet completely justified, as they are showing respect for the impressive figure. The Green Knight, then, is an example of the Lacanian extimité, the ‘embedded alien’. He is the ‘intimate that is radically Other’, recognisable to the court as a fellow ‘cortays knyƷt’ (l. 276) but also a ‘selly’ (‘marvel’; l. 239) who might not be fully human. He is a symbol of liminality, embodying both ‘self’ and ‘Other’, ‘civilisation’ and ‘wild’. The items the Green Knight carries with him only further frustrate the ability to definitively categorise him; in one hand, he carries ‘a hoge and vnmete’ (l. 208) axe, whilst the other holds ‘a sprig of holly as a sign of peace and goodwill.’ Further, he refers to his challenge as a ‘Crystemas gomen’ (l. 283), but the violence of his request conflicts with the idea of it as a mere ‘game’. The unclear intentions only

As this essay has discussed, it is difficult, even erroneous, to attempt to address the notions of civilisation and wild as distinct from one another. The poet continually juxtaposes and interposes the concepts, inviting us to interrogate what exactly constitutes ‘civilisation’ and what determines its separation into the definition of ‘wild’. This tenuous relationship is typified through the character of the Green Knight, whose liminality disrupts and defies attempts to define him as either one thing or the