Beowulf In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight

Heroism has been a prevalent topic in fiction writing pretty much since the start of writing in general. Many people would think the values people held in the 9th Century would not be the same as the ones in the 21st Century, but there are many examples of why these values are relevant to modern society. These values have been expressed in historic fiction writing through the use of heros, people of extraordinary ability who personify the most ideal qualities a person can have. Some of the most notable historic fiction hero’s include Beowulf in the epic poem “Beowulf”, and Sir Gawain in the epic poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. While you can argue that certain values were more useful hundreds of years ago rather than today, you can also

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight tells the story of Sir Gawain, a knight who is the member of King Arthur’s knights of the round table. During Christmas celebrations the Green Knight shows up to the festivities and challenges the knights to strike him once with an axe on the grounds that the Green Knight must be allowed to perform the same strike a year later. King Arthur offers to participate, but Sir Gawain requests to perform the task and he beheads the Green Knight only to find out the Green Knight is a supernatural creature who did not die after getting beheaded. Sir Gawain was challenged by his code of ethics, also known as chivalry, when King Arthur accepts the Green Knight’s challenge to perform one blow with an

When “Beowulf” was written, bravery meant fighting for those you loved, and fighting to get revenge from those who wronged you. In modern society we sometimes view revenge as irrational, since if we stoop down to our enemies level, then we would be no better than them. However, a stark contrast to this idea is the American justice system, where all crime is punished to make the criminal pay penance for their actions against others. This can be viewed as a form of revenge, and we can easily relate it to the revenge taken by Beowulf against Grendel. When someone murders another person, we sometimes sentence that person to death. When Grendel kills Beowulf’s men, Beowulf kills Grendel and his mother. Sir Gawain may follow a moral code, but a moral code may not be the best thing to follow for the benefit of your loved ones and your own good. Although, in modern society our moral code is written down in the form of laws and regulations, we all still follow this moral code to make sure others in our society that also follow the same code are safe and well. So even for Sir Gawain and the Green Knight there are values that are still very relevant to modern society, and therefore the stories are worthwhile for MELS students to read as cultural