Sir Gawain And The Green Knight Gender Roles

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In Sir Gawain and The Green Knight, I noticed many themes, but the themes that stuck out at me were chivalry, gender roles, sin, the color green and game. However, the biggest theme of the poem I believe it to be gender roles. Unlike most stories, the gender roles in Sir Gawain and The Green Knight are flipped. Throughout Gawain, you see Lady Bertilak is more dominant and Gawain is more feminine. You see this in the bedroom scenes the most. Bertilak is the one trying to seduce Gawain, which shows her being more forward and making her more blunt than most women were in that time. I think a reason Gawain could have been unwilling to accept Lady Bertilak’s advances at first was because of his honor and loyalty to the King. But when Gawain learns …show more content…

Bertilak is able to be polite, but also threaten Gawain’s reputation of courtesy and his name. Not only does what Lady Bertilak take skill, but it also takes guts. Throughout the poem you see Bertilak become more brazen as she tries to seduce …show more content…

The author writes these two scenes where they connect and go together. The juxtaposition used is symbolic with the bedroom and hunting scene. It shows how the hunting probably mirrors what is happening in the bedroom, with the Lord’s prey becoming the metaphor for Lady Bertilak trying to trap Gawain. When the author starts the two scenes the Lord is getting ready to go hunt deer, whereas Gawain is laying in bed, being the prey of Lady Bertilak. You can get a sense of the hunting scene when Gawain calls himself a prisoner and Bertilak says Gawain is the man she has pinned. On the second day, the Lord goes to hunt boar. Because bores are tougher than deer, it goes back to the bedroom and how Lady Bertilak tried even harder in day two to seduce Gawain. When Bertilak starts to tease Gawain, which makes her the hunter again, because at the same time, the hunters are goading the boar. On the third day, Bertilak hunts a fox, and foxes are known for being very tricky. This lets the reader infer that because of what Lord Bertilak is hunting, that Lady Bertilak will act the same way towards Gawain. Lady Bertilak becomes more forceful towards Gawain. She pushes him to decide if wants to keep his knightly code, she becomes very crafty. Gawain has to approach the situation like Lord Bertilak will have to approach his hunt,

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