The Struggle for Virtue and Faith in “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”

Valor is not what is given, but what is gained. The original author of this book is anonymous. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, basically teaches people to keep your faith and to not be moved by temptation. This book was written between 1350 and 1400 A.D. Hence Forth, the prestige of a knight lays in faight. The animals presented in this book represent the torture Sir Gawain endured in resisting Morgana. “They screamed…Hunted back from the safety of high ground.

”(pg.94) The Deer in this book represented the struggle Gawain faced. How he was getting pierced with arrows of temptation by Morgana, and how he declined such words of elegance even though it ripped him to shreds. The Boar is the temptation of Gawain making himself vulnerable at the words of Morgana. Also, how he started giving in more but still keeps his commandment. The Fox symbolized the way Gawain did all he could to decline the gifts Morgana presented, but in the end the fox was not triumphant just like Gawain gave in a little bit. Morgana played a big role as the Gamer of this twisted wrongful trial that she had wished to commemorate. Sir Gawain’s faith, love, and emotions were all mistreated and abused for amusement. It was like slowly starving a Siberian tiger in a cage.

Where such a beautiful deity exists only to play with it and illusion it with false food only to test its strength or durability. Morgana is very persistent in her temptations to sugar-coat her way of speech, because of her curiosity in finding the limitations of this so called Great Knight. The belt in itself had an extravagant amount of symbolism varying by the way one viewed it or understood it. One of the main components of these strong symbolisms, is that the belt is a reminder of Sir Gawain’s mistakes that taught him to learn and apply that experience for the rest of his life. It also symbolized the love he experienced with Morgana before he found out he was hitting on his aunt. The belt hung as a failure to resist sin, as Samson was with Delilah, the same as Gawain with the Green Knight’s wife. Only, Gawain did not perish but had some close friends that hung a belt in the same fashion to honor and support him. Sir Gawain was a man of Great Faith. Even though he did give in a little bit to temptation, does not change the fact that he’s still human. The prestige of a knight was one of the highest positions in those times regardless of the king. Not only did the knight represent himself but also God, the king, his land, and his castle. The faith Gawain obtained was immensely rare back in those days, even after his deception. I challenge the readers of this essay to try to get your own understanding of this book, and see if they relate to this or just have completely different meaning than mine.

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