The poem opens with a feast at Arthur’s court and there are the feasts at Bertilak’s castle. On Gawain’s journeys to Bertilak’s castle and to the Green Chapel, there are both stylised and realistic nature descriptions. The Green Knight arrives with news for Camelot. There are numerous battles, both literal and metaphorical. Gawain confronts hostile creatures such as wolves, dragons, bears, boars, and giants, and of course, not least, the Green Knight. Gawain also has a battle of wills in the bedroom scene. The purpose of the poem is not only to describe courtly behaviour but also to challenge and analyse the ideal of courtliness in practical contexts.

The vision of alliterative poetry is that:

Heroic conduct is rewarded by earthly fame.
(The tradition originated in pagan times.)

Such an ethic disregards the religious or transcendental nature of reward, which inevitably gives potential for secular and religious tensions in the Christian world of medieval literature.

In the poem, the force by which Gawain is challenged has no religious status. The Green Knight is an ambiguous shape-shifter. At the end Gawain is perceived by Arthur’s court to have heroic virtue, but the achievement of earthly fame is presented in ambiguous terms; achievement is only possible if the idealised transcendental notions of perfection are compromised.

In alliterative poetry there are also certain metrical-syntactical tendencies:
Synonyms are regularly used.
While interchangeable, these words sometimes have slight differences in meaning or tone, therefore developing or complicating a theme.

Synonyms for the word truth – ‘trouthe’ – are a key example of this tendency. Words like ‘chivalry’, ‘courtly’, ‘honour’, are interchangeable with ‘trouthe’, but there are also the slight variations focused on in the moral exposition of the five virtues of ‘trouthe’ in the pentangle scene. Thus ‘courtesy’ and ‘cleanness’ also act as synonyms for ‘trouthe’, but contain slight differences in meaning, complicating the nature of ‘trouthe’.

Alliteration is used to unite descriptive words.

These words are repeatedly used in a line or across a few lines (creating three stresses in each line). The effect of this pattern is to emphasise a particular expression or idea.

An example from the poem is the description of feasting. At every point in the poem where a feast occurs, a formulaic description is used consisting of a line alliterating on the letter ‘d’, in which at least two of the four words ‘daynte(s) … dece … dressed … or der(rest)’ are used:

line 75: ‘Dressed on the dere des, dubbed al aboute’
line 114: ‘Thise were dight on the des and derworthy served’
line 121: ‘Dayntes driven therwyth of ful dere metes’
line 445: ‘Toward the derrest on the dece ne dressez the face’
line 483: ‘of alle dayntez double, as derrest might falle’
Thus associative links are made between certain words by this formula, ‘image clusters’ if you like.

ORAL TRADITION

Although the poem was read rather than recited by its original audience, features of oral poetry (a tradition that co-existed with literacy in the fourteenth century) can be seen in the use of repetition and variation.

The study of the alliterative tradition above has already highlighted the repeated use of sounds and the variation of synonyms (alliterative verse originated in the oral traditions of pre-history tribes).

Note as well the repeated and varied use of numbers. There are three days of hunting, three meetings of the Lady and Gawain in the bedroom, and three axe-blows at the Green Chapel. There are two Christmas feasts, a priest offers Gawain absolution as does the Green Knight, there are two good females (Guinevere and the Virgin Mary) and two deceptive females (Lady Bertilak and Morgan La Fay), and the Beheading Game is repeated. The figure of five is the most sustained pattern in the poem. Gawain makes five promises (one to the Green Knight, three to Bertilak and one to the Lady). There are five testers (the Green Knight, Bertilak, the Lady, the Guide and Morgan La Fay). There is, of course, the pentangle, with its many five-fold associations.

FABLIAU

Fabliau tales are burlesque in character, and include:

intrigue

irony

equivocation

intimacy

parody

comedy

In the bedroom scenes the Lady is extremely intimate in her physical gestures, both parties are equivocal in their speech, and the relevance of the scene is mysterious and therefore intriguing. The kisses of the Lady are parodied in the Exchange of Winnings and expose Gawain to ridicule in contrast to the vigour and vitality of the hunts. There is the dramatic irony of the significance of these scenes, making us feel uncomfortable at the end of having enjoyed their comedy.

DIRECT SOURCES

The three folkloric elements of the Beheading Game, the Temptation and the Exchange of Winnings are key plots found in eighth- and ninth-century Celtic and French analogues. What is of interest is the fact that they are always found separately: ‘Sir Gawain and the Green Knight’ is the only extant poem that combines all three narratives.