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The importance of honor summary
The Value Of Honour
Essay about honour
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In the Pearl poet’s Sir Gawain and The Green Knight, an epic talk emerges to reveal a man’s journey of honesty, morals, and honor. Sir Gawain accepts a challenge in place of his uncle King Arthur, with hidden tests and viable consequences. As Gawain begins his journey, he proudly upholds his knightly honor and seeks out his own death; however, Gawain gives into his human emotion and is soon distracted from his chivalrous motives. As a result of this distraction, Gawain is marked with a scar to show his dishonest and cowardly deception. This scar is a visible reminder to Sir Gawain that honor and prestige cannot always protect against the desires of the flesh. Gawain pays for his sins at the Green Knights axe (Stone 136). This sin tarnishes his honor and causes Gawain to face the rest of his life as a witness to human frailty.
To begin with, Sir Gawain enters the castle seeking refuge. There he makes the deal with the King which invokes his knightly honor, obligating him to fulfill the pact. During his first hunt, the King seeks doe, while, his wife stalks Gawain in the same manner. Both the doe and Gawain attempt to flee from the potential danger that exists. However, just as the one arrow captures the doe, Gawain is caught with one kiss. The doe, being the easiest of the three animals to kill but quick on its feet to flee from danger as was Gawain at the Lady’s attempts. Gawain must first find a way to discourage the Lady without offending her, which proves to be difficult (Putter 118). Gawain must not cause the Lady to become upset because the king might become angry and then pass this aggression on to her husband. In his approach to turning her away, “Gawain first gives a gently dismissive smile, and next utters...
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...s corrupted by the need for subterfuge in concealing the gift of the girdle; in which acct his loyalty to his host necessarily disappeared” (Stone136). Because Gawain did not completely give in to the Lady’s beauty, he only received his mark instead of facing his death. Though Gawain has the one visible scar to represent his folly, humanity has many hidden beneath its dark veil of sin.
Works Cited Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Second Edition. Translated with an introduction by Brian Stone. New York: Penguin Books, 1974.
In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Gawain shows qualities of a chivalrous knight. He demonstrates that by showing generosity, courtesy, and loyalty during his travels. A mysterious knight shows up at the king’s castle and calls himself the Green Knight. The Green Knight then challenges one to play a game which he challenges the king to strike him with his axe if he will take a return hit in a year and a day. Sir Gawain steps forward to accept the challenge for his uncle King Arthur when nobody else in the castle would. He took the King’s role in the game to protect him from the Green Knight. He must learn to accept his responsibility as a knight, in accepting his fate.He demonstrates goodness at the hand of the Green Knight. He shows courage by accepting what is to come upon him during his voyage. His journey to find the Green Knight is filled with temptations.In the conversation with him and the “Lady”, Sir Gawain showed a Chivalrous code by keeping his loyalty to the king by not kissing his wife. The lady states “if I should exchange at my cho...
The next day's hunt is for a wild boar. The fierce animal is symbolic of Gawain's reactions to the increasing advances from Bercilak's wife. The boar is fierce and much more difficult to catch and kill, just as Gawain is steady in his resistance to temptation. Bercilak is aware that Gawain is resistant to all temptation at this point. Gawain is true to his reputation of a chivalrous, worthy knight.
Gawain is a gentleman, who would never kiss and tell, so the two reaffirm their pact for the next day. The lord’s determination in “pursuing the wild swine till the sunlight slanted” is paralleled by his wife’s determination in seducing Gawain as “she was at him with all her art to turn his mind her way” (188). Lady Bercilak attempts to exploit Gawain’s reputation as she tries to seduce him. She greets him in the bedroom and coyly asks how “a man so well-meaning, and mannerly disposed.cannot act in company as courtesy bids” (189). Lady Bercilak is not subtle (she points out that the door is locked and the two are alone in the castle) as she offers herself to Gawain, saying, “I am yours to command, to kiss when you please” (189).
But in the end he conceals the green girdle that the Bertilak’s wife gives him from him, revealing that despite Gawain’s bravery, he values his own life more than his trustworthiness. When he finally reencounters the Green Knight, he realizes the problematic nature of courtly chivalric ideals. During this, Gawain confesses his fault, of hiding the girdle, to the Green Knight and pleads to be forgiven. Afterwards, he chooses to wear the girdle as a symbol of his mistake. He cannot accept his sin and free himself of it the same way the Green Knight had and he continues to do penance by wearing the girdle for the remainder of his life.
On the first day Bercilak gives chase to the noble deer. The deer is characterized as being shy and elusive. A creature that would rather flee to safety then to try and fight its pursuers for its life. This parallels to the Lady and her first attempt to try and seduce Gawain. Gawain is given the qualities of the deer in her first attempt. For Gawain acts shy and looks for a way to stay true to his values and at the same...
When Gawain spurns the lady 's advances, she questions the validity of his reputation: "So good a night as Gawain is rightly reputed / In whom courtesy is so completely embodied / Could not easily have spent so much time with a lady / Without begging a kiss, to comply with politeness / By some hint or suggestion at the end of a remark. " Here we see the first example of Gawain 's values being thrown into opposition: he cannot hope to hold his honor, fellowship, and chastity without calling his chivalry and courtesy into question. Gawain faces a fork in the road in the first bedroom scene, yet it quickly becomes clear that neither road ends with perfection. The perfect, archetypal knight, one who seamlessly, simultaneously embodies all of the qualities so harmoniously unified on Gawain 's shield, cannot exist, as the five points of Gawain 's pentangle cannot fully be kept
...” (2383-2384). The truth of the games are finally visible, Gawain stayed true to his word for the most part, but his fear of death caused him to hang onto the girdle that was supposed to protect him. In doing this, he lied to the Green Knight, but more importantly turned his back on his trust in God to keep him safe. He fails right at the end of the game, making it through everything else but the decapitation. Gawain does however vow to wear the girdle as a symbol of his cowardice with his encounter with the Green Knight.
Sir Gawain is presented as a noble knight who is the epitome of chivalry; he is loyal, honest and above all, courteous. He is the perfect knight; he is so recognised by the various characters in the story and, for all his modesty, implicitly in his view of himself. To the others his greatest qualities are his knightly courtesy and his success in battle. To Gawain these are important, but he seems to set an even higher value on his courage and integrity, the two central pillars of his manhood.
Norton. "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight." The Norton Anthology English Literature. New York : W.M. Norton and Company, 2006. 162-213.
Yet, Gawain did err in accepting the girdle; that much cannot be denied. We, the reader, can forgive him since he repents fully, even going so far as to impose penance (of wearing the girdle eternally as a mark of his fall) on himself. It takes a mild rebuke by the Green Knight to crack Gawain’s façade of confident valor. His conscience compels him to break down when confronted by his host as to his indiscretion. However, this happened only when the host had revealed himself to be the same as the Green Knight. We realize that Gawain had previously perceived in Sir Bertilak an equal in knighthood; thus his ease in deceiving him in the exchange of winnings game. When Gawain realizes he was the subject of a test, he sees Bertilak/Green Knight in a different light. The Green Knight now becomes Gawain’s confessor and in doing so assumes a fatherly role.
The lord planned to go hunting and invited Sir Gawain to eschange what he recieved in the castle for what the Lord recieved in the woods. For the first two days, the Lord gave Sir gawain venision, bear and a goose. And for every day, Sir Gawain recieved kisses from the Lady, so in return he must kiss the Lord. But on the third day, Sir Gawainj recieved three kisses and a green silk gridle. This gridle was magical according to the Lady. She said ""My knight, you must face many foes. This is a magic girdle; it has the power to protect whoever wears it against any weapon." Sir Gawains desire to live was overpowering so he accepted the gift. He failed to give the Lord this gift, but instead he gave him three kisses. Days passed and eventually Sir Gawain had to face the Green Knight. As scared as Sir Gawain was, he was determined to commit to his word so he allowed the Green Knight to swing his axe with the intent to decapitate him. Oddly enough, the Knight swung his axe three times and only cut Sir Gawains neck slightly.
In the final hunt the party chases and slays a fox. A fox, as one knows, is a cunning and tactical animal that will try to outwit his predator. In this case the temptation parallels the hunt in that Gawain must use his
Instead of continuing his faith in God, Gawain places his faith in a worldly object––one that he suspects might prove to be more sufficient than a spiritual being. He wears the girdle “determined to save his neck when he [bends] it towards death.” Mistakenly, Gawain turns his back on God and relies solely on the girdle, illustrating that the amount he values his life is greater than the amount he values his faith in God. The girdle causes his faith to deteriorate, and he strays from the primary source of all of his past success––God. It is often hard to believe and remain faithful in the things that we are unable to physically see; in order to be truly successful, though, maintaining a strong and steadfast faith in the things we believe in will, in the end, be the most rewarding. Gawain is unsuccessful in loving God unconditionally; due to his fear of losing his life, he is not willing to do anything that will put him in harm’s way––not even for God (“Code of Chivalry, 1”). He gives up his faith which provides a clear depiction of his weakness and inability to stand up for his beliefs. The girdle tempts him to take a wrong turn down the path of life, and it guides him away from God. Gawain, as human as the rest of us, is easily distracted by the things of the world; he lets worldly pleasures stand in the way of the important things in life. The things that jerk us away
The fact that he is willing to hold to his stated word is evidence enough that he has good ethics. After Gawain accepts the challenge of the Green Knight he promises to let the Knight perform the challenge to himself. Gawain also has respect for women and their wishes. Gawain’s respect is indicated by the immediate response of Gawain to kiss the lady of the castle after she comes in to greet Gawain for the first time. Gawain’s action stems from the lady’s statement, "So true a knight as Gawain is holden, and one so perfect in courtesy, would never have tarried so long with a lady but he would of his courtesy have craved a kiss at parting." The meaning of this quotation is if this man in the bed were truly the noble knight Sir Gawain, he would not have taken as long as he did to kiss the master of the castle’s wife. A few other examples from the ethics of Sir Gawain are the three promises or instances of gift exchanges with the lord of the castle. For the most part, Gawain holds to his word and gives to the castle lord that which he, Gawain, had received each day. The one instance that he breaks his code of ethics occurs when he exchanges the third gift of three kisses with the host, when in all actuality he had been given a girdle by the lady of the castle to aid him in his encounter with the Green
In the anonymous poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the character of Sir Gawain is portrayed as the imperfect hero. His flaws create interest and intrigue. Such qualities of imperfection cannot be found in the symbol of the pentangle, which he displays on his shield. This contrast between character and symbol is exposed a number of times throughout the poem allowing human qualities to emerge from Gawain’s knightly portrayal. The expectations the pentangle presents proves too much for Gawain as he falls victim to black magic, strays from God, is seduced by an adulterous woman, and ultimately breaks the chivalric code by lying to the Green Knight.