Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: Not Really a Chivalric Romance

Medieval English romance Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is unique not only in its form, content and structure, but also in the poet’s skillful use of conventions that play with the reader’s expectations by introducing elements that make the poem exquisitely ambivalent and place it in the fuzzy area where reality and fiction overlap. Although the poem seemingly praises the strength and purity of chivalry and knighthood, it actually subtly criticizes and comments on their failure when practiced outside the court and in real life. This is particularly noticeable when the poem’s symbolism, its hero, and the society he comes from are read against historical context, i.e. as reflections of the realities of medieval life. Accordingly, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight can be read as a poem that praises chivalry and knighthood more by way of commenting on their dissipation than through overt affirmation, as the future of the kingdom, its rulers and society, with its faulty Christian knights, is far from bright, given the cracks and flaws that mar its seemingly glossy façade.