Gawain and the Green Knight

I read this translation by Brian Stone

Gawain and The Green Knight was written by an unknown poet people call the Pearl Poet, since he also wrote the poem Pearl. There are numerous translations from the old English of Gawain, including one by Tolkien, which I didn't read unfortunately. (I have read Tolkien's translation of Pearl, though!)

I finished Gawain a while ago, but I didn't write my essay for the Arthurian Lit course until recently, so here it is: the idea of Parallellism in Gawain and how it binds the story together.






                                                                                                                                                               

Throughout Gawain and the Green Knight, the Pearl Poet incorporates many examples of parallelism. This provides an insight into the deeper meanings of the story, and also helps the reader make connections as they progress through the book. These parallels, through similarities as well as through contrasts, help in the interpretation of the book, and ultimately reveal what the Pearl Poet is trying to say about the search for truth and virtue.

The most obvious example of parallelism in Gawain and the Green Knight is a comparison between Gawain’s actions for three days with his host’s wife, and the three blows that the Green Knight gives him at the climax of the story. As Gawain gave in and took the green sash from the lady, so he again gives in to his fear and flinches before the Green Knight’s first blow. The second blow stops short, paralleling Gawain’s resistance to anything else but kisses from the knight’s wife. And the third blow leaves him with a small scar on his neck, to constantly remind him of his deception towards his host.

Another example of parallelism can be seen between the three animals Sir Bertilak kills on his hunts, and the three temptations given by the host’s wife. The first animal, the fox, is a symbol of deceit, pretending to be dead in order to trap his prey. The second animal, the deer, symbolizes the flesh and carnal desires. And the boar, the third animal, is a symbol of worldly treachery. The Pearl Poet uses this parallel, and characterizes the hostess as representing the flesh, deceit, worldliness.

Medieval artwork depicting the Green Knight

Parallels can also be found between the covenants in each of the fits. The covenant made in Arthur’s court between Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is closely interwoven with Gawain’s temptations in the Green Knight’s castle, and a strong sense of right in truth and fair exchange emerges from the beheading in Arthur’s court, the temptations by the hostess, and the final encounter between the Green Knight and Gawain.

                The Pearl Poet also provides parallels through contrast, such as between the lively hunt and the quiet bedchamber, as well as between Gawain’s harsh, cold journey and Sir Bertilak’s warm castle. The most obvious example of contrast is between Sir Bertilak’s beautiful young wife and her old, ugly lady in waiting, who is actually Morgan le Fay in disguise. The contrast between the noble Gawain and the Green Knight is also striking, as the Green Knight is described as lacking chivalry.

                Yet another example of parallelism through contrast can be seen in the two different roles the Green Knight takes on through the story. In the beginning, he is harsh, evil, and unchivalrous, clearly coming from some supernatural source. But eventually, he takes on the role of Gawain’s confessor, who teaches Gawain a lesson and helps him see his faults.

                The ultimate contrast is between Gawain’s pentangle symbol in the opening of his journey, and his green baldric in the end. At the outset, the pentangle – the symbol of the valiant, truthful knight – showed the world that Gawain was a perfect knight, and he himself only saw his faith in the Virgin Mary. By the end, however, the world now sees his shame in the baldric, the green belt he sinfully accepted from the Green Knight’s wife. Though they see his sinfulness, the rest of Arthur’s knights forgive him his fault and wear green sashes as well.

                The story ends with the motto “Hony soyt qui mal y pense” – “Evil to him who evil thinks.” This emphasizes the Pearl Poet’s theme of truth and virtue, for, as Gawain says, “Man can conceal sin, but not dissever for it” (p. 114). Ultimately, Gawain and the Green Knight is a moral tale, using parallelism and contrast to reveal its lesson: no human is perfect, but, despite our flaws, we should all should strive to achieve truth.

Art by John Howe for the Tolkien translation

~Sophia

Madame Bovary Final Update

Linked up at ebookclassics.

Yay, I finished! Let's talk about it. It will probably be filled with spoilers, so if you haven't read Madame Bovary, I advise you ignore this post.

Emma

Did Emma learn her lesson? I'm not sure. (I have a big thing for people learning their lessons, as you can see from the second book featured in THIS post.) She had some moments of revelation where she realized that maybe she wasn't headed in the right direction, but her desires and selfishness soon pushed those moments into the back of her mind.

Emma and Leon's relationship solidified what I said in my last update. Emma will NEVER be satisfied. She thinks once she gets Leon, she'll be happy, but even then, there are thousands of troubles that just won't go away. Emma always needs novelty, and her relationship with Leon grows old. Leon is getting tired of her continuous needs, even to the point of noticing that the other men at his office are talking about how Emma is a bad influence on him. She always wants to be in a relationship that is in that phase of passionate first love, and doesn't understand the concept of a calmer, constant love that does not always need to be manifested by grandiose romantic gestures.

Charles

Poor, poor Charles. All he wanted was to be the beloved father and husband in a happy family - is that too much to ask? He seems to have bad luck in picking out wives. His first one is too old and he doesn't really love her, and his second one is unfaithful and flighty. Emma is Charles's downfall. She spends all his money and makes him go bankrupt. She thinks she knows how to deal with financial matters, but, in the long term, she doesn't. Selfishness! UGH. My heart broke for Charles when he found out that Emma had been cheating on him. His last hope had vanished.

The end of the book seemed to drag on a bit. We get it - Emma's dead. The book could have ended there, maybe with a short Epilogue to show how everything turned out. We did NOT need all that detail afterwards. Do we care that the pharmacist got the Legion of Honor?

So, overall, a good read, though I can't exactly pinpoint how I feel about it. It was more of a character study than a story, and could have been shorter than it was (cut off a few chapters at the end, maybe?).

What did you think of it? 

~Sophia

Here are my previous updates:
Update #1
Update #2

"Hypothesis," A Sonnet by Me!

Because we just talked about sonnets last Thursday, I thought I'd share with you a Shakespearean sonnet I wrote last year for an English class. And it's a perfect time to share it for a different reason as well. It's the perfect representation of how I'm feeling right now - it's almost finals season!

"Hypothesis"
How pleasant it would be if time stood still,
Just so I could complete my to-do list.
If only I could stop time at my will,
The deadlines would not be so often miss'd.
I would have all the time that I desir'd
To study for my college Physics test -
And with that extra time, I'd be inspir'd
To write my English essay with more zest.
To parties I'd be able more to go,
(Since with my schoolwork quickly I'd be through)
And listen longer to the radio,
And read the thousand books that I want to.
      In truth, hypothesis is all this is,
      So now I must go study for my quiz.

Yep - off I go to study some AP Psychology!

~Sophia

Post Script: Because of this school craziness, sadly I won't be posting Top Ten Tuesdays for the next two weeks. :-(

The Bible Project: Week 16 (1 Kings)

(It's actually Week 17, but I'm a bit behind. I'll catch up soon!)

So.... 1 Kings was a bit confusing, especially Chapters 12-16. Those were basically about all the Kings after Solomon, and how each was more corrupt than the last, until we get to Ahab, who "did more to anger the Lord, the God of Israel, than any of the kings of Israel before him." (1 Kings 16:33)

The moral of the story here that I'm getting with 1 Kings is that God punishes evildoers and those who leave him for other gods, and rewards those who follow Him faithfully.

But the names! They are so confusing. There's Rehoboam, and Jeroboam. And theres Abijah (son of Jeroboam), Ahijah (a prophet who lives in Shiloh), and Abijam (who I believe is Jeroboam's brother...). It was so hard to keep track!

Let's go back to the beginning of 1 Kings for a second, back before David dies and Solomon takes the throne. In the first few chapters of 1 Kings, Joab, our friend from 2 Samuel, is back, and is more confusing than ever. I said in 2 Samuel that he is loyal to his King, no matter what. Well, turns out I was wrong, because he ends up deserting and siding with Adonijah, who is trying to take over. Now, Adonijah is another one of David's sons. So let's track Joab's loyalties:

First, when David and his son Absalom aren't on speaking terms, Joab helps out and gets Absalom back into David's favor. So here, it looks like he's on Absalom's side.

Next, when Absalom revolts against David, Joab is SO MUCH on David's side, that he stabs Absalom when he has him cornered, even though David expressly said not to kill Absalom. So here, he is utterly against ANYONE who is against David.

But now, he shrugs at his past loyalty and joins up with Adonijah. WHY? After being such a loyal servant to David all this time? I don't get it.

I think I'll stop there, even though there's way more to 1 Kings. Like Solomon. And Ahab. And Jezebel. And Elijah, whom I really love for some reason. But I'll talk about Elijah when we get to 2 Kings.

~Sophia

National Poetry Month: Sonnets!

April is National Poetry Month!
And right now, we're focusing on Sonnets - woot!

Sonnets are super easy to write. You have a structure, you have a meter, you just need to find words that fit it all. :-)
(Well, maybe not so easy. But for me it's easier than writing free verse, and my sister - who is more of a poet than I - agrees. If you want to write poems, but don't know where to start - start with limericks, and then move on to sonnets. The structure definitely helps.)

I'm going to talk about three types of sonnets - Shakespearean, Italian, and Spenserian. There are others, but these are the main ones. But first, we need to start with a description of meter - specifically iambic pentameter. (If you know what this is, feel free to skip.)

Meter refers to the rhythm our words make when we speak. When the rhythm is da-DA da-DA da-DA, it's in iambs (each da-DA is called an iamb). For example, "ToDAY I ATE some BREAD with JAM." We usually talk in iambs. Take a random sentence, and see if it's in iambs. Most likely, it is.

"Hey! Did you buy some fruit?"
"I did not have a chance to."
"There was a sale today!"

That's all in iambs. Of course, we don't say "Hey! DID you BUY some fruit?" :-)

There are other kinds of feet (iambs are a type of feet). For example, there are trochees (DA-da DA-da DA-da). We sometimes speak in these, too. Then there's dactyls (DA-da-da DA-da-da DA-da-da). And anapests (da-da-DA da-da-DA). And a lot of others. But sonnets are usually (always?) written in iambs.

But I said they were written in iambic pentameter! What does that mean? It just means that for every line in a sonnet, there are five (pent-) iambs. (It can be tetrameter [three], quatrameter [four], even monometer [one iamb per line]. You can go as high as you like - heptameter [seven], octameter [eight], etc.) So a basic sonnet goes something like this:

da-DA da-DA da-DA da-DA da-DA
da-DA da-DA da-DA da-DA da-DA
...and so on and so forth...

Now that we understand iambic pentameter, let's move on to actual sonnets!

Sonnets usually deal with some conflict, and are divided into a part setting forth the conflict, and a part resolving the conflict in some way. Also, sonnets tend to be consistently 14 lines long. See what I meant about the strict structure?
Now, let's discuss...

Shakespearean (or English) Sonnets!

Obviously, the guy who wrote these a lot was none other than:

William Shakespeare himself!

He wrote 154 sonnets. Yup.
So, the Shakespearean sonnet is of the form ABAB CDCD EFEF GG, where each letter signifies a new line, and the lines with the same letter rhyme. Remember, every line is in iambic pentameter. Also, in a Shakespearean sonnet, the conflict generally makes up the first 12 lines (or three quatrains), and is quickly resolved in the last two (the final couplet, which is generally indented, to show its difference from the rest of the poem).

Here's an example of one of Will's sonnets. Do you "feel" the iambic pentameter?

Sonnet 73 

That time of year thou may'st in me behold  

When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang

Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, 

Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. 

In me thou see'st the twilight of such day, 

As after sunset fadeth in the west, 

Which by-and-by black night doth take away,

Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. 

In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire 

That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, 

As the death-bed whereon it must expire 

Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.    

      This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong, 

     To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

You can probably see the conflict is about death and the fleetingness of life, and then the resolution is that it is this fleetingness that makes him love her so much more.

 Next up...

Italian Sonnets!

These are also sometimes called Petrarchian - after this guy:

Petrarch, an Italian scholar and poet

These are of the structure ABBA ABBA CDECDE. Well, the last sextet (or six lines) can sometimes have a different rhyme scheme, such as CDCDCD, or even CDECED. This one gives you some flexibility.
Here, generally the first two quatrains (the first eight lines) present the conflict, and the final sextet presents the resolution, though with this also there is flexibility.
Here's an example by Wordsworth:

"Scorn Not the Sonnet"
Scorn not the Sonnet; Critic, you have frowned,
Mindless of its just honours; with this key
Shakespeare unlocked his heart; the melody
Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch's wound;
A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound;
With it Camoens soothed an exile's grief;
The Sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf
Amid the cypress wtih which Dante crowned
His visionary brow: a glow-worm lamp,
It cheered mild Spenser, called from Faery-land
To struggle through dark ways; and when a damp
Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand
The Thing became a trumpet; whence he blew
Soul-animating strains--alas, too few!

And finally:

Spenserian Sonnets!

These were named after Edmund Spenser, who you may know as the author of the epic poem The Faerie Queen: 

Spenser

The Spenserian sonnet is basically a modification of the Shakespearean sonnet, where you use the last line of the previous quatrain to determine the rhyme scheme of the next one. Here's the structure:

ABAB BCBC CDCD EE. See how the rhyming sort of overlaps?

Here's an example:

"One day I wrote her name upon the strand" 

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
But came the waves and washed it away:
Again I wrote it with a second hand,
But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.
Vain man, said she, that dost in vain assay
A mortal thing so to immortalize!
For I myself shall like to this decay,
And eek my name be wiped out likewise.
Not so (quoth I), let baser things devise
To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:
My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,
And in the heavens write your glorious name;
      Where, whenas death shall all the world subdue,
      Our love shall live, and later life renew.

Here, I believe that the conflict is resolved in the 9th line. So it seems that there is flexibility with conflict/resolution structure here as well. 

And those are the basic forms of sonnets.
I strongly suggest you try one - especially the Shakespearean kind. They aren't too hard. But a rhyming dictionary like this one might be useful; English isn't a very rhyme-friendly language.

Later on, I might post some of my sister's excellent sonnets. And maybe one of mine as well :-)

I talked more about writing sonnets than actually reading them, but understanding meter and the whole conflict/resolution business can make reading sonnets a bit easier.

~Sophia
____________________________________________________________
Since it is National Poetry Month, I thought I'd start a collective poetry effort. Make your contribution HERE! All you need is a pinch of creativity to write a line or two. 

Happy Birthday Shakespeare!

Today is the 450th birthday of none other than the great Bard: William Shakespeare!



Some of our most commonly used words and phrases were invented by this ingenious fellow ("upstairs" and "downstairs," anyone?). His works are probably some of the most quoted (second to the King James Bible, of course).

I actually had the chance to see Merchant of Venice at the Globe Theater when I was in London a few years ago - it was SO SPECTACULAR.

Why don't you read some of his works today in his honor? If you have some time, read one of the plays - or if you're a bit busy (as I am), try a sonnet! Actually, I'll post more on reading (and writing) sonnets tomorrow.
If you'd like some recommendations, my personal favorite plays are Much Ado About Nothing, and Hamlet, and Sonnet 130 is very unique.

And here's a post back from January with tips on reading Shakespeare.

Finally, the ultimate question:



~Sophia

Top Ten Tuesday: Characters Whom I Would Love to Have as Friends

Hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.
For today's topic, we get to fill in the blank: Characters Who ____.
So I picked those ten whom I would LOVE to have as my friends.

1. Winnie the Pooh. He was literally the first to come to mind. Always ready to write a hum for you, help you out, or even share a nice chat over a little something at that time of day. I'd say that's perfect. And the fact that he provides sweet wisdom unknowingly is even better.

2. Thursday Next. (From The Eyre Affair, etc. by Jasper Fforde.) Maybe she'd take me on a visit to Bookworld with her. Now THAT would be the experience of a lifetime.

3. Merry Brandybuck and 
4. Pippin Took. These fellas are awesome. 'Nuff said.

5. Anne Shirley. (From Anne of Green Gables). Romantic, yet sensible. Whimsical, yet grounded. A dreamer, yet practical. A devoted student at school - and an enthusiastic student of life.

6. Charles Bingley. (From Pride and Prejudice.) He's a bit too easily influenced to make my list of literary crushes, but he's a cheery guy to have around. And we'd have SO MANY PARTIES. :-)

7. Lucy Pevensie. (From The Chronicles of Narnia.) She's so sweet and kind, and has such an innocent heart, even grown up. Lucy's just a decent person.

8. Hermione Granger. Who wouldn't want to have her as a friend? Yay for nerds! :-)

9. The Abbe (Monsieur Bienvenu) (From Les Miserables) Such a decent fellow. He's the personification of kindness, and he can be funny, too.

10. Sherlock Holmes. Such awesome adventures! Well, on second thought - uhh, I could get killed hanging out with that guy. Watson is both lucky and unlucky.

~Sophia


What about you?