Sir Gawain And The Green Knight Women Essay

The Depiction of Woman in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Views of woman in the book Sir Gawain and the Green Knight are often talked about in this poem. Sex is expressed very openly by each character in the story, as Bertilak’s wife often tries to seduce Sir Gawain. The portrayal of woman and the power they wield through sex shows how they can ruin one person. She makes it seem that sex is easily related to hunting or even a game. We see how the poet has structured the bedroom scene as the conflicting demands of spiritual and courtly love. Bertilak’s wife is a very strong and demanding character in the poem. She constantly tries to question ones morals and values through her actions. Gawain’s code of Christian morals and chivalry are constantly at conflict. Lady Bertilak is a temptress with associations of lust, disobedience and death to get Sir Gawain to sleep with her. She has no sort of code to follow except to brake his fundamental ethics he has. As stated in Christianity sex is between a man and a woman for the purpose to have a child. The story mentions how the Virgin Mary is the holy mother of God throughout the play makes it hard to see how sex is portrayed very common here. Gawain is Mary's Knight, is made clear as he is robed for
Strolling down the aisle with the Lady is an older woman and the two are compared, 'For if the one was winsome, then withered was the other" (951). Rather than just representing the vicissitudes of time, the comparison is a moral statement about women and their association with sex, sin and death. Further, decay of the flesh is often a symbol of spiritual decay and this also traces to Eve who "cursed to bear children rather than blessed with motherhood was identified with nature, a form of low matter that drags man's soul down . The deposition of the two women clearly demonstrates this