Editing Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (section)

===Nature and chivalry===
Some argue that nature represents a chaotic, lawless order which is in direct confrontation with the civilisation of Camelot throughout ''Sir Gawain and the Green Knight''. The green horse and rider that first invade Arthur's peaceful halls are iconic representations of nature's disturbance.<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Cawley |editor1-first=A. C. |title=Pearl. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight |publication-place=London |publisher=Dent |year=1968 |oclc=17520073 |quote=...the Green Knight, ''alias''  Bertilak, is an immensely vital person who is closely associated with the life of nature: his greenness, the birds and flies of his decorative embroidery, his beard as great as a bush, the holly branch in his hand, the energy he displays as a huntsman-all give him kinship with the physical world outside the castle.}}</ref> Nature is presented throughout the poem as rough and indifferent, constantly threatening the order of men and courtly life. Nature invades and disrupts order in the major events of the narrative, both symbolically and through the inner nature of humanity. This element appears first with the disruption caused by the Green Knight, later when Gawain must fight off his natural lust for Bertilak's wife, and again when Gawain breaks his vow to Bertilak by choosing to keep the green girdle, valuing survival over virtue. Represented by the [[sin]]-stained girdle, [[nature]] is an underlying force, forever within man and keeping him imperfect (in a chivalric sense).<ref name = woodsw>{{cite journal |last1=Woods |first1=William F. |title=Nature and the Inner Man in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight |journal=The Chaucer Review |date=2002 |volume=36 |issue=3 |pages=209–227 |doi=10.1353/cr.2002.0006 |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/8499 |jstor=25096166 |s2cid=170429103 }}</ref> In this view, Gawain is part of a wider conflict between nature and chivalry, an examination of the ability of man's order to overcome the chaos of nature.<ref name = rhg>{{Cite journal| issn = 0013-8304| volume = 29| issue = 2| pages = 121–139| last = Green| first = Richard Hamilton| title = Gawain's Shield and the Quest for Perfection| journal = ELH| date = 1962| doi = 10.2307/2871851| url = https://www.jstor.org/stable/2871851| jstor = 2871851}}</ref>

Several critics have made exactly the opposite interpretation, reading the poem as a comic critique of the [[Religion in Medieval England|Christianity of the time]], particularly as embodied in the Christian chivalry of Arthur's court. In its zeal to extirpate all traces of [[Anglo-Saxon paganism|paganism]], Christianity had cut itself off from the sources of life in nature and the female. The green girdle represents all the pentangle lacks. The Arthurian enterprise is doomed unless it can acknowledge the unattainability of the ideals of the Round Table, and, for the sake of realism and wholeness, recognise and incorporate the pagan values represented by the Green Knight.<ref>This interpretation was first advanced by {{cite journal|author1-last=Speirs|author1-first=John|journal=Scrutiny|volume=16|year=1949|pages=274–300|title=Sir Gawayne and the Grene Knight|isbn=9780521067928}} (and later incorporated in {{cite book|author1-last=Speirs|author1-first=John|title=Medieval English Poetry: The Non-Chaucerian Tradition|publisher=Faber and Faber|location=London|chapter=Sir Gawayne and the Grene Knight|url=https://archive.org/details/medievalenglishp000573mbp|year=1957}}). Similar interpretations were later offered: 
* {{cite book|author1-last=Berry|author1-first=Francis|editor1-last=Ford|editor1-first=Boris|title=Volume I of the Pelican Guide to English Literature: The Age of Chaucer|year=1954|publisher=Penguin Books|location=Harmondsworth, Middlesex|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.70836| ol=5793249M | lccn=60004556 |ref=none}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Goldhurst |first1=William |title=The Green and the Gold: The Major Theme of Gawain and the Green Knight |journal=College English |date=November 1958 |volume=20 |issue=2 |pages=61–65 |doi=10.2307/372161 |jstor=372161 |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |author1-last=Spearing |author1-first=A. C. |title=The Gwain-poet; a critical study |publisher=Cambridge [England] University Press |year=1970 |oclc=125992 |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |author1-last=Davenport |author1-first=William Anthony |title=The Art of the Gawain-poet |publisher=Athlone Press |year=1978 |isbn=978-0-567-35802-8 |location=London |ref=none}}
* {{cite journal |journal=The Haltwhistle Quarterly: An Irregular Review | author1-last=Tambling | author1-first=J. | title=A More Powerful Life: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight | year=1981 | volume=9 |ref=none}}
* {{cite book |last1=Sagar |first1=Keith |title=Literature and the crime against nature: [from Homer to Hughes] |date=2005 |publisher=Chaucer Press |location=London |isbn=9781904449478 |chapter=Sir Gawain and the Green Girdle |ref=none}}</ref>

The chivalry that is represented within ''Gawain'' is one which was constructed by court nobility. The violence that is part of this chivalry is steeply contrasted by the fact that King Arthur's court is Christian, and the initial beheading event takes place while celebrating Christmas. The violence of an act of beheading seems to be counterintuitive to chivalric and Christian ideals, and yet it is seen as part of knighthood.<ref>{{cite journal| last1 = Martin| first1 = Carl Grey| year = 2009| title = The Cipher of Chivalry: Violence as Courtly Play in the World of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight| journal = The Chaucer Review| volume = 43| issue = 3| pages = 311–29| doi = 10.2307/25642113| jstor=25642113| s2cid = 161393222}}</ref>

The question of politeness and chivalry is a main theme during Gawain's interactions with Bertilak's wife. He cannot accept her advances or else lose his honour, and yet he cannot utterly refuse her advances or else risk upsetting his hostess. Gawain plays a very fine line and the only part where he appears to fail is when he conceals the green girdle from Bertilak.<ref>{{cite journal| last1 = Jucker| first1 = Andreas H.| year = 2015| title = Courtesy and Politness in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight| journal = Studia Anglica Posnaniensia| volume = 43| issue = 3| pages = 5–28| doi=10.1515/stap-2015-0007| doi-access = free}}</ref>