The Marriage of Sir Gawain
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"The Marriage of Sir Gawain" is Child Ballad 31. Found in the Percy Folio, it is a fragmented account of the story of Sir Gawain and the loathly lady, which has been preserved in fuller form in the medieval poem The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle. The loathly lady episode itself dates at least back to Geoffrey Chaucer's "Wife of Bath's Tale" from The Canterbury Tales.
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[edit] Synopsis
King Arthur must answer a riddle ("what do women want?") or lose his life. A hideous woman tells that if Sir Gawain will marry her, she will give him the answer. To save Arthur, Gawain agrees to marry her, and she tells him that the answer is "their own way". Arthur is saved, and Gawain marries the loathly lady. On their wedding night, she becomes beautiful and tells him to choose whether she he would have her be beautiful by day and ugly by night, or vice versa. He tells her that she can choose which one, and this breaks the spell of ugliness that binds her. The entire court is amazed by her beauty.
[edit] Commentary
The positive view it expresses of Gawain, who is willing to marry the woman who saved King Arthur despite her hideous looks, is not a common feature of Arthurian literature at the time. It is often noted that Sir Gawain breaks the spell by giving her her own way, as in the riddle.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- "The Marriage of Sir Gawain"
- "The Marriage of Sir Gawain" from the Camelot Project
