This study will examine Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, focusing on the poem's Christian irony that mercy and joy are generated endlessly out of severity and grief, and vice versa. The poem shows the protagonist's heroic quest as spiritual as well as physical, so that every celebration and every challenge in the work can be viewed on at least those two levels. The obstacles set in Gawain's path, from the temptation of the host's wife to the Green Knight himself, are designed to test the physical and mental valor of the hero and to require him to fulfill his spiritual potential. His enlightenment as an evolving Christian, in other words, is an important part of his overall quest.
The quest would not be worthwhile were it not for the rewards. Gawain is not a monk dedicated to the ascetic life. He is shown to enjoy his relationships with others, both men and women. However, the principles of the Christian life, as well as the ideals of the Romance, a genre to which the work also belongs, demand that the enjoyment of life be defined by strictly applied rules of conduct and manners. In the Christian reality as portrayed in the poem, one does not enjoy life without paying a price, but neither does one suffer without winning some reward. One can view this as irony or simply as a system of spiritual checks and balances designed to keep the chivalrous knight on the right path, challenging him when his soul needs to be tested, and rewarding him when he proves equal to the task.
Accordingly, the poem opens with an example of this irony of joy following suffering following joy, etc. The reader enters the work immediately after a hard-fought war, which has brought a major victory for Britain and Arthur and his men. They have joined "in splendid celebration, seemly and carefree. . . . For fifteen days the feasting there was full" (22). However, the religious aspect of their lives is not forgotten:
With all delights on earth they hous...